So, Janey, who’d you get? I got good old Uther Pendragon. Not my first choice, necessarily, as a writing partner—I’d kinda hoped to get one of those fledgling girl-type eroticists—you know, shy and demur and sublimely nubile on the surface, and hot, HOT, steamy-juicy HOT inside—and together we’d plumb the depths, explore the crannies, mine the riches of collaborative sexual expression.

At least with Pendragon I thought I’d learn something about the craft of erotic writing, but the man is awfully grumpy, and when I asked him what I could do to help, he pointed to a crate over in the dark corner of the huge room and said, “Sharpen those.” The crate, once I’d crowbarred it open, revealed a dozen cases of Purist pencils, 12 #2 pencils to each packet, 12 packets to the case. And Uther apparently doesn’t believe in electricity. He handed me a tiny wooden implement—a pencil sharpener in the shape of a lion. My wrists soon got so sore.

In a few minutes I had a dozen done. That should be enough, I thought. “How’s this?” I showed Uther the gleaming carbon tips.