I didn’t feel very good last Wednesday evening, and the feeling only got worse Thursday. So when I woke up Friday about 4 a.m. with a fever of 103° and severe body aches from head to toe, I knew something was wrong. I ended up at the urgent care center about 3 p.m. and tested positive for strep throat.

Well, as luck would have it, a former co-worker had just loaned me his copy of the first season of Lost, an ABC television show shot entirely on location on O’ahu, Hawai’i. The premise is that a plane crashes on the island with 40-odd survivors.

I tried watching the show when it was broadcast, and for some reason, it didn’t stick. The first episode opens with the survivors of the crash on the beach, the burning jet engine still spinning next to a large chunk of the fuselage. Maybe it was too soon after 9/11 (the show came out in the fall of 2004), but for some reason, that scene killed it for me. As soon as that one engine sucked a guy in before blowing up, I switched it off.

Now, I wanted to like Lost. I had heard a lot about it – how it was going to be kind of Twin Peaksish with strange and subliminal backstories, etc. Well, since I was sick, I figured this would be a good time to see if I liked the show. And all I can say after watching 22 episodes back-to-back is Wow!

The show awakens the same part of me that William Golding’s Lord of the Flies did when I read it as a sophomore in high school. To this day, Lord of the Flies remains my favorite book. As I watched, I founded it stirring the part of my psyche that would enjoy being stranded on a deserted island with strangers. Yah, I said it: I think it would be cool to be stranded on a deserted tropical island. After watching the entire first season, I’m too tired mentally to explain that statement, but it’s true.

I’ll probably download the second season from that iPod Web site that is a cheap knock-off of Napster (well, iTunes does have video for download, but still, I’m sticking to principles here).