Welcome to my hotheads, friends, friends of friends, friends I haven't met yet,

and most importantly, any talking animals pretending they're not listening to ensure their owners

suspect nothing.

It's Aparnan and Charla with you once again with an episode of Too Hot for Radio.

The show where, month after month, we

answer the question that nobody asked. What if some super hot fan fiction won a national

book award? That's right. The short stories performed on this podcast are smart, literary,

and often naughty. You decide which parts of the story are which.

In this episode, love, sex, the great outdoors, and oh so much more. It's a story in which our

narrator has 99 problems and the vast majority of them are in fact boyfriend related.

The remaining problems relate to her dog, Jackson.

And Jackson is a male dog, so a bitch is still not, in fact, one of those problems.

This story is by Pam Houston.

Houston is a novelist, memorist, and short storywriter whose titles include

Cowboys Are My Weakness, Waltzing the Cat, and her latest autobiographical volume without

exception. If you've not read her stories, she's got a very recognizable authorial voice.

This story has some slightly surreal imagery and a playful syntax, and there are a lot

of blurred lines between the boyfriend and the dog.

Which brings me to my next point.

My warning about the things that may have kept this story from airing on the radio.

Warning.

Sexy talk.

...