Okay. As usual, this requires a rather lengthy preamble.

For a while a few years ago, I had a resident fox who spent many a winter's day curled up in a patch of sun up in the woods of the back yard. Snoring away. I have I don't know how much footage of him, but let's face it--after the initial "Oh, look, it's a fox!" watching an animal sleep is about as exciting as watching a person sleep. Which is to say, not very.  MORE Mojo! »

I think for those who have never experienced a really BAD burn, you imagine the pain will be just an absolutely horrendous nightmare for the duration. I suppose I am somewhat lucky in that respect, as indeed I seem to be lucky in a lot of things lately (except for the actual burning part), in that It's Not As Bad As It Could Have Been.

Oh, yeah, make no mistake about it--it hurts. The pain is what drove me to the hospital in the first place. But it built up. I went into shock pretty quick--in fact I had to talk to myself for a bit while I paced to calm myself down so I wouldn't go entirely into shock and freak out--and it didn't get bad until an hour or two into it. But pretty much run-of-the-mill painkillers took care of it fairly well, although I believe I spent most of the first week snoring away on the couch. And, to be honest, I did absolutely ZERO work. I just couldn't concentrate.  MORE Mojo! »

Lately my Favorite Husband has taken to doing a very funny impression of me attempting to interact with him while high on Oxycondon. I am complaining a bit more about the pain and he said at first I was so high on drugs I was trying to convince him that I wasn't really hurt at all. It's a very funny conversation that will lose half its humor in transcription. You really need his acting abilities to truly bring it to life. Of course I was high on oxycondon when he told me this, so maybe some of the humor I get from it is drug-induced.

The real funny thing is, I don't remember this conversation one tiny bit.  MORE Mojo! »

The thermometer seems perpetually frozen in the teens this morning, but my fox is back, curled up under the pines, fast asleep. I don't know how wild animals survive in these temperatures. He wasn't there early in the morning, but once the sun was well up, somewhere in the seven-to-eight a.m. range, I spied that now-familiar ball of fur under the trees. He's curled up much tighter than usual, but snoring pleasantly away in the sun.  MORE Mojo! »

Even a confirmed backwoods rube such as myself must sometimes heed the siren call of a more glamorous life. I am off to NYC to cover the Little Women the Musical press conference for the website. Sutton and company will be singing four or five songs. I will put clips on the LWOB site as I edit them.

Incidentally, the fox is back this morning, snoring away under the same tree. I think I've got another regular!

Mojo