‘Have fun or look good? It feels impossible to lose my lockdown weight’ Samuel Muston My belly has a name. I call him Gerry. He moves like a Mexican wave, though it’s unclear what’s to celebrate. He is a molehill where once there was flat ground. I grew Gerry, all two stone of him, these past 12 months. With each can of Stella, with each sip of wine, he grew in stature and lately has become proud and boastful. I hardly noticed his creeping advances during the winter. I didn’t look in the mirror for weeks on end. Why bother? We were all at home, short on hope, driven only by the desire to get through another day. Booze was a reliable friend during lockdown. It moved time, it fast-forwarded things, it anaesthetised in a world in which the only high points were meals, the larger and more elaborate the better, and with it the first glass of the day. Anything to battle the boredom. It was unhealthy, it was unwise, and it was necessary.