Thanks to everybody who wrote in to send along good wishes and such.  Thanks.  My arm is just getting back to where I can type comfortably, so I'm way behind on emails, and I apologize.  But thanks, lots.

My strange affliction seems to be almost vanquished, although since it began by cooking away inside me for who knows how long, hell if I know.  I'll probably be just fine from here out.  But don't sit too close to the computer, just in case

Kidding.

Which I elaborate because sometimes writing something absurd with a straight face (or straight fingers perhaps) leads to misunderstandings.  So let me clarify the bit about spiders, below, for the dozens of you who wrote in half-panicked: no, we don't all actually swallow bugs in our sleep.  I thought the absurdity of the idea self-evident.  Apparently not.

Lots of you now seem to be genuinely worried about your personal level of involuntary spider intake.  Be reassured, O my readers.  You are not eating spiders.  Unless that's your thing.  In which case, good on you, stay away from me, and God Bless our America for the freedom to make these private lifestyle choices.

Moving on.  So.

Since there's still a tiny but finite chance I may still be rotting from within, obviously the only responsible thing I can do is head directly for as many airports as possible.  So for the next few weeks this blog will probably again become a chronicle of various travels.

Assuming any of them happen.  I made the mistake of beginning this trip on Air Canada, an airline so cutting-edge that the trip from from Los Angeles to London yesterday took only 31 hours, achieving an average airspeed rivaled only by stray balloons released at children's birthday parties.

At one point, we spent three full hours trapped on a Montreal tarmac, listening to distant, muffled banging noises emanating from deep in the plane's bowels, our only distractions a lump of warm fromage, a video of a leering Francophone inscrutably caressing handbags (this was some sort of sales thing, but it was more interesting to pretend otherwise), and the full complement of screeching babies mandated on all flights by the International Convention on Implacable Screaming.

Thankfully, the pilot came on the speaker every now and again to update us with the news that he had no idea whatsoever when we would leave.  This was a huge help.

The only DVD in my bag: The Aviator, featuring not one but two plane crashes.  Because I am some kind of freaking genius, if you must know.

After the first two hours, as the flight attendants began feeding us for the third time, I began to wonder if Air Canada had abandoned the transportation industry altogether and decided to open a chain of extremely realistic failed-aircraft theme restaurants, to be positioned randomly around runways across North America, committed to force-feeding their customers while providing sullen incompetence in two languages.

The flagship location was certainly a success on all counts.

But I was wrong.

Eventually, the plane was pronounced dead, given last rites, doused with kerosene, and sent burning over a cliff while onlooking Vikings tried not to cry.  (I exaggerate slightly here.)  Soon, we were all marched into the terminal and instructed to form a 300-person-long queue, at the head of which sat a polite woman who eventually explained, many times and with remarkable good cheer, that the queue was completely unnecessary.  After this, we were invited to form another queue to take a shuttle bus, which would take us to another queue at a hotel for a couple of hours before returning to form another queue in precisely the same spot where we had just been informed that no queue was originally necessary.  Which, inexplicably, we all did.  After which we were informed that no one on the replacement shift had the slightest idea what our latest queue was about.

It went from there.

So I'm in Britain.  I'm not dead.  Thanks.  That's pretty much it for now.

There are a dozen things I'd like to blog about -- the differences between UK and US media perceptions on the Downing Street Memo, for example, or the upcoming new TV show Make Me A Porn Star, which leaves only room for perhaps Prenatal Idol, a 24-edition of Big Brother: Gitmo, and Who Wants To Be An 80-Year Old Former Treblinka Guard Now Living Quietly In Iowa? as the last three rungs before we all start eating each others' flesh on live webcams -- but for now I need some sleep.

Thanks again for your patience.

PS: and the food on Air Canada made me almost wish the spider thing was true!