Contrary to all appearances, dear friends, I have not fallen down a long, deep, electrified hole in midtown, although you would be forgiven for thinking that I had. Thanks to seven years of box factory toiling, I've become very good at juggling numerous simultaneous projects, so I should not have thought twice -- the way that most normal and reasonable people would -- at the prospect of continuing my paper research, launching the website that will help me pay for it, baking, more baking, just a little more baking, finishing the sock I've been knitting for two weeks, starting the mate of the sock I've just finished knitting, to say nothing of paying occasional visits to the office and dry cleaner and having an occasional conversation with Lloyd. I did not, in fact, think twice about it, but forged gamely ahead, only to realize that maybe my stepdad was on to something when he counseled me about how sometimes, when one takes on too many things at once, nothing is actually done well.
He's right, of course. On the other hand, I have a really great sock, soon to be half of a pair of really great socks! Would you like to see my socks?
Okay, fine. 
The astute among you will notice that I dropped a bit of news in that first overwritten paragraph. Thanks to my kind and excellent pal Keith, master of the house and keeper of the key at Scrine, I will soon be joining the ranks of scurvy dog internet capitalists and selling a few little things online, via a commercial website completely separate from this space (although of course I'll be namedropping PTMYB like mad; to quote John Cleese, I may be an idiot, but I'm no fool). It's still in development; Keith is working on the design and I am working on content, both the necessary (can I get a "terms, conditions and liability waiver" in the house?) and the fun (overwritten paragraphs about whatever happens to be for sale that week). Of course you know that as soon as it goes live, I will share the news, without an iota of hard-selling. Well, maybe just one iota. An angstrom unit of hard sell, really.
As a result of all this entreprenoozing and knitting, I have been way off my writing game, and I apologize for that. I'm particularly sorry because earlier in the week, the New York Daily News ran a particularly nauseating article about how the Food Network is loading its programming schedule with shows featuring sexy youngsters. Smacking the Food Network's hand is like shooting fish in a barrel, I know, but if there's one target easier than Food Network, it's silly journalism about the Food Network. I haven't linked to the article because I think the Daily News archives their stories pretty quickly, and this ran almost a week ago, but trust me: The article included a rundown of current Food Network personalities (Rachael Ray, Sandra Lee, Giada DeLaurentiis, Warren Brown, Tyler Florence, Dave Lieberman, Cat Cora), each labeled -- wait for it! -- "Hot Dish." And yet I could not get it together to sharpen my knives and let loose with a few thousand words on "Food Network: Remember when you used to be able to watch actual cooks making actual food that you might actually want to eat?" Instead, I just yelled "Auuuugggghhh!," Charlie-Brown-like, and baked another couple of loaves of pickle juice rye (which, for trainspotters, did rise more than the previous ones, but the color is still a little pallid and the bottoms burned a bit; clearly, more testing is in order).
But I digress.* If I continue to go three or four days at a time at radio silence, please know that it's not because anything big and terrible is happening; it's because small and interesting things are happening, a dozen at a time. Undoubtedly the Food Network (or the New York dailies or the dailies of some other metropolitan area or some food company trying to peddle some dumbass convenience food) will piss me off again soon, and when they do, I will be right here.
*I cannot use these three little words without smiling now. Last week, on the day of our canceled trip to Boston, Lloyd and I went to see Tristram Shandy, Michael Winterbottom's film adaptation of a heretofore-thought-unadaptable novel about a man who is trying to tell his life story, but spends so much time on diversionary topics that he never gets past the day of his birth. Steve Coogan plays Tristram Shandy, as well as Tristram's father Walter, as well as himself. One of the narrative devices of both the book and the movie is to set up a completely farcical, and often sick-humored, scene, only to have Tristram end the scene abruptly by announcing, "But I am getting ahead of myself. I have not yet been born." Because I am a simple tool, I find myself saying this to Lloyd as often as possible. He, gentle good soul that he is, just smiles and continues typing. I do hope that he's not planning to smother me in my sleep.