I’ve never liked it when a podcaster or a blogger says, Oh, it’s been too long since my last thing.

I apologize, but I’m back on it.

But I do feel that way.

It has been too long since my last episode, for no real reason other than getting busy with all the different things that I do at my desk.

But now here we are, ready to do another episode.

Why the British accent?

Oh, what I consider to be a reasonable British accent, or at least a subtle enough British accent, because I’m rehearsing this play where I have to use the British accent all the time.

And now I find that there are times when I’m simply using it for no good reason whatsoever.

This is one of those times.

Anyway, here’s a podcast.

I’ll drop the accent right after this.

Your Daily Lex.

As promised, I dropped the accent.

I had intended to record this episode before my first call of the day, but then Logic had issues and I had to restart Logic and this whole thing, so now I can only do this before I have to go join the meeting.

But I’ll tell a story, and note to future self, it’s the story about what happened over the weekend.

You know what it was, Lex.

I know.

Okay, here I am instantly for you and after a while for me.

Months ago, my mother-in-law had mentioned that she and my father-in-law were going on a cruise, and could I take them to their cruise and pick them up from their cruise?

And I was more than happy to do so.

She gave me the dates, whatever.

Then this past Saturday, she sent me a text in the morning saying, Hey, I know we told you we wanted to get off the ship at 9:30, but we’re going to try to get off at an earlier slot.

So if you can come closer to 9, that’d be great.

And I was like, Great, tomorrow.

And she’s like, No, today.

And I’m like, What?

And she’s like, Today.

And I was like, Hmm, this is all over iMessage.

And I show her, I’m like, Okay, I’m going to leave now so I can get there close to the time you’re asking, but here’s a screenshot of when you initially asked me where she said the dates.

Now, in her defense, she said like Saturday, September 20th, which was a day that didn’t exist.

It was Saturday, September 19th or Sunday, September 20th, and I saw the 20th, and that’s what I put into my calendar.

But I hop in the car.

I head out to the Manhattan Cruise Terminal, which at that time took me maybe an hour and ten minutes.

I got into the terminal right as they were getting off the ship.

The downside was the Manhattan Cruise Terminal was chaos, and so they were coming out on one level and I was being forced to drive to a different level.

So I had to then loop around, exit, they crossed the street, and then I picked them up on the main streets of New York City, and we get them home.

But as I’m driving them home, you’ll know where this is going right away, but as I’m driving them home, like, Why, you guys sound crappy.

And they’re like, No, no, no, it’s just allergies.

Then the next day, they call and say, Oh, by the way, we tested positive for COVID.

Good stuff.

I had just spent, you know, an hour plus, an hour and a half maybe, in the car with them in close quarters.

And the way my family handles this is if there’s a COVID exposure, that person has to hide from everybody else.

With my kids, it’s in their rooms, and with me and Lauren, somebody leaves.

So in this case, I went and lived in the basement, which was very sad because I wanted to be with the family.

Like we were doing the evening meal before Yom Kippur starts, and I’m like eating in the basement while they’re upstairs.

And truth be told, I started to feel pretty crappy.

I started to feel pretty not great.

And I waited a couple days to take a test, and I stopped feeling crappy actually after about 24 hours.

So I have no idea what I felt crappy for.

Could have just been tiredness.

I don’t know, because I never test positive.

And I did wear a mask at a rehearsal for the play, and I explained to everybody, like, you walk in with a mask, everybody’s like, Oh no, you’re a disease vector.

I’m like, Well, actually, I think I’m not a disease vector.

I haven’t tested positive for anything, and I don’t feel bad, but I was exposed to these folks.

And bringing down a whole cast in rehearsals is not good.

Bringing down anybody with COVID is not good.

But I definitely didn’t want to do that.

So it was a whole thing.

But it appears to me I do not have COVID.

I’ve now taken two negative tests.

So many people, though, quote this advice of, If you don’t want to test positive for COVID, don’t test for COVID, and that is insane.

That is insane advice.

Anyway, I am really struggling more than I can ever recall struggling in the past with lines, learning lines for this play.

It’s a pain point for me.

Have my recordings.

I’ve listened to them, and I think the challenge I’m having, like I had to do monologues, and I had to do the whole show when I did Same Time Next Year, and I learned those lines much more easily than I’m doing with this.

And I realized it’s because so many of my lines aren’t actually prompted by what other people are saying.

Like, I’m the director of the show within the show, so people are saying things and I talk to them, and then I say, I’ll quote to them the line I want them to start the play from, which has no context of anything.

And I’ve got to know double names.

I’ve got to know the names of the roles they’re playing and then the names of the roles they’re playing on the show within the show.

I don’t know if that makes any sense, but like a guy is named Gary, and then his character is named Robert, I think.

Oh my God.

See, I’m struggling.

But so I’m struggling with these lines.

So I have been trying all the things.

I’m listening to them a lot.

I’m reading them a lot, and now I’ve started writing them by hand, which I hate because it just feels like such a waste of time to be writing down lines.

But I read that that helps you with memorizing, so I’m trying.

Man, oh man.

And then there’s the second half of Act Two is, from my perspective, mostly pantomimed.

Like it’s all these shenanigans happening behind the scenes, and it’s all physical stuff, and I don’t even know how to memorize that because it’s not dialogue.

It’s just do this, and then it’s like choreo, basically.

Anyway, those are my complaints.

I don’t have COVID.

That’s not a complaint.

I hate learning lines.

That is a complaint.

And I love you.

That is just a celebration of joy.

Goodbye.

Lex.