Upside Down and Inside Out
Drawn across a fiddle, born in a time play, measured by what you could do and not who you were, the subject of false rumour and malicious gossip from malicious government operatives who should have been sacked long ago; these were the walking victims, but we all were now. The curdling, fermenting disposition of the mass, the population now imprisoned in their own homes, lives, loves, adventures destroyed, the only reward that for conformity, a bin slackened, sleet laced, fermenting pile of shit. That's what they were; that's what they were transforming the population into.
The falcon picked grubs from the rotting corpse and smashed them against a wall.
The vaccine hysteria, a side cousin to COVID hysteria, swamped and swaggered through the airwaves, transforming an already confused population in to a seething, warring mass; where not the gods but the evil spirits of yore could plunder their power.
Normally as indifferent to the native spirits as to the fate of men, that time was not this time. Those spirits born of foments and who stalked the corridors of power, those mono eyed demons were now astride them all.
Was this them?
Hitotsume nyūdō could pass for really tall human priests if not for the large, single eye in the center of their faces. They dress in luxurious robes and travel in enormous, ornate palanquins carried by lesser yōkai or human slaves. Their palanquins are surrounded by a splendid precession fit for a corrupt abbot or a rich lord. The fantastic procession is enough to make most travellers stop and stare, speculating about what nobleman or lady might be riding inside. But when the palanquin stops and a hitotsume nyūdō comes strolling out, it means trouble for any curious gawkers.
Probably not.
But there was an evil afoot. Everybody said so.
Imprisoned in their own homes with no end in sight, trapped by a government whose deranged authoritarianism was writ large across the cityscapes; from deserted town squares to military coating the suburbs, from helicopters and drones overhead to imprisoned populations.
What on Earth did you want to gain?
At the end of the day?
Brave souls fought authorities.
"The most dangerous man on Earth is someone with nothing to lose."
Well, nobody had anything to lose anymore. They had lost their freedom of movement, their ability to care for their own children, their integrity, decency, sovereignty, their right to freedom of speech, their right for hope of a better future, their right to disagree with the government of the day.
Astride all this was a Prime Minister who had let it all happen, who had allowed his own country to be destroyed; whose destruction of the welfare of the population, the lived experience of Australian suburban life, would live on in the mirrors of infamy.
And who, ludicrously, having placed himself front and centre of the COVID scare, was claiming to have saved 30,000 Australian lives.
And would be gone in a trice, with nothing but a whisper of disgust as a trace of history.
It could not happen soon enough.
NEWS
NSW records 1,331 COVID-19 cases as state runs Indigenous vaccine blitz
By Paige Cockburn and Leah White
Posted 10h ago10 hours ago, updated 2h ago2 hours ago
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NSW Police have quashed another anti-lockdown protest in Sydney this afternoon as the state records 1,331 new COVID-19 cases and six deaths.
Key points:
Just over 81 per cent of the eligible NSW population has received one vaccination
A shipment of the Moderna vaccine arrived in Sydney last night from Europe
There is a vaccination blitz for Indigenous people across NSW this weekend
A visible police presence was credited with preventing a repeat of what took place on July 24 when thousands of protesters descended on the CBD. Protests have now been thwarted several times.
Police said 20 people were arrested in Greater Sydney and 236 fines were issued. Thirty-two people were arrested across the state.
Earlier today, head of the NSW Health COVID response branch, Jeremy McNulty, said the COVID deaths in the 24 hours to 8.00pm yesterday were all from Sydney's west and south-west.
Three people were not vaccinated and three had received a single dose of the vaccine.
One person was in their 40s, one was in their 60s, two were in their 70s and two were in their 80s.
One person, a man in his 70s from Western Sydney, acquired his infection overseas.
There have been 228 COVID-19 related deaths since the outbreak began in June.
Dr McNulty said the majority of new cases were still being seen in the Sydney suburbs of Merrylands, Auburn, Guilford, Liverpool, Bankstown, Greenacre and Punchbowl.
Catch up on the main COVID-19 news from 18 September with a look back at our blog
Since early this morning, mounted police, the riot squad and PolAir were among the 1,500 officers deployed across Sydney.
Many roads were blocked off and more than 60,000 cars were checked at 19 traffic points.
Busloads of police officers were also patrolling Sydney Park — the location of today's planned protest.
From 9:00am to 2:00pm, trains were not able to stop in the CBD, Redfern, Martin Place or St Peters. Taxis, rideshare and passenger services were also restricted from entering the city centre.
A handful of arrests were made at Sydney Park including two men for not wearing masks.
Another man was led away by police after he spoke to the gathered crowd of officers and picnickers.
Minister for Police and Emergency Services David Elliott thanked all those who complied with the public health orders.
"I'm pleased to see that common sense has prevailed and the vast majority of people have complied with the existing public health orders," Mr Elliott said.
"We are close to reaching the end-goal, which will see the significant easing of restrictions, and I want to thank everyone who made the right choice today for the greater good of their loved ones and the entire state."
Meanwhile, an anti-lockdown protest in Byron Bay on the Far North Coast saw between 200 and 300 people take to the streets around the centre of town.
The protest was largely peaceful however the exact message from protesters was unclear.
Some held ‘Freedom from Lockdown’ signs and chanted "freedom" despite the fact the Byron Shire and many of its neighbouring shires were not in lockdown.
Police made 11 arrests and created barricades on either end of Middleton Street to contain the protest from moving into other parts of the town's centre. Twenty-eight fines were issued.
One person was arrested in Tweed Heads and subsequently given a penalty notice.
Sydney man leaves hospital 399 days after getting COVID
Yesterday, Tweed-Byron Police District Superintendent Dave Roptell said they were aware of planned protests in Tweed Heads and Byron Bay and had called in reinforcements, including the public order and riot squad, the dog squad and highway patrol.
Outside of Greater Sydney, there was a sharp rise in cases in the Illawarra region yesterday, with 75 new infections.
In Hunter New England there were 30 new cases and on the Central Coast there were 29 new cases.
Glen Innes on the Northern Tablelands had its travel ban to Queensland re-imposed at 1:00am today after a COVID-19 case was detected in the community.
The person had recently visited Sydney for several days and yesterday the region was put into a seven-day lockdown.
The LGA of Lismore, which is also now in a seven-day lockdown, was suspended from the Queensland border bubble on Thursday.
Read more about the spread of COVID-19 in Australia:
Just over 81 per cent of the eligible NSW population have received one vaccination dose and 50.6 per cent are fully inoculated.
Moderna will soon be available after Australia's shipment of the US-developed vaccine arrived at Sydney airport last night.
The doses came from Europe on the first of two flights that will bring a million doses of the vaccine into the country this weekend.
Anyone aged 12 to 59 is eligible for Moderna and the federal government says almost 2,000 pharmacies will start distributing the vaccine next week.
This weekend, NSW Health is running a vaccine "blitz" for Indigenous people across the state where everyone over the age of 12 will be offered the Pfizer vaccine.
Indigenous staff will be on hand at 18 vaccine centres across the state.
Sydney Local Health District's mobile vaccinations teams will also visit 18 social housing blocks in Redfern and Waterloo in inner Sydney this weekend.
The district is home to one of the largest social and public housing estates in Australia, with more than 3,100 people living in buildings run by the Department of Communities and Justice, and another 3,000 in community-supported housing.
There are currently 1,219 COVID-19 cases admitted to hospitals in NSW, with 233 people in intensive care, 123 of whom require ventilation.
There were 120,954 COVID-19 tests reported yesterday, compared with the previous day's total of 155,334.