Holding up the Covid-19 test with a vivid stripe under T and a faint stripe under C, I looked back and thought of the volumes of data needed to arrive at an accurate antigen test – how, with just swabbing on the farthest reaches of the nose with a bit of liquid to extract data, it was able to validate one’s Covid-19 case through some wondrous sorcery. My wife and I were in shock: I didn’t have the hallmark symptoms! Until this afternoon, that is – when I couldn’t taste the tofu and Japanese curry I made for lunch, nor could I even get a hint of the chicken pho I made. Taste, temperature and texture were the same: the noodles were silky, the chicken slippery, the soup were tepid, stringy, gloopy. I’ve filed for sick leaves the whole week when a colleague mentioned the risks of prolonging symptoms in the absence of rest.