I WASN’T worried to be awoken by Mrs B snorting in her sleep. I blamed it on the pollen count and drifted back into slumber. I was still snoozing when my bedside radio burst into life with dire warnings of an impending pandemic.

Normally I daydream through the news, but I know what chaos an epidemic can bring and knew a pandemic must be far, far worse. I sat bolt-upright in bed until the newsreader mentioned ‘swine flu’.

I glanced back at Mrs B gently snuffling her way towards daylight and began to panic. She’d had a temperature and, although having not been to Mexico, she did have Elvis, the pig. How was I going to tell her?

I remembered the strategy used during the bird flu pandemic when police placed roadblocks around affected towns. Wild birds, which were blamed for spreading the disease, would, apparently, observe the restriction and fly elsewhere.

If roadblocks can deny airspace to a flock of sparrows, what would control the migratory instincts of a pig? (It’s the sort of question you get in a pub quiz at Wincle).

Barrage balloons appeared to be the only answer, but where do you acquire them at 7am? I couldn’t imagine Sutton Stores stocking them.

Early reports indicated half of Central America dying from swine flu, rapidly revised to a couple of hundred in Mexico City, only to be downgraded to 79 an hour later. By breakfast the total number of confirmed deaths worldwide, directly attributable to swine flu, was five (marginally less than green monkey disease). Panic over.

"I’ll just pop out and feed the animals before breakfast," said Mrs B, totally unaware of her (and Elvis’s) brush with a killer pandemic.

NB: Happily, Mrs B recovered, Elvis never flew beyond the farm gate, and I disposed of the facemask I was planning to wear in bed.

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