There are very few things that will wake me from deep slumber--I narrowly escaped a Towering Inferno incident in college--but it's apparent that if you really want to get me out of bed, you merely need to make me shell out 500 clams for a piece of polymer resin and then hide it from me.

Last night, I found it pretty quickly nestled in the folds of the sheets.

The first time I lost it, however, I was frantic, turning the entire bedroom upside down, wondering if maybe, just maybe, I'd swallowed it. (Thank goodness I'd just seen Maria Full of Grace!)

I finally gave up, hoping that maybe it'd turn up in a couple days, the cat batting it around the hall. At that, I yawned and stretched. There was a clackety-clack.

Well goddamn if it wasn't my night guard, stuck in the folds of my, ah, pajamas. Oh Christ, I have become the human couch.

[Administrative notes: There's a dearth of reviews right now, I know. We have an excellent (if I do say so myself) interview coming up, and hopefully after the weekend we'll have a review of the new Guralnick book, a bio of Sam Cooke. I know it came out last week, but I didn't get an advance copy until two weeks ago. I assume this is because Little,Brown ran out of the first batch after flinging copies at every half-wit reviewer and his brother. What's the secret frickin' handshake, Cochise?]