Okay, time to start tackling these... (I'll get to all of them, but some have longer answers: if I don't post in order, it's because I'm going with the easier ones first.)

Question: Are you going to do anything involving this Amazing Race season with Alex and Mary-Jane?

Oh. Gawd. No. Most of that is because this is where we draw The End to the season and story: this was about Alex's journey, and the Race is the end of that journey -- or at least a major step along the way. Not playing alone, but with a teammate. Not healed, but healing. I think we can leave her in peace for a while. I'd even say she's earned some.

Also -- and these are the major obstacles to any TAR season, at least one done in story style:

A. It would be just about impossible to do in first person. Part of that is the structure of the Race itself: the teams don't see each other for long stretches of time. An insider's view of the Race is long stretches of travel and brief periods of total chaos. Any TAR tale pretty much has to be a third-person series of fast switches: changing perspective in large and small jumps as the story moves between teams. It's possible -- think of any multi-author viewpoint novel -- but it's a headache. And it means juggling a whole lot of stories at once. You don't have one main character: you have twenty-two.

For this season, we always had at least a glimpse for half of whatever was going on: Turare was seen through Alex's eyes, and the DAW Chorus (the house name for the Internet posters -- it stuck) could catch everyone up on Haraiki until the merge hit. First-person Racing with the same style means the Chorus pretty much takes over. Third-person lets you see everything and removes the Chorus if needed -- but oh, are you ever moving around a lot. And you're asking the reader to do the same amount of traveling from team to team. Where are we? Who are these people? What's their position in relation to each other? Help... Easier when the numbers get cut back a little, and you could even focus on just half the teams at the start -- but that either gives away the final group early or cheats the reader on knowing people if they're not.

And that's just a couple of the potential style problems.

TAR might be easiest to tackle in a nearly-pure dialogue/script style like Zoidberg uses. As a more typical design, it's a nightmare waiting to happen.

B. Research, research, research. You need a course, you need travel times between the points, country information, languages, possibly customs problems and local laws, Detours, Roadblocks... ow... The cheap-and-dirty way out is another domestic season, but -- bleah. Six months of study for one season. And eight readers. Possibly nine. Oh, what fun. Yes! Torture me for no apparent reason again!

C. Did I mention the really low readership count?

D. I'm tired right now... I'm really tired...

Some series are easier than others. TAR has a lot of inherent problems, and a lot of those go to the show's structure. If you fix those, it isn't TAR any more.

I'd love to see someone go for a full-scale fictional TAR season. But for me, right now? Pass. Sleepy. Nap now.

Are you going to show a transcript of Alex and Andi on the Early Show?

No. As with the Race, some things may be better left to the imagination. Besides, the whole point of the TES segments may have been to reach the moment where Robin effectively got Julie off the Survivor air, possibly forever... What's the fun of the segment if someone's there who can actually ask decent questions and may have even heard of the show?

One way to do TAR: eleven writers, each of whom takes a team, and then you just pass off between them during each episode. I've seen it done in novels -- but the coordination required is another 'Thank you sir: may I have another?' problem.