Then sometimes I’m introduced to other projects that leave me licking the dust of underachievement. Tonight’s narrator is behind one such project. You should have a listen to Poetry Scores, and share in the dust-licking awe of it. And as a bonus to all of us, Chris King, the genius responsible, is a Rilke enthusiast of the very best sort. It’s our lucky day.

Visit Poetry Scores and Confluence City and don’t forget to thank Chris for the story.

I’ll be back very soon now, honest.

Reflecting on his interpretation of Alice McDermott, I realise that perhaps I haven’t given her a fair shake, and that should change. This is heartwrenchingly rendered beauty, which, given our narrator, shouldn’t surprise anybody.

I’ll be back in my own voice very soon now, and still have a few guests to post. If you told me you’d read for me and you haven’t, I am probably very disappointed in you, although I just might understand all the same.

I’m here to tell you resolutely not to mind this, not to let it interfere with the almost toxic pleasure you might receive from a Patrick/Flannery one-two-punch. If anything, think of it not as a probably loud computer fan, but rather, as a Flannery O’Connor story as broadcast from the other side of the buckle of the asteroid belt.

The next two weeks will be just full of guests, and if you’ve offered a story and haven’t delivered, I will remember this when your birthday rolls around. There’s still time to redeem yourself. You know who you are.

And so, I would appreciate no murmured speculation on rhinoplastic nasal blockage or testosterone injections on my part. For the next month or two, I’ll be hosting some featured narratorial guests, as I take care of some necessary business of a personal variety, which may or may not involve the sexual reassignment of my nose. Go ahead, speculate away.

My first guest, George Carr, is (on my authority) among the world’s most dedicated and assiduous close readers of David Foster Wallace, so it was with a blushing schoolgirl’s delight that my inbox received his reading of Everything is Green. It’s a story on the shorter side, when measured in minutes, but don’t let that stop you: every second is greater than itself. And if you’re as in thrall by George’s voice as I am, put your eyes back here next week for more. Enjoy.

I’m featuring guest readers for the next month or two. Stop writing to me with snoopy questions about my health! My health is just fine! Or at least, it is, and will continue to be if you don’t send me into a paranoiac hell of hypochondriasis. Nor am I in prison. Yet. I do have a talented stable of guests lined up, and if you’d like to have a stab at a reading, email me.

1> the last post was James Joyce, who can hardly be noted without mention of underthings OR orificial expulsions. And underthings are far pleasanter for that particular task.

2> this post features a rare appearance by my friend Patrick, who has a tendency to tease us all with the hope and promise of starting his very own regular microphone-purring habit. Patrick is, if memory serves, the only other living person to have made a narrator’s appearance here, and once you listen, you’ll understand why. If you don’t, ask Christine. You’ll want to lap him up out of your headphones, and if you figure out how to do so, tell me.

3> it’s hot where I am, and quite likely where you are too. Too hot for underthings. Too hot for overthings. Too hot for anything other than the barest of skin. And headphones.

I’m back next week, if we and our underclad selves survive. (For those following, there’re also new chapters at The Man Who Can’t Die)

I don’t get the chance to kick back and listen to another’s purring drone very often, but when Patrick delivers the musing about Fran’s hair, there was a little patter in this dark heart o’mine.

And if you think all babies are angelic beauties and that children are some sort of personification of happiness, this may help set you straight — and in that sense, it’s a morality story. Hope you like. More from me next week.

And on days like these, you, as a podcastress, would be grateful for offers from your listeners, to muscle it out for you. And you’d sit back, and listen, and think, “well, this is nice, to sit back and listen, isn’t it?”