Sherlock Holmes and 3:30 AM notes

 Who starts writing things at 3:30 AM?

Well, Stanley Hopkins for one. With a high-society murder that he knew would get Sherlock Holmes heading for Abbey Grange before dawn to come investigate. 

Also, bloggers who finally caught the dread virus after two and a half years of avoiding it, thanks to Mr. Sherlock Holmes and missed their Blogaugust goal of a post a day. (Does 3:30 AM on Friday still pass for Thursday? Probably not, but I made this goal, so I'm making the requirements. It's still Thursday night in Blogaugust.)

How can I blame Sherlock Holmes for my own indiscretions, which led to the catching of said virus?

Well, he just places such tempting lures in our path. "Come on down to a college town the weekend the freshmen are all rolling in and see something of me you've never seen before!" he whispers. "Oh, and here's a social event at a pub that doesn't know how to seat a large group, which folks you haven't seen in years . . ." 

Such lures. In these times when you never know if you're the carrier or the receiver, and the lion's share of the population, including now the CDC, going "Ah, just go for it!" I suppose it was inevitable. My eighty-something-year-old mother and step-father both caught it and made it through okay, having vaxxed to the max, as I have. But now I have to worry about the people in my life who aren't quite as healthy as me, and the damage I might have inadvertently done there before the second test proved that this just wasn't a touch of flu.

But, hey, Sherlock Holmes.

He's always been the carrot at the end of a stick I hold in front of myself to get me to move, whether it was to travel to some distance city or to ask a girl on a date for the first time. (A story for another time.) The detective has been woven so thoroughly thru the experiences of my life that I have to actually wonder: So, maybe this isn't the thing that kills me, but will the thing that finally does end me be Sherlock Holmes related somehow?

Well, of course, everything is related to Sherlock Holmes does at some point. Unpublished writer Douglas Maberly died of pneumonia before Holmes took up his case, and how many people does that wind up being the end of? Kind of doubt I'll get harpooned, but getting shot is rising up the charts, and . . . whoa, why so grim, Brad? Sure, it's the wee hours of the morning and you've got the cursed virus, and you're ticked that you missed getting a Thursday date on this post from all the distraction of testing positive earlier "this evening." (Sticking with my story.)

I should write about my good fortune in forming a JHWS Treasure Hunt team and giving them a document to work before all this hit. Going to have to contribute something to that effort this weekend to keep up my street cred. But maybe, for now, I should just go back to bed.

Good idea.