The former Sky News presenter is writing a weekly diary revealing how COVID-19 has changed his life.

Monday 1 June

School's back. That's the chatter of this COVID week.

Not all classes, not all children - and definitely not all parents convinced. At the school gates, legions of trepidatious grown-ups contrast sharply with offspring just itching to see their classmates.

Parents Emma and Ryan tell me they're in two minds: "We're watching with bated breath."

But their doctor friends are sending their kids back. And even the most anxious self-isolators are chancing it.

Anyway the first week goes well. And, as Emma tells me, they even manage "a fully distanced Black Lives Matter kneeling solidarity event in the playground".

Jamie says Alex, his five-year-old, is going alternate days. The school's made it easy and rather fun. The kids all get a "magic wand" - a social distancing stick - to ensure they stay apart.

Alex is one of only five to return to a class designed for 15.

That means one teacher to five pupils. So the parents are delighted. Each child has their own dedicated desk, unlike most of their parents who spend their working lives hot-desking.

As her children gambol around her in the park, I hear one mum say to her friend: "I'm going to see how this first week goes before I decide whether to send back my children."

She may be in the majority.

Peter and Karin, our most adventurous friends by far, have now followed their Los Angeles to London flight with a London to Stockholm hop.

They report that boarding the plane was done in a very orderly fashion - three rows at a time. But disembarking turned into the usual helter-skelter dash for the doors, with a total disregard for social distancing.

Stockholm was open for business, with outdoor bars carefully spaced.

After living under lockdown for two months in the US and the UK, Peter says: "It feels unreal, as if nothing has happened here in Sweden."

But Sweden's light touch approach may come at a price. The country has far more COVID-19 deaths than its Nordic neighbours and is facing a damaging recession.

Peter tells me the economic cost could be severe when the next quarter's results come in. And the virus has also exposed chaos in the elderly care home business.

He thinks the government could be punished for its handling of the crisis.

Tuesday 2 June

Surgeon Saul in South Africa has a lightbulb moment about the virus. And he's always worth listening to.

He tells us about a leading private hospital in Johannesburg, close to my old Sky News bureau, where a nurse in ICU became infected.

All the medical staff were tested. Out of 33, 18 were negative, 15 were positive, but every single one of them was asymptomatic. The staff were in their 50s or younger.

The ICU was immediately closed for 14 days' quarantine.

He admits it's a small test sample, but says it suggests the large majority of younger people who become infected will show no symptoms.

"The disease is targeting a single age group like nothing we've seen before," he said.

Around 89% of COVID-19 deaths are among those aged 67 and over.

So Saul thinks it makes sense to shield that older age group and the vulnerable, while letting the rest of the world get back to work and get on with their lives.

Friends in the States are shocked at the civil unrest now engulfing the country.

"It is awful," Peter tells me from Miami. "I really hope this time there will be serious policy changes made to address racial inequality."

But he fears the government is missing the point by tear-gassing peaceful protesters.

Allen, who was filming those protests near the White House, says: "Just when things couldn't get any worse."

As an experienced news cameraman, who's seen all this before, he reminds me: "Covering riots is no fun at the best of times. Having to deal with this virus as well just adds another layer to the insanity."

Then Allen tells me he looks over and sees Donald Trump holding up a Bible "like he's the chosen one".

He said it was "a surreal moment in what has now become the new American carnage."

Allen adds, probably not for the first time in his working life: "I really am getting too old for this!"

I know the feeling, mate.

While the US flares, the protests in Hong Kong abate, just for the moment.

Mark reports that on the health front "Hong Kong is bouncing back from COVID and returning to a semblance of normal".

He adds: "Now all we have to do is figure out how to manage the political front."

Wednesday 3 June

There goes another holiday we'll never get back. We were booked to fly to Spain today.

One more case of "this is what you should have had".

Oh well, the weather's been stunning here. Sunshine has kept the blues away over the last couple of months. I hate to think how much gloomier we'd have been without it.

Outside our apartment, the Thames has turned into one huge, free water park full of youngsters hurling themselves into the river.

The Teddington Lifeboat - based beneath us - has been in demand, rescuing the stragglers.

Looking out over the river reminds me that 80 years ago this week, 100 little ships gathered here in Teddington Harbour and set sail for northern France.

They were to become a part of British military history, among the 850 private boats that rescued over 330,000 troops from the beaches of Dunkirk.

This year's commemorative return has been postponed. But COVID-19 cannot dim the memory of those heroes of Operation Dynamo.

Churchill called it "a miracle of deliverance". A deliverance from the deadly virus would be most welcome right now.

Good to see more life up our high street. The shutters are slowly opening like the eyes of some retail behemoth blinking its way out of hibernation.

But apart from the food stores, trade's not great. Not surprising when you see online retail sales are up 200% this year.

As most friends observe, clicks have obliterated bricks and few see a reverse in that trend.

My son James adds: "The Amazon delivery guy is down our street so often he's more like a family friend."

His neighbour, who works for the Post Office, reports pre-Christmas parcel volumes.

Thursday 4 June

After the madness of the 1.1km, four-hour queues at Ikea, I bring you more orderly scenes from the council waste tip in Mortlake.

Olive and Bruce describe waiting only an hour in a "very well-organised" queue to use the recycling and re-use centre, as it's rather grandly named.

They pass the time watching funeral processions come and go at the neighbouring crematorium, which seems busier than usual.

The two locations always did seem in unfortunate juxtaposition.

Our friends admit offloading 11 weeks' worth of garden waste was "one of the highlights of our week".

On a more serious note, funerals are causing huge concerns in South Africa.

From the remote, snow-dusted mountains of the Klein Karoo, Madeleine tells me the farm workers fear what's going to happen when COVID-19 peaks in the coming months.

They believe there will be "so many deaths their coffins will go straight in the grave". Local tradition normally allows the coffin to rest at home before burial.

The fortnightly shopping trip into town is a culture shock "to see everyone wearing face masks".

And the cost of cigarettes is another shock. The government's tobacco ban during lockdown has led to a sixfold jump in the price of contraband cigarettes.

The good news is that the booze ban is lifted, leading to a rush for the liquor stores.

One friend reports his local bottle shop taking 16,800 orders on the first morning. Another tells me he grabbed 12 packs of beer and four cases of wine, adding: "You may not hear from me for a while!"

Friday 5 June

I chinwag with several old journalist chums and they all express concern at the battering the UK news media seems to be getting from the public. But they're honest enough to agree that some of it is of the media's own making.

"They don't help themselves," says one. "That Newsnight thing was a betrayal of the principles of broadcast journalism - and just so stupid to do now, when broadcasters are unfairly being accused of bias."

We all see fake news as another type of virus that's rapidly infecting the world view. The only vaccine is for journalists to be as direct and non-partisan as possible.

As one friend says, "it's a fight you can only win by relentlessly being factual NOT opinionated".

Report, don't comment. But we journos may be losing the battle when I regularly hear this sort of view from non-media friends:

"It's not that we've taken against news readers and journalists really," explains Nicky. "It's just that most of them are biased and not particularly loyal and are certainly far more left than right."

The debate continues.

Then there's the economy. The buoyant stock markets seem to belie the evidence we see with our own eyes. It feels like they're whistling while the Titanic tanks. Everyone we know is aware of businesses that may not survive.

Even the chancellor predicts a 14% slump, with the worst recession for 300 years.

Friends talk pessimistically about "the long furlough farewell" - the feeling that when the government pulls away the carpet of cash support this autumn, many employers will simply give staff the heave-ho, leading to unemployment for millions.

Derek calls it "the October time-bomb".

Our daughter-in-law Lisa didn't even have to wait that long. She was made redundant this week.

As for UK plc, the cost of the crisis is growing like crazy. I checked and we only paid off the debt from World War Two in 2006 - 60 years after the event.

Another debt mountain is looming through the COVID-19 clouds.

Saturday 6 June

D-Day was 76 years ago today - the Normandy Landings.

As I walk through Bushy Park, I pause at the flagpole that marks Camp Griffiss, the military base where Dwight D Eisenhower, later to become the 34th President of the US, and his team planned Operation Overlord.

It makes me wonder how they would have coped with the current challenge.

A very different sort of invasion. Another existential threat. The virus attack is not quite wartime, but it's certainly feels like a siege.

Friends in the Cape say they're channelling the old "laager mentality". This phrase dates back the Afrikaners' Great Trek in mid-19th Century when they circled the wagons into fortified encampments.

Today's environment may be less hostile.

But what our friends are talking about is becoming more self-sufficient - a bore hole water supply, a purifier and solar panels, combined with a large vegetable garden.

"Going a bit more off grid," as Mike puts it - less reliant on government if things go wrong.

Sunday 7 June

Now if you ever find yourself stuck in quarantine, here's an idea to ease the discomfort.

One hotel group in Thailand is offering a five-star luxury "Homecoming Health Watch".

It's an all-inclusive 15-night pandemic package, including airport transfers, for a mere $1,832 (£1,447).

In a country where all returning passengers are obliged to spend a fortnight in isolation, my man in Thailand says this deal sounds a whole lot nicer than the state's offer of detention in an old naval base.

Another travel firm is offering a COVID-free, private jet safari experience at $125,000 (£98,740) per head. Good luck with that.

Lynn's just pointed out that I've been wearing shorts for 12 weeks. That's probably the longest since I was at junior school. It makes me wonder when I'll wear long trousers again.

What occasion will finally demand dressing up? That rather depends on the big question: Is the future any clearer?

One of several mates named Mark reckons we're nearer to "peak confusion" than peak infection.

He offers the following conflicting arguments: "Was Sweden right or wrong, is there a second wave coming or not, are men more at risk, but only if they're bald, does distancing need two metres or one metre, is the economy doomed or will the recovery surprise us, we locked down too late/too soon/should never have locked down?"

Whatever the truth - and it may be years before we really know - there's enough uncertainty out there to make many friends of around my age crave the comfort of their cocoon.

As one says: "The old days - BC - Before COVID - may not return for a long time."

In other words, the day when we feel safe going to a restaurant, a bar, the theatre, a sports stadium or take a flight.

Another friend, vulnerable enough to self-isolate for 11 weeks, finally emerges into what she describes as "a post-apocalyptic world".

Graham has taken his car off the road for six months.

One mate adds: "You know the good thing about lockdown is that you don't have to make difficult decisions."