“Are you going to be at home?”  
     “Yes, I’m going to be at home.” 
     “All day?” 
     “All day, every day.” 
     Right.  What fools we were to think that the pandemic was over and we could go back into society and disport ourselves.  Concerts, bars, restaurants—the airplane!—are only memories all over again.  Delta rules.  Every day is the same (I’m not complaining; what the average Afghan wouldn’t give to be able to say that) and I progress through the sameness with an eye for nature and a tumbler of joy bubbling up in my soul—till it stops bubbling and the depression sets in.  The members of the family are here, as they have been since the beginning of the pandemic back in times so remote they seem beyond reach, and that is a fine and revivifying thing, plus I have the mountains presiding over my little town and the sea washing its shores.  I hike, I kayak, I swim.  And I write.   
     What I’m trying to say is that all live appearances in support of the September release of my twenty-ninth book of fiction, Talk To Me, have been cancelled.  I will Zoom, just as I’ve been doing all these long, long months.  Stay tuned here and to my Twitter feed for dates and times.  I was especially looking forward to returning to Iowa City in October for a reading at the Englert Theater (leaves aflame, the cold prairie wind shattering my bones, old friends, dark bars), but that has been postponed till spring (leaves a-bud, the cold prairie wind shattering my bones, old friends, not-quite-as-dark bars).  Ah, well, as I said last time around, let us thank the anti-vaxxers and assorted nutballs for the continuing death counts and the takedown of society as we once knew it. 
     While there isn’t a whole lot of good news, I can at least offer you this—three of the remaining stories for next year’s collection of thirteen new pieces (I Walk Between the Raindrops, titled after The New Yorker story) have found homes, “The Hyena” in Zoetrope, “SCS 750” in The Southern Review, and, as I mentioned previously, my COVID story, “The Thirteenth Day,” in Esquire.  And, of course, my American readers will finally have a chance to possess copies of Talk To Me and thrill to this powerful, tragic and ruefully funny novel.  As for the seven million film projects of my work, they slog forward, COVID-crippled, one-legged, blind and deaf and dumb, but I did return contracts this week to Disney for their adaptation of The Terranauts.  I wish the Disneyites well.  What a series that book would make!  Of course, I am using the conditional tense here, because that’s what adaptations are all about—would, could, maybe, perhaps, next week, next year, next century.  And people ask me why I refuse to participate in the world of Hollywood—ha! 
     So, the sun keeps rising and setting and I continue my march toward the grave, a little slower now, a little less steady afoot, but there you have it: welcome to the human condition. 
     Ciao for now.