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My mother called me about an issue she and my father were having on their iMac. After trying to debug things over the phone, I remembered that Messages has a screen sharing feature. I got Mum to turn it on and it was fantastic. Not only did it let me see her screen with almost perfect fidelity but it automatically switched on her microphone so I could talk to her through the far superior connection of the computer versus her phone. Like most tech-interested people, I detest helping people fix their computers over the phone but this was such a positive experience, I’m honestly looking forward to the next time they have a problem.
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In less positive news, Tokyo’s state of emergency was extended until 20 June (NHK). It seems utterly bizarre that the Olympics (which are scheduled to begin at the end of July) are going ahead in these circumstances.
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I picked up where I’d left off reading Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone to the kids. We don’t get through much before they fall asleep (which is good) so I suspect even if I don’t take another break, we’ll be reading it for quite some time.
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The NBA playoffs began and that’s dominated most of my video watching. As a result, no movies with Mubi, no DS9 or Law & Order and not even that much YouTube. Well, still a little bit of YouTube. I’ve been working my way through Jenny Nicholson’s oeuvre and if you’re looking for a shorter one, ‘The Worst Reality Show of All Time’ (YouTube) had me in tears of laughter.
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Speaking of the NBA playoffs, this isn’t really about my week but I just want to take a moment to acknowledge how incredible LeBron James is. I disliked LeBron when I came back to watching basketball because I perceived him as entitled and selfish but all that bitterness has melted away as he’s continued to produce in post-season games. He has an ability at the end of a game to flip the ‘winning time’ switch on that I’ve never seen before.
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I came across an old post on Deadspin about Wile E Coyote. I love the Road Runner cartoons and if you enjoy them at all, this is about an in-depth look at them as you could possibly imagine.
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I took the kids to the park on the weekend and met up there with Ferdinando and his daughter. Although the kids made it a little difficult to chat, it was nice to have some adult human contact outside of Eri.
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I published my fourth annual list of podcasts I’m listening to. I realised that last year, I dug up the original lists I’d written in the period from 2008-2011 and said that I meant to put them up on the current website. That is a good idea. I should do that.
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Apple Music generates a number of algorithmic playlists for subscribers each week and my New Music Mix was oddly quite a trip down memory lane this past Friday: the Offspring, Alanis Morissette, the Whitlams and You Am I—all artists that I heard first in the 90s—have new songs out. I presume this is partly the result of algorithmic playlists. In the past, it must have been difficult for a band to maintain a relationship with its fans after they’d moved into their 30s and 40s but in the streaming era, you simply upload the files and let the service find your fans for you. For what it’s worth, my selection this week is Reprise, Moby’s orchestral reprise of his greatest hits (Apple Music).
