Friends...

Friends are important. Really important. I was thinking about another benefit of friendship today when an acquaintance on the telephone began exploring deeply personal issues and crossing boundaries with his frustrations.  I didn’t really know this guy that well, and I was a bit shocked at his behavior.  Then it dawned on me, he is friendless.  Although he has plenty of acquaintances, he has not confidant. Therefore a stranger, an animal, or a lightpost can take away his pain. High times, toasts, and roaring laughter I often associated with friendship, but...

Attention....

Don’t choke on your Ritalin when I say this, but I love to work with people who have ADD. Or, maybe I can’t stand working with people that don’t, the bores.  Either way, I made a startling discovery today:  I have deep respect for those that can run laps (and rabbit trails) around the others. After a meeting this morning (with someone whom I had assumed to be more OCD than ADD), I exclaimed to a colleague, “[Blank] is VERY smart!”  I loved the fact that we were carrying on multiple conversations with as many digressions as a schizophrenic...

Talk away....

Cresting the hill of 129 South just past campus, I was in a race to get home and crack open my Tennessee Law Instute update cold beer and get down to some bar studying. Simultaneously, I spotted the cop parked out under the bridge and my speedometer boasting 70–I knew I was screwed. Like any respectible red handed criminal, I slammed on the brakes–admitting my guilt, conforming to the law, and possibly seeking mercy. I approached the policeman with caution observing every movement of the patrol car, but there were none. I peered into the drivers’ seat...

The best thing about being a pessimist&#...

…is that you can always think of a worse situation. Share the...

Aut-Six...

WHOA!  What a year this is going to be?  We have milestone years in our life, but this one will perhaps be the most significant for me.  Things to do this year: 1. Turn Thirty. 2. Graduate from Law School. 3. Take (and pass) the bar. 4. Have another baby (not me personally, of course). 5. Begin my professional career. Here I sit January 1 at a Starbucks thinking about all of this–kind of surreal. Happy New Year. Share the...

Eat, Drink, and be Merry...

Pat Robertson doesn’t have to tell you that the world is a seemingly scary place to live right now. Natural disasters, Wars, and Terrorism are all around. Now, the threat of a pandemic is evolving into a perfect storm with the spread of the bird flu through the East. To all of this doom and gloom I say, “Eat, Drink, and be Merry!” This saying connotes, strong middle ages usage. In that time there was little predictability to health and mortality. But somehow in our modern world we feel that we can predict our lives. We plan our lives out for 5, 10, 25,...

Epidemic?...

I don’t want to strike fear in anyone. MSNBC, CNN, and FoxNews are such experts at distributing desperation that I would not want to diminish their impact. I just have one question: What usually happens when we travel? When I travel I usually get the sniffles–at a minimum and sometimes I get far sicker. As far as I understand this phenomenon, our immune systems build up antibodies to local environmental viruses and bacteria. When we are exposed to foreign strains of disease, we are ill-prepared to deal with those strains. New Orleans is forcing every citizen...

Hobbies Investments...

As I have watched obsessed over Katrina’s devastation this last week, through my media center computer, I have really thought about the hobbies that I have in my life. The winds and the water came into these people’s lives and wiped away all investments that they had. Months and years of acquiring “things” was wiped away in the matter of hours, in turn, the victims will get a piece of paper–at best. While watching the finely tuned news channels, I realize that countless days and hours went into creating my truly all-in-one media center. I...