All sorts of technical difficulties this week. I won’t go into my personal difficulties, as I’ve already done so to some degree. Plus, like the rule that hearing other people’s dreams is always boring (unless they are mine, because I tell you truly, I have an insanely weird dream life), nobody wants to hear about other people’s computer problems.

But I will take the opportunity to grumble about the technical difficulties at the Thievery Corporation show at Central Park Summerstage last night, because the sound system sucked. I think Summerstage is a great idea. It’s nice that it’s usually free, and I didn’t mind paying a high ticket price to see Thievery, since I love them and the money was going in part to support the free concerts. But when you’ve got an audience shelling out plenty of $ to see a show, shouldn’t you make certain that the sound is at least halfway decent? Come on, Summerstage!

Thievery themselves were really good, fully of energy and ready to renovate well-known songs of theirs. I really liked the reggae-inspired riff on James Brown’s “Get up Offa That Thing,’ laid over a usually lyricless track from Richest Man in Babylon. Bebel Gilberto was pleasant, but we weren’t really able to pay much attention, as we were fighting the lines to get bottles of water and trying to set up our picnic on the bleachers. Which isn’t Bebel’s fault.

The crowd was interesting. I had a nice chat with a young mother who brought her baby to the show. The 13-week-old was wearing some huge headphones to cancel out the sound. There were plenty of barefoot hippie types dancing around, which was all very well and good, but I was shocked when a tiny, long-haired girl danced her way into a Port-o-Potty with bare feet. How does that make any hygenic sense?

When walking around Central Park, I was delighted to discover that there are lightning bugs in New York City! I never would have thought it. I love lightning bugs. They remind me of home. I told my friend Todd all about my happy surprise, and he said, “There are lots of fireflies in Brooklyn. I see them around my house.”

I want to live in Brooklyn!