Dog Ate Our Homework

A discombobulated week upset our best intentions

SOME WEEKS the stories arrive and depart on time like a French bullet train, as if propelled by rail magnets from assignments to posting.

This week, not so. A tumbling series of events—missed deadlines, a medical mystery, dental appointments, housekeeping mishaps—I could go on—derailed our usual schedule of three, four, sometimes five original stories a …