ELGIN, Ill. — Local graphic designer Oliver Boone sat in his parked car for approximately 10 hours yesterday, catching up on the podcasts he usually listens to on his commute, weirded out neighbors confirm.
“Before all of this, I had an hour and a half commute downtown every single day… and then I’d do it all again in the afternoon,” said Boone on one of his few bathroom breaks. “I could typically burn through ‘My Favorite Murder’ and ‘Stuff You Should Know’ just on a Monday. But now I’m like, three episodes behind on ‘Pod Save America’ and I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed. I just have to hope and pray ‘30 for 30’ doesn’t drop a new season anytime soon or I’m completely fucked.”
Boone’s wife Cheryl doesn’t understand why Oliver had to retreat to his car to catch up.
“I told him he could put it on the Google speaker in the living room, but he said that was too impersonal,” said Ms. Boone while rewatching the first two seasons of “Killing Eve.” “I bought him some really nice wireless headphones so he could listen to them on the treadmill, but he said it just wasn’t the same. Then he went into the garage, backed the car into the driveway, and sat there for all of yesterday’s daylight hours. He just stares off into space… occasionally I see him laugh, and it’s very off-putting.”
The podcast community has felt the impact of the quarantine as well.
“Boone is a hero. Our listening number our way down, our Casper Mattress promo code hasn’t been used in weeks, and no one has tweeted our catchphrase ‘Mississippi Flippy’ at me since I can’t remember when,” said Ollie Greer, host of “Pod Man Out.” “I have a whole box of shirts printed with the inside joke, ‘All Hail the Queef Queen,’ just sitting in my living room. We need to get America back to work so they can enjoy podcasts again in real time. Otherwise, I might have to shut down one of my eight podcasts.”
Oliver plans to catch up on every “Planet Money” podcast before going inside to inaccurately recap them to his wife.