Warm, only slightly damp, and Oprah-approved

It's a rainy day in San Francisco, and I'm still glad that I'm not James Frey. Collette will usually be our Friday nanny, but she's out of town this week. Maya's dismantling some toys as I get a few thoughts out for the day. Megan's been taking Maya out in the Park as we all love to do in the mornings here, but I was glad to have dibs on getting outside with her today. Some parts of the world are surely getting cold weather today. Not here. Not missing it much either.

Maya's not nearly mastered the confidence necessary to start walking on her 11-month Birthday. But every once in a while she forgets to hold on to something and she holds her standing position just fine. Then she realizes and grabs back onto support of some sort. Thankfully no hard crackin' headers taken, recently or otherwise. So maybe she's athletic. Or at least not clumsy. And maybe by her First Birthday we'll see some real steps. Expect that you'll hear of it first here.

I've been listening to podcasts of the Al Franken show occasionally, including on this morning's run. I expect that the Sundance boiled-down re-broadcasts are no longer being produced in part because Al's back in Minneapolis (broadcasting from the MiniIconic Foshay Tower). I've recently heard while buzzing through much of his show that 3 hours is often a lot of space to fill. Al's good much of the time, yet lameish and good-spirited when he's out on a limb with a bit that doesn't have a real pay-off. Today's show had a golden nugget early on, nonetheless. Al was riffing on how the FISA Court had only turned down 5 warrant requests since 1979, while giving the thumbs-up to 19,000. He went into a bit about how the 5 requests all came from one intelligence agent who kept trying to bug his wife because "she's cheating on me (SOB!)" with her boss, and then 4 other guys. Al's voice skills and timing are amazing. Stream it (go to iTunes). Well worth the time taken to download or listen through the first 10 minutes.

I think Maya's looking for some playtime assistance. Hope your own playtime is prodigious today. Rock on.