The capital offers such a smorgasbord of cultural and epicurean joys at the moment – plays, ballets, restaurants, galleries, department stores, Downing Street parties – that even the most miserly and parochial among us could likely construct a dream 24 hours filled with activities.
There haven’t been many silver linings in the course of the coronavirus pandemic, unless you’re the CEO of Andrex, or you happen to be an old university friend of Matt Hancock.
So even is the usually packed Chiltern Firehouse, where you can spend £70 on white truffle scrambled eggs, and get the added benefit of never being more than six feet from a Delevingne sister.
Fuelled up? Onwards, we have much to do before lunch – not least Christmas shopping, which would normally be total hell, but with footfall on Oxford St down 30 per cent on 2019 , it’s approaching bearable.
For lunch, why not take advantage of there being almost no queues for the city’s most popular “no reservations” restaurants, such as Padella, Blacklock, Kiln or Dishoom? You’d normally be quivering in the cold for any of those, but at the moment they’re desperate for diners at any hour, thanks to Covid case numbers and the Government’s lockdown-but-not-lockdown.
The idea of going to Hyde Park’s Winter Wonderland might have always seemed about as appealing as drinking a pint of sputum, but that’s probably because of the sell-out crowds rather than anything else.
But consider all that preamble.
At the time of writing, there are tables available in the coming days at Le Gavroche, Michel Roux Jr’s two-Michelin-starred haute cuisine restaurant in Mayfair; at one of 2021’s most critically lauded new openings, Sessions Arts Club in Clerkenwell; and even at Muse, chef Tom Aikens’ 25-cover Belgravia mews house conversion.
Earlier this week, TV chef Tom Kerridge revealed that one of his restaurants had seen 654 cancellations over a seven-day period recently.
Elsewhere outside the capital, you can book Heston Blumenthal’s three-Michelin-starred The Fat Duck, in Bray, Berkshire for January, Amersham’s The Artichoke, and even dine at Simon Rogan’s iconic L’Enclume in Cumbria on Christmas Eve.
And then for entertainment.
If you want to finally see the musical Hamilton, for instance, tickets can currently be bought in any section, on just about any night.
A disclaimer, mind: at all these shows, you might have to put up with a long wait while staff check Covid passports, and there’s always the chance it will get cancelled at a few hours’ notice.
Just time for one final drink – maybe at the Connaught Bar, recently voted the world’s best, which doesn’t take reservations – before getting back on the train home.
Every Christmas cloud has a tinsel lining, and at the moment, if you’re feeling brave and immunised enough, you could benefit from Covid by doing some things you’ve always wanted to.