Netflix’s 2019 show gave us the perfect meme for our coronavirus quarantine, but it offers so much more.
On March 26, my fourteenth day of social distancing, I forgot what day it was.
Like millions of Americans, I was working from home, isolating myself from society, using new phrases I had never uttered before. Self quarantine. Social distancing. Flatten the curve.
I was padding around my apartment in thinning leggings, trying and failing to complete a to-do list. I had legitimately forgotten the day of the week until I opened Twitter to see a picture of actress Natasha Lyonne as Nadia Volvokov, the acerbic protagonist in Netflix’s Russian Doll. Eyes wide, hair ablaze and cigarette aloft, she was the perfect meme. “Thursday,” her remarks were captioned. “What a concept.”
The captioned screengrab was especially popular that day, despite the fact that it is tweeted every Thursday by an account whose sole purpose appears to be reminding people it’s Thursday. This week, though, the comments suggested the post was more.
