When all else fails, look within

ISOLATION? More like isolonely.

Here’s a pandemic guide to staying sane.

Twentytwenty was supposed to be our year — the start of a new decade, bringing back the roaring ’20s.

But it is only March and already there have been threats of a nuclear world war, and Australia became Earth’s largest fireplace.

Even as I write this, a global pandemic descends upon us, and the world’s population slowly retreats into their separate houses, the apocalypse seems like it has just begun, and insanity seems to be a looming promise within the months to come.

Lockdown is something unlike anything I have ever experienced, and being confined to my house (mainly my room) is going to drive me, and many others, absolutely insane.

When you’re living in a reallife dystopian teen novel, there are a few things you can do to make life a little more bearable — starting with: The toilet challenge.

Each family member takes a day of the week and has to dress your dunny up a little more each day.

Starting with a scarf, glasses, or even a hat, and gradually building up to full formal tuxes, the toilet challenge is exactly what you need for a bit of family fun.

If crossdressing toilets just isn’t your thing, you could try crossdressing yourself.

If your parents are unwilling to let you experiment, and are just milling around in the lounge, give them a technology challenge that will keep them busy for hours — like figuring out how to text.

After successfully sneaking into their room, you have the whole closet at your disposal.

Try on outfits of all shapes and sizes, and even try jamming your feet into your mother’s heels (like the ugly stepsister you are).

And whether you find yourself wearing a flash red velvet dress or a smoking hot suit, you can 100% crossdress to impress (your cat).

If neither of those really seem to butter your biscuits, you can always try bartering for a human soul.

I have conferred with many experts and they seem to all agree you’ll need roughly 300 cupcakes for the purchase of an upperaverage human soul.

This may seem like a lot of cupcakes, but on the plus side, at least your family will be happy with you (until they see the dishes you’ve made).

After baking said cupcakes, you’ve got to summon the devil to buy the soul, and this could be difficult, because she is currently in Auckland. However, I’m sure she’d be happy to make the rounds.

If all else fails and isolation is making you miss your friends, there’s always another solution — the ‘‘Quaranteen’’ hut.

The hut can be built anywhere, at any time, and you only have to add friends to it for a 100% guaranteed fun quarantine.

However, the only issue with this is the kidnapping you must do to get the friends, because it’s a given that you don’t have any of your own.

This is a small crime, but due to the fact that the outside world is currently what you make it, you can simply consider this month Purge Month.

You may just need to wait a few more years before coming back to civilisation, assuming it still exists.

If you still feel as though you are going to lose your mind, and all these methods have failed, then I am truly at a loss.

I guess the only thing left for you to do is to hibernate the months away.

Or since this is pretty much impossible for humans (trust me, I’ve tried), you could simply embrace the insanity itself.

After reading this guide, if you are left with no other option, you could turn to our last hope.

The saving grace of our world. You could ask the wisest of our people, keepers of hidden sacred knowledge, found camouflaged around the earth, hidden within plain sight, they could even be someone you know.

They are the only ones with the ability to keep their sanity without the help of anyone else. They are . . . the introverts.