At some point during all of the festivities, you start pacing yourself. There's that massive dinner coming up, and you're running a serious calorie-overload from the lobster-fest the night before, and somewhere along the line you picked up the tell-tale signs of a hangover flickering around the campfire of consciousness.

It's time to rally the troops, so you hold a "mission briefing" for the central nervous system:

You: OK, boys, listen up. We gotta be sharp out there today.

CNS: [Grumbling and delayed synapse firing...]

You: Now here's the SITREP: We've got prime rib and martinis heading our way—

CNS: Aw jeez, Sarge, it was champagne last night...

You: And we expect you guys to maintain control tonight. Relatives are watching to see how the genetic material holds up.

CNS: Sir, with all due respect, couldn't we just do a turkey sammich and a beer? Speaking for the other guys I think we earned a break here and—

You: Put a sock in it, mister. Just a few more days of this and we'll be heading home. We can treadmill some of this off at the gym tomorrow.

CNS: [In unison] Yeah! Sauna!

You: But New Year's is right after that, so don't get too sassy about it, capisce?

CNS: We won't let you down, Sarge. Right boys?

You: That's the spirit! Now hit that snack tray, double time!

Stuff to Be Thankful About

Yeah, we all get reflective during this season. It's axiomatic that after seeing how much all of your kin and enemies really love you, you think about those who have less—and those who have more. One of the hot gifts this year was plastic surgery; yes, some folks opened up envelopes with gift certficates for Botox and skin lasering.

As The Washington Post reported yesterday, people are trading up on cosmetic presents. Instead of a massage, manicure, facial or spa weekend, Santa's sleigh is brimming with gift certificates for the knife, the needle, the laser and the vacuum pump.

Whatever you do for a living, you probably aren't a Department of Forestry firefighter. These guys not only have a rough job, but since most of 'em get paid only for time spent fighting a raging inferno, they're sitting around hoping for a major conflagration. Of course, they do get perks:

Dinner is a sack lunch—"sack nasties," as they call them—filled with a ham-and-cheese sandwich or two, the occasional cold and salty bean burrito, and the treasured Payday, Skittles, chocolate-chip cookies and granola bars.

But since many bloggers have no background in publishing, they often come to the medium unaware of the rules that apply, and complaints are becoming more common. Many people publish as if they were untouchable, assuming that because what they write appears in a virtual world, it won't come back to burn them in the "real" world.

2:23:28 PM