Anonymous Lawyer

I was stuck in the dentist's office for an hour and a half this afternoon. There should be a VIP line at the dentist. Pay a little extra, get quicker service. It's ridiculous that an important person should have to waste ninety billable minutes in a dental office. I once advised an associate to get all his teeth pulled when he was young, in the gap between the bar exam and the start of work. Get some fake ones put in there and then you never have to worry about the dentist ever again and all the productivity loss that causes. Doctors too, but it's not as easy to get rid of that distraction. You can't avoid all human contact. Although you can certainly make an effort to avoid contact with the kinds of people who tend to get the worst kinds of diseases. No one in a position like this, where we're needed to be sharp and healthy every day of the year, should be hanging out in hospitals, or soup kitchens, or public schools, or anywhere where the poor and sick tend to congregate.

While I was waiting at the dentist, I browsed through a copy of this week's Time Magazine. I read an absurd quote in an article about a guy with a new comedy show on some cable station. He said the egotistical character he plays wouldn't be a good dad because your kids need to be more important than you. That's pretty silly. Obviously you're the one who should be more important, or else how are your kids going to learn to respect you. You need them to realize you're out there in the world doing important work and earning the money that allows them to live the lives they're getting the chance to live. They can't be the ones in control, or I'd never get out of the house and back to the office, with the whining and the grabbing onto your legs and the ear infections and the food allergies. Did we have this many food allergies when my generation was children? I think we coddle youngsters too much today. A little food allergy never hurt anyone. I don't mean the peanut things where people can die, but some hives or itchiness just isn't a big deal compared to the kinds of transactions we're dealing with at the office every single day. They should realize how lucky they are we have enough food in the house that they have the luxury of being able to be allergic to some of it.