Hello and welcome to the upgrade, the podcast from the team at LifeHacker, where we help you improve your life one week at a time.

I'm Melissa Kirsch, editor-in-chief of LifeHacker.

And I'm Alice Bradley, LifeHacker's deputy editor. And today we are talking with New York Magazine's

senior art critic and friend of the upgrade, Jerry Salts. We spoke with Jerry back in February ahead of the

launch of his new book, How to Be an Artist. And he was such a delight that we thought,

why not talk to him again? When we spoke to Jerry, we were so struck by how much of the world

he takes in in the course of a week. He goes out and he looks at art pretty much every day. And we

thought, how is somebody like that coping in isolation? Jerry spoke with us about how he's able to

stay creative and inspired during this time.

And also he talked to us about how the art world is going to change after the pandemic.

What you do now in these, I'd say, 18 months that you're looking at, you will take with you

for the rest of your days. You are modeling something crucial for yourself.

This is not unimportant this period.

After our conversation with Jerry, we'll hear from our health editor, Beth Skarecki, who

spoke with epidemiologist Dr. Saskia Popescu about the facts and fictions of disease prevention. When I hear people getting

worried about groceries, my concern is more, how are you behaving at the grocery store? I'm less

worried about the grocery bags and packaging and the produce than I am about somebody going to

the grocery store and using really bad infection control measures. Dr. Rapescu is an infection preventionist.

She's been nationally recognized for her work with hospitals on their response to infectious

disease outbreaks. Hey, Alice. Yes, Melissa. How is week seven of self-quarantine going? Oh, my God.

Is it week seven? I don't even know anymore. I don't know. I'm reading the script.

I would think this was the 97th week if I hadn't read it here. It's always been this way,

...