Kage Baker’s memory had a lot to contend with this week.  Birthdays. Heat. Domestic endurance trials. British television.

All these have been contributing to my not writing for the last couple of days. It’s getting hot here – finally and seasonally, so I really should not complain; but it tires me out dreadfully in these senescent days. Once the thermometer gets above 80 degrees, I am confined to an artificial indoors environment – otherwise, I desiccate and deliquesce by turns, and become a sort of whiny fungus.

My birthday is in two days; as usual, I forgot it was coming on so fast, have no plans, and am sort of hoping my family does not remember – though they will. They always do. A nice card and good cake are all I really need, and my family never fails to come through. I’m not best pleased by the prospect of being 66, but it does share a certain panache here in California: we are where the Mother Road begins, after all.

Life has been hard this last week in my household, as well. On the good side, daily visits by the nurses to administer IM furosemide to Ray (whose body has decided to arbitrarily ignore the oral medication) have worked and made him more comfortable. On the bad side, those same nurses have turned the entire house upside down with their visits – so much petty tyranny! So little communication with the doctor! So much needless duplication of effort! They seem to be missing the point of this home hospice thing, which is to make THE PATIENT more comfortable. Not the staff … well, we now have a week off to keep things quiet and calm for the family. This is supposed to be a peaceful denouement for Ray, not some fiery End Times scenario. Unless we get to set fire to intruders. That would be keen.

A new two-edged sword in the productivity wars is the introduction of BritBox to my Amazon Prime subscription. They are fiends, subjecting me to unending temptation (to which I have promptly given in.) Kim and I have been binge-watching Midsomer Murders, an engrossing and madly entertaining detective show set in a semi-rural English village, a little inland from Brighton in the South-East of England. It’s modern, not a period piece – but in any decent rural village in England, most of the place looks like a re-enactor’s paradise anyway. By yestreday I was reduced to a blob with eyes, lusting after thatched roofs and dry stonework. and translating the thicker Sussex accents. I love a Sussex accent.

In short, Dear Readers: I have run out of teeth.

But not to worry! Literary teeth are like a crocodilian’s, and grow back in endlessly. Also, there is a limit (I assume) to how many seasons of Midsomer Murders I can find …

Writing is happening. Enjoy your run-up to the holiday weekend (lay in thunder shirts and lots of pet tranquilizers) and I will return with goodies.