I think you must have been right about the plague - I noticed that many houses put up banners with the mark of a bloody red cross to show that they were afflicted, and appropriately for a modern-day apocalypse many cars did too. These have mostly been taken down now, though, so I do hope that is a sign of people having recovered, rather than that all inhabitants died of the plague...

(Dammit, I keep wanting to type 'plaque'. I've never been the same since I saw tigerfort's utterly brilliant letter to the Times, regarding the question of which is the *real* Shakespeare's mother's house (or whatever the debate was) in Stratford: his suggestion of course was "a plaque on both their houses.")