Word about this is starting to get around, but Daily Kos has a good rundown on some of the ramifications of the bankruptcy legislation the banks pushed through a little while ago, which they intended to limit consumer options and get them more money faster. At the moment, though, they're planning to take a hit from it, because among other things, it causes minimum monthly payments on revolving balances to rise quite a bit, which will cause more defaults, especially as people funnel cash toward mortgage payments... And the Bay Area economy hasn't quite recovered yet.

I watched some of Love Actually tonight. As recommended, it's quite good, smartly done and not sappy.

Work has dropped more difficult bugs on me, and I'm starting to realize what a luxury it was in the first several months to be able to crank out lots of code. I understand why burnout is inevitable on the stuff I'm responsible for: there's enough work to occupy three people, and there's really only 1.5 of us. That's okay, though.

I am inordinately excited about my new backpack. I love stuff that holds other stuff. My older brother shares this joy: one Christmas he got me a duffle bag that stuffed into a small stuff sack when empty (sweet, recursive storage happiness!), and as my face lit up the way we like to see when giving gifts, he looked at his wife and said, "See? I told you." For a while now I've been wanting a CamelBak backpack, and a sort of daypack with a low profile that would stay tight on my back and not get in my way as I climbed, hiked, walked, biked, ran (unlikely, but still) or whatever. And I found it, the CamelBak Peak Bagger. Sweet.

I did have some years that went really smoothly, give or take, the latter times in high school and college. In my memory the time is marked by grace, confidence, and a bit less depth than I have now. I think I had an easier time articulating my intuitions about people, but I was also less cautious with them. In retrospect, I had enough uncertainty about myself to kill a horse, just waiting to work itself out, but only really coming out in certain relationships. The cycles of growing up, if you choose, as I do, to spend the rest of your life growing up in an aware and engaged sort of way...they have a kind of they have a kind of Obi-wan Kenobi quality to them as you go from level to level. This arises in aikido and other practices as well, where we spend weeks, months or years with some confusion, and the fog clears and we emerge changed and grown from the time, seeing clearly what we are and, at least in part, how we got there; and turning around we still can't see where we're going, but we know it will be as right and natural as where we now stand.