Can I tell you something about my speculative fiction habits? Of course I can– this my barroom restroom wall and the red marker’s in my slimy mitt.

Here’s the thing: I just love stories about sentient animals. I can’t get enough of talking dogs or super-intelligent rats or telekinetic polar bears– this is the stuff of unconditional love.

This story was brought to my attention a few months ago, making its way inbox-ward on the anniversorry of my trip down Amniotic Lane, timing not unintentional. Now, I would share with you my thoughts on why this was selected as a Birthday Story, but that would involve psychographic profiling of the sender’s right [...]

A couplefew nights ago, catatonic with fatigue after a couple days of travel, I found just the right pace of entertainment watching my cat chase a furry little squeaker all around the place. My conscience wouldn’t let me object– it was nature’s way and the mouse deserved whatever was coming to it, after all… [...]

So listen, about today’s story, well, as you’ll know when you listen to the first minute, I’m running low on resources at the moment, tapped, so to speak, at least, until things are nice and orderlied again.

Last night, I was thinking of what to write to you today while starting to doze off just prior to handing over the wheel. I woke up with one of those Holy Mother I’m Dozing Off kind of starts, and, as I was now more alert than usual during this leg of the trip, I made the sad discovery that what I’d read as the Bikini Avenue Exit was actually something far more G-Rated, and significantly less scandalous.

Herbert Goldstone, what are you going to tell me about him? Writes crazy sci-fi about thinking machines more human than man. This story in dozens of brilliant anthologia. Very little else to be found. The wiki draws a blank. This story is not a drop shy of Wondrous.

A delivery truck pulled out in front of me the other day, freshly deflowered by a graffiti artist who chose to express him- or herself by relaying the following, in big blue caps:

I LOVE SARAH, KINDA?

What else is a podcastress to do when a great writer dies? Sheckley wrote hundreds of exceptional stories, hundreds, and though I wouldn’t rate this one his best (I See a Man Sitting in a Chair, and the Chair is Biting His Leg rates high on my list, and very few of life’s experiences top a first glance at Can You Feel Anything When I Do This? (and I’m only just barely exaggerating)).