Over.

After nearly two weeks in a "Hot House" and a night last night that went almost to dawn, I slept in today and am slowly returning to the land of the living.

The first thing I did when I finally woke up was take a long walk along the river. I don't believe creativity is served if you are sequestered from sunlight. If you are shackled to a table and stink-eyed if you need to get out and walk.

As Yogi Berra might have said, 'you can observe so much by seeing,' but instead we were heads down in a sticky loft of iniquity peering deep, with electron microscopes, into our collective navels. Not an interesting view, or a good one, or one conducive, I think, to creative elan.

That said, I can't be wholly dismissive of the process either. It demands forced concentration. It brings in people from different entities who carry the banners of different disciplines and who trumpet different points of view.

I think all that's good. I think that part of the process produced a good amount of ideas. Which was the whole point in the first place.

Last night, the last couple of night actually, when work had to be writ, comped, proofed and revised, I thought of a World War II hero (and later Vietnam villian), head of the US Air Force, General Curtis LeMay.

I have a bit, or more than a bit of LeMay in me.

He earned the nickname "Old Iron Ass" for his ability to sit on his keister and grind out work for hours on end. I did a little bit of that for the last two weeks.

It's over now.

I think the work was pretty good and I hope it goes well.

I hope to return to the living soon.