4:44 a.m. Ok. Now I'm a zombie. I really am. I have no feeling in my limbs. I walk the night, alone. Ooooooh poor me. I have speckles in my vision. My head feels stuffed with cotton.

But the book is done, basically. It's in the box. I believe all the pages are buttoned up, hung neatly, poured and combed over with a fine tooth.

I will answer email tomorrow, first thing, and with great joy. I will return phone calls tomorrow, second thing, and with even greater joy. I will then take a nap, I guarantee. I have to find some antennae for my Halloween costume.

Really. A few hours ago there was this little black dot floating across the monitor, and it wasn't a stray period or a fruit fly. You can get too tired, you know? But here's something to keep in mind -- I haven't had any coffee, or even tea for that matter, or Tab, or soda, ever since I read in a medical self-help book last month that I should avoid caffeine.

The world's slowest-moving infection is still making its presence known, and although I'm mostly improved, I'm still drinking cranberry juice. But if you would have told me that I could stay up all night several nights in a row -- without coffee -- I would have laughed in your general direction. Who knew this was possible? I mean, I've been drinking coffee for maybe forty years now. And then suddenly: nah.

I was all set to leap, happily leap, back into a big steaming cup of joe as soon as I thought the infection was going, and you know what? It just tasted and smelled bitter and nasty? And so I didn't bother. And you know what? It's nice to know that a body can wake up and stay awake just by moving around in the morning.

I don't even miss the ritual that much. I moved my office around and I haven't even plugged in my mug warmer. I have more than one, but they're going unused. It's so odd.

I did take a break and watch Action tonight. If you think there's nothing unusual on TV, you really should check it out. It's not unlike picking up a rock in the dark shadiest corner of your old backyard and crouching down with a magnifying glass as the weird shiny creatures slither and skitter, suddenly exposed. Fascinating in a horrible sort of way.

You will probably think about certain scenes long after the show is over. The Big Guy in the white bathrobe, for instance. He's hard to forget. And the screenwriter with the orange and brown-striped crocheted afghan on his miserable futonish couch. I don't know. If I told you I've met all these people, at least once, maybe then it would make more sense.

But it's worse. I actually work with some of these people, even when Halloween is over. At Lift a Rock Productions, where it's always on spec and over the line and off the top and gross -- you wouldn't believe how gross.

That's why, of course, staying up all night to make sure a book gets bundled off to the printer all neat and on time is a privilege and a pleasure. And so is taking a nice hot bath. Zombies like bubbles.

See you tomorrow.