"You wake up at Seatac, SFO, LAX. You wake up at O'Hare, Dallas-Fort Worth, BWI. Pacific, Mountain, Central. Lose an hour, gain an hour. This is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time. You wake up at Air Harbor International. If you wake up at a different time, in a different place, could you wake up as a different person?"

Yes, Chuck, you can. You can wake up at John Wayne. You can wake up at John Wayne on a Monday night 2200 miles behind schedule, after two klonazepam and a Johnnie Walker chaser. You can wake up on a Monday night at John Wayne and wait in line for a bus to shuttle you to a management offsite where you wake up on a Tuesday a different person. And on a Wednesday and on a Thursday where you discuss workforce productivity and enterprise architecture until you wake up again at DFW and again at RDU on a Friday. Where you see your children and you see your wife and you remember who you are. And on a Saturday when it's back to early morning wake-ups with the Technivorm, early morning wake-ups with Lee, when it's back to diapers, back to bottles, and back to breakfasts in front of the television.

Random leaps:

The latest object of my material affection: The Rancilio Silva. Of course the bonus pool was much smaller this year, so it may be the no-frills Gaggia Espresso instead.

Just finished: Rick Moody - The Ice Storm

Just starting: Nicholson Baker - The Mezzanine, Italo Calvino - The Watcher and Other Stories

Today's agenda: Isabel at soccer and Wisconsin at UNC.

Thank you: Robert Whyte