Unmuffled.

My boss is back in town, and I'm back at his office again, and I'll still be doing some telecommuting, but not doing it constantly anymore, and I'm much happier working today than I have been in some time.

I know what a big part of the problem is:

I am deeply, strongly, heavily reliant on non-verbal feedback during a conversation. Ironically enough, although I'm a writer, the words are only half of the transaction. I need your tone of voice, your body language, your eye contact (or the lack thereof). Without it, I can't tell if you're lying, exaggerating, happy, unhappy, ready to wring my neck .... I can't tell if I'm understanding you correctly, or if I'm being understood.

This is why I don't like talking on the phone in general. It's like trying to carry on a conversation while wearing a diving helmet. But when I'm talking to someone who controls my paycheck, trying to tell the difference between "I'm mildly put out right now" and "I'm thirty seconds away from firing your ass" becomes a wee bit more stressful.