We made a baby yesterday! Introducing Hokey Pokey, 8 lbs 8 oz, born 11/26/10.

We started a new family tradition this Thanksgiving, and I felt obligated to share:

That's right! No family holiday is complete with a trip to Ye Olde CARWASH.

Okay, so we didn't really go there. But I will note, here, for future car wash empresarios: Ye Olde CARWASH probably shouldn't advertise one of its key selling points as "LASERS!" (signage not pictured, as I was already creeping people out taking crappy cell-phone-camera pics of a CARWASH).

As you all know, I have a tradition of listening to Alice's Restaurant on Thanksgiving Day, so I like to make it available a day early for anyone who wants to play, too. Then the old-timers have a tradition of saying they were sick of this song before I was out of shortpants.

"Performances by an elder statesman of classic rock, Carlos Santana, was a look back", begins a sentence in a hard-hitting article about Justin Bieber. Elsewhere an attempt at syllepsis turns into an ugly comma splice: "Still, this is the first major U.S. opera staging by a feisty young American who lives in Berlin, has ideas and German fans in high places."

And of course credulity regarding the TSA and pornoscanners.

There are plenty of things I like about my job -- arguing with people in court; convincing judges that we're right and the other side is wrong; folding gracefully when my side happens to be momentarily in the wrong. But I am cranky and worried about it all the time.

I've been realizing that I've got a very low limit for the number of unconnected tasks that I can keep track of at the same time without feeling continuously threatened and panicky, and it doesn't really matter how insignificant they are. I'll be paying attention to my most urgent task, and maintaining a steady background level of panic about the four problems I can't get to yet, because I can't imagine how I'm going to be able to get everything done. And then once I clear the top couple of items off the agenda, and I'm down to three or fewer pending projects, suddenly it becomes apparent that there's actually not all that much work to do; I go straight from "Oh my god, I can't cope, I'm going to drop everything and be disbarred for missing deadlines" to "Huh, how will I amuse myself on this dull day at the office with nothing urgent to work on?" More than four or so ongoing matters that I have to monitor feels like an emergency, regardless of how undemanding each one is, and I have a hell of a time objectively evaluating what I really need to do when I have that emergency feeling.

This is probably the sort of problem that decent people solve by making better to do lists, and keeping their files organized. Me, I fantasize about leaving litigation and getting a job raking patterns into the sand of a meditation garden. And really, who's to day which is a more practical solution?

Here's a light thread to provide some conversation fodder, while the thread below is going on.

An idle corollary to the game "What was I doing half my life ago?" is to try to remember what you'd just learned at that age, and then to exclaim "I've been doing X for most of my life!" For example, I've understood conic sections for most of my life! I've been able to recite Gin And Juice for most of my life! Now you try.

My sainted mother said to me yesterday, "I can see happiness in your eyes for the first time in a long time." I'm doing my best not to take this as a back-handed compliment.

"Man, you were looking like total dogshit for a while there."