The magic number is eight.

That’s according to the Count on this morning’s Sesame Street. And he ain’t kidding.

8:00am ends my only hour of down time in the day. During this hour, Leah and Sarah are sleeping. Asher’s watching Sesame Street, and I get to shower, catch up on emails, and plan the day.

Things are mostly under control here. Asher and I both have colds and Leah has a perpetual tummy ache, but that’s par for the course. The only real bummer is the constant rain. Try entertaining a sniffly toddler indoors for a week.

Actually, my real concern is what’s happening at work while I’m gone. It seems that my projects are not really moving forward, and I’ll have a lot of pushing to do next week.

Of secondary concern is this paper due on May 3. I’ve got a theme – something about the social impact of convergence on the news media (i.e., how it’s giving rise to evolved consumer behaviors), and how news organizations can operate responsibly/profitably in the age of the continuous news cycle. Sound good? Anyone got any academic sources I can cite? Right now, I’m looking at two ill-fitting books that are part of the course, an On The Media interview with one of the reporters from Talking Points Memo, and a few tidbits from other tomes I have laying around. Of course, I can blather on about this topic endlessly, but I think this is supposed to be a paper, not an essay.

Sesame Street’s winding down. Time to bust out the Ernie bowl and get the oatmeal ready.