Part one: Going over eighty. In your spare time ; The sissy strikes back ; The diminished thing ; Catching up, ha ha -- The Annals of Pard. Choosing a cat ; Chosen by a cat -- Part two: The lit biz. Would you please fucking stop? ; Readers' questions ; Kids' letters ; Having my cake ; Papa H ; A much-needed literary award ; TGAN and TGOW ; TGAN again ; The narrative gift as a moral conundrum ; It doesn't have to be the way it is ; Utopiyin, utopiyang -- The Annals of Pard. The trouble ; Pard and the time machine -- Part three: Trying to make sense of it. A band of brothers, a stream of sisters ; Exorcists ; Uniforms ; Clinging desperately to a metaphor ; Lying it all away ; The inner child and the nude politician ; A modest proposal: vegempathy ; Belief in belief ; About anger -- The Annals of Pard. An unfinished education ; An unfinished education, continued ; Doggerel for my cat -- Part four: Rewards. The circling stars, the sea surrounding : Philip Glass and John Luther Adams ; Rehearsal ; Someone named Delores ; Without egg ; Notre-Dame de la Faim ; The tree ; The horsies upstairs ; First contact ; The lynx ; Notes from a week at a ranch in the Oregon high desert.