I served it with a large nob of butter and a generous sprinkling of salt. It was delicious in a way that defies description.

As is well known, when potatoes come, they come not as single spies, but in battalions. On subsequent nights, it was like a recitation of the children’s rhyme: “One potato, two potato, three potato, four.” By the end of the third week, I was practically Irish.

Next problem: once you’ve been reminded of the virtues of carbohydrates, you wonder why you worked so hard to reduce their role in your diet. A little pasta for lunch, perchance, or a steak sandwich for dinner, with oven-baked chips on the side?

Even the health authorities say that, when staying at home, it’s important to “build structure into your day”. The word “structure”, I believe, is a reference to “breakfast”, “breakfast dessert”, “lunch”, “lunch dessert”, and so on. This followed by 17 consecutive episodes of Tiger King.

Salted nuts are worth having in stock, by the way, otherwise the fourth beer begins to pall. And, of course, in order to prepare the freezer for further food storage, it was practically a public service for me to knock off the Macadamia and Chocolate Ice-Cream that had been so selfishly taking up space.

Over-consumption is not my only problem. I can’t bring myself to clean the house, and even a button-up shirt seems too much trouble. A pair of pants that requires a belt feels like formal wear.

Continue this decline in standards for the suggested six months, and I doubt I’ll end up fully human. Evolution itself will be thrown into reverse. Month three and the opposable thumb will go; month four and I’ll lose the ability to walk erect. Keep the lockdown going for a year we’ll all become aquatic.

At this point, Jocasta decides to step in. While I am happy to embrace this collapse, Jocasta argues this should be a period of self-improvement and reflection.

She believes it is possible to flatten the curve, while not fattening the husband. As she puts it: “We should be making the most of this time.”

Enter a malevolent figure called Joe Wicks, a bright and breezy Englishman whose Self-isolation Exercise Videos have ruined many otherwise happy households.

Jocasta has us doing two workouts each day, with me huffing and puffing as I attempt to reach parts of myself that haven’t experienced the touch of a human in years. The chances of me visiting a hospital emergency department having caught the coronavirus are now nothing compared with that of visiting with a Joe Wicks related injury.

I complain my way through each session, which Jocasta says reflects a poor attitude and does not represent the sort of can-do spirit that Australians have brought to the battles of the past.

She may have a point. Do I have such weak personal standards that they are all dependent on outside witnesses? If there is no one to witness my state of dress, the cleanliness of my bedroom, or my consumption of potatoes, is there no inner personal morality that will hold me steady?

There is none. But at least there’s Jocasta.

At her suggestion, I throw myself into energetically cleaning the shower recess and mopping down the hallway. I fold laundry and vacuum carpets. I sing a Vera Lynn tune as I scrub: “There'll be bluebirds over, the white cliffs of Dover ...”

It’s exhausting work but should burn up sufficient calories to excuse another baked potato frenzy.

How did that nursery rhyme end? “Five potatoes, six potatoes, seven potatoes – more. Eight potatoes, nine potatoes, ten potatoes – all.”

As various leaders have put it, when it comes to the virus, we’re all on a bridge, designed to take us to the other side. I’m just wondering if it will be able to take my weight.