Lisa Scottoline: Lockdown Part II

I've been watching pundits on cable news all day, and here's what I learned about the coronavirus:

People with maps in the background give the best interviews.

I love all of these interviews with TV pundits, which are now being conducted from their homes.

This is News for the Nosy.

I admit it, I love to see inside people’s houses.

Why?

A natural curiosity, which I suspect comes with estrogen.

All I can tell you is, I’ve gone to open houses just to see how people decorate.

Architectural Digest is my porn.

Now I watch TV pundits being interviewed, and I miss nothing.

Well, to be honest, I miss everything they’re saying.

But I miss nothing in the background.

Books are the most common background. Most TV pundits talk on the computer in front of their bookshelf, but I can’t listen to a word. I’m too distracted, and all I do is try to see the spines of the books. I could tell you that I’m curious about what they’re reading, but I’m only curious if they’re reading one of my books.

It could happen.

But it never does.

That doesn't stop me. In fact, once I thought one of them did have one of my books on the shelf, and I turned my head sideways to see, but I was wrong. Still, now I watch the TV news sideways, just to be sure. I don't want to miss a single me-sighting, which would improve my self-esteem.

Amazingly, even as I write this, a TV anchorperson is talking from her home office, and behind her is a bookshelf with one shelf of all-red books and one shelf of all-blue books.

And I'm completely distracted.

Is this secret coding as a bipartisan bookshelf?

Or is she just someone who uses books for home decoration, instead of reading them?

No judgment here.

Either way, I get a royalty.

And I spend it on home decoration.

So it's kind of like recycling, for girl authors.

Lots of TV pundits have family pictures in the background, and they distract me, too. I find myself imagining the pundit getting ready for his interview and placing the picture strategically, or maybe his wife making sure she looks young in the photo, or the kids not wanting their photo to be shown, and maybe the family was fighting.

How could they not be?

Imagine being quarantined with your family, and one of them is a TV pundit.

At least we can turn off the TV.

They can't.

Remember that, next time you think you got it so bad.

It could be worse.

You could live with Wolf Blitzer.

All the time with the breaking news.

Just kidding, in case Wolf Blitzer reads this.

Again, it could happen.

One cute background I saw was behind a medical expert, who had about 50 lanyards with conference badges, clustered on a hook. Me, too. I save any conference badge that has me as keynote speaker.

OK, there’s only one.

But still.

It has a blue ribbon.

I won!

My current favorite background is maps. All of the coolest TV pundits have maps in the background, and if you want instant credibility talking about a global pandemic, you’d better have a map behind you. Not of a single country, but of the entire world.

A world map is a Power Background.

It's like wallpaper for smart people.

I hadn't seen a world map since third grade, but now I want one.

I bet with a world map and a pair of false eyelashes, I could be a TV pundit keynote speaker myself.

Also, there are backgrounds you should avoid. For example, someone this morning was on TV talking about the coronavirus, but behind him was a hamper with a piece of laundry sticking out from under the lid.

Dude, get it together, like me. I wouldn’t do the laundry, but I sure as hell would hide it better.

Nobody hides laundry better than I do.

If somebody knocks on my door, I whiz around the family room like Wilma Flintstone. It's the only time I move that fast.

And yesterday, somebody was on TV from their home office and behind them was an exercise bike, folded up and covered with dust thick enough to see on high-definition.

Another mistake I would never make.

I would dust off the exercise bike if it were in the background of my TV interview.

And I might even hang a little rag on the handlebar, so viewers would think I actually break a sweat on an exercise bike, which has never happened in my life.

I have even eaten popcorn on an exercise bike.

Only during the warm-up.

What can I say?

I was warming up.

And the music put me in a party mood.

Peloton is my social life now.

Also before, but let's not get technical.

The worst background of all is nothing on the walls, the blinds drawn, and the door closed, like a hostage video. A surprising number of interviews have the hostage background, including Robert De Niro, who filmed a stay-at-home video as a public-service announcement.

Far be it from me to criticize Robert De Niro, but I was dying to see inside his house.

Which might be why he filmed from his panic room.

To me, the real public service would have been showing us the inside of his house.

In fact, if all the celebrities start showing us inside their houses, I would never leave mine.

Happily.

Look for Lisa and Francesca’s humor collection, “I See Life Through Rosé-Colored Glasses,” and Lisa’s novel, “Someone Knows,” in stores now. Also you can preorder Francesca’s debut novel, “Ghosts of Harvard," publishing May 5.