Exile, Interrupted

Having spent the past week prone, boneless and comatose, the wife is now demanding I raise my pulse to that of an average cadaver.

“No problem,” I nod - as another twisted guitar solo flickers through my subconscious. "I’ll get right on that and the lawn - just as soon as I finish watching these three dozen Stevie Ray bootlegs on YouTube. Until then, I reserve the right to remain suitably useless, intensely inert, tenaciously incapable of any acts of urgency. Sure, I make it look easy, but a catatonic state of this level requires extraordinary dedication to the science of restraint. A street level shooter of my camera-acumen cannot dash about madly 52 ceaseless weeks a year, ya know? I owe it to my viewers to return to the broadcast refreshed and energized, able to pounce on the next available calamity with the speed of a cheetah and the bloodlust of a jacked-up badger. It’s a jungle out there, all right, heavy with humidity and teeming with predators… overzealous assignment editors, insipid public information officers and the occasional rabid rent-a-cop. No ma’am I cannot risk hurling myself into that perilous void without the proper amount of Zen-like preparation, endless hours spent locked in grueling inaction. It's all a part of a strict regiment of feng shui fitness, focused solely on my triumphant return to the news scene of someone else’s liking. For tomorrow I don the visage of mercenary journalist, a dusty lenslinger riding the horizon to make the electronic frontier safe from the onslaught of a thousand nefarious press releasers - Hmm? What’s that honey?”

“Yeah, I'd love to de-weed the flowerbeds...”