(no subject)

Following a chain of links, I came across this excerpt from a book:

What would you do right now if you learned that you were going to die in ten minutes? Would you race upstairs and light that Marlboro you've been hiding in your sock drawer since the Ford administration? Would you waltz into your boss's office and present him with a detailed description of his personal defects? Would you drive out to that steakhouse near the new mall and order a T-bone, medium rare, with an extra side of the really bad cholesterol? Hard to say, of course, but of all the things you might do in your final ten minutes, it's a pretty safe bet that few of them are things you actually did today.

I would have thought that was a no-brainer: I would spend those ten minutes preparing myself for death. I would close my eyes, make my peace with God on the offchance that there is one, and summon the most joyous and loving thoughts I could to my dying mind.

Unless, of course, I was in a room with a really attractive woman, in which case it would be tempting to find out if "I've only got ten minutes to live" was an effective chat-up line.