Month: December 2020

Of course I am home, doing nothing. I really should be working on my book proposal today, but I didn’t and I’m going to have to let that go for now. Live to fight another day. Like tomorrow.

But I feel good about staying in. A friend, who is a medical examiner, posts a lot of COVID news and reactions, and his latest post about the new strain properly scared me. I’ve been good about following all the guidelines, but we’re all going to have to do even better. And a high school friend of mine just died, on December 22. He lived in Colorado, so I’ve been thinking more about the new strain (it has shown up in Colorado). His name was John Arnold, sweetest guy in the world. We spoke on the phone a couple of months ago, he was helping me understand some concepts I needed to learn about to write this proposal. And now he’s dead. While the president golfs. Fucking fuck.

I was in Chinatown recently, getting new lenses for all my glasses (best prices are in Chinatown). The streets are always famously packed, but when I took a long walk through Chinatown a few months ago it wasn’t like this. People have been getting lax. Not so much lax really, I think, as weary. But we need to go back to being super vigilant again. I was very happy this day in Chinatown. The new lenses in all my glasses made the world sharp and bright again. All was well. Ish.

I’ve posted about this before. In the movie The Bishop’s Wife, the Mitchell Boychoir perform a hymn called O Sing to God. I love the arrangement. But every time I see this movie, and I watch it every holiday season, there’s one boy who always gets my attention. Every once in a while I try to find out who is he is. The movie was made in 1947, and I’m guessing he was around 15 years old, maybe a little older. That would make him 88+ now.

I just tried a Google image search, but no luck. Maybe I can find programs for Mitchell Boychoir performances in 1947 which list all the boys in the choir. Who is this boy??

Here’s a screenshot of him, but you can also see him here. I cued it so when you click on the link it starts at the moment he appears.

I don’t know why, but I just want to know how his life went. What did he do? Where did he go? Did he keep singing? Was his life mostly happy? (Are most people’s lives mostly happy?)

My friends David Schwartz and Anne Dorobis have this amazing holiday party every year, amazing because they are great hosts and they have a lot of talented musical friends. There is always a line-up of gifted performances at their parties. This year the party was on Zoom and it really worked. They made it fun, (with a limerick contest and the traditional musical performances) but they also made it special by inviting everyone to say a few words about what they missed this year and what they were were looking forward to when things get more back to normal. I loved hearing what everyone said. Choked me up.

I said I missed singing great music in harmony every week with other people, but I was loving reading books again for the sheer pleasure of it, and not because there was something I needed or wanted to learn, or for research.

I had a behavior problem with my cats, (Bodhi and Bali making Bleecker’s life miserable) so whenever I have evidence that things are better I have to take a picture. Bodhi and Bali still chase Bleeck sometimes, which he doesn’t love. But I’m starting to think that maybe they always chased him, and I just didn’t pay attention before because someone is always chasing someone around here. In any case, peace reigns at times.

This is Bali sleeping on top of Bleecker. While I was dealing with the behavior problem Bleecker couldn’t even be in the same room with the other cats. This is a miracle. And …

This is all three of them chilling out together. Bleeck is on my lap and that is Bodhi and Bali on the desk, distracted by something in the window. Hopefully a bird. And not Godzilla. (That was a big fear of mine as a child, that Godzilla might arrive at any moment. Or, that a volcano would erupt and I’d have to run from the lava.)

Oh! I love the COVID artifact on my laptop. I have to take my temperature before going to work and then email them that I’m good to go. I forgot once, so now I have a note reminding me to do this.

I watched a livestream of a mini-Loser’s Lounge last night, and had a zoom meeting with friends as we watched it. I teared up. A glimpse of life back to normal. (The Loser’s Lounge is a musical tribute show I’ve been going to for about 25 years.) You can see last night’s show here. The next livestream is January 21st, according to their website.

Balloons. Always uplifting. Spotted these as I was leaving work last week. Someone had a fun night!