A Journal of the Plague Year 2022–chapter 255

Near Astor Place in Manhattan.

Monday, February 21

“…to facilitate her near-constant pogoing, [Eilish] sported sneakers, bike shorts, and a punky oversized graphic tee. The effect was a cross between Harley Quinn, Minnie Mouse and Glenn Danzig.”

Pogoing? And who are Harley Quinn and Glenn Danzig? (Minnie Mouse I remember.)

The New York Times, responsible for the first sentence above in a review of a recent Billie Eilish concert, seems to be part of a conspiracy to make me feel hopelessly over-the-hill. “Pogoing” was what stopped me—but I guess that refers to bouncing up and down, derived from that toy of yore, the pogo stick. My word-processing system balked at “punky,” trying to change that to “pinky.” It’s even more out-of-date than I am.

Eilish is, of course, one of the faves on the current pop scene. I’ve never heard her music, but she is to be congratulated for apparently doing a lot with a little: much of her success is due to the efforts of herself and her multi-instrumentalist brother.

But Eilish is too flash or whatever the au courant term might be to get any airplay on Radio Paradise, my own current fave. RP as it calls itself instead favors the likes of Zero 7 and The War on Drugs…neither of which is familiar to me either.

I’m listening to more online music thanks to resolution of a technical problem. After getting a new battery installed in my Mac Book Pro in September, the machine’s internal speakers seemed broken. Whenever I listened to music, there was lots of static—and ultimately this proved intolerable. I took the Mac to Best Buy’s tech-fixit types, the Geek Squad, where I was told that it would be cheaper to buy a new machine than to replace the internal speakers, which Apple no longer makes anyway.

Now, the store functionaries always say stuff like that, since their racket is selling new stuff. But it had already occurred to me that I could solve my problem by buying a new, wireless speaker. So I just did that: It’s a Bose Soundlink Revolve II. Only a bit larger than a Campbell Soup can (remember those? or am I showing my age again?), it sounds great. The biggest problem so far is that, every so often, without warning, it barks out something like “battery charge is 30%…connected to MacBook Pro and Hardy’s iPhone.” 

I haven’t yet tamed the beast, it seems, but maybe I will.

Dinner: Braised chicken with lemon and olives, couscous, and a green salad.

Entertainment: We’re now watching the Netflix import Young Wallander, a prequel to the Henning Mankell series of books and movies. But we haven’t stopped enjoying silent films, so maybe we’ll also see the Chaplin classic The Gold Rush from 1925. We recently saw his The Circus, which was hilarious…despite a melancholy ending.

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