Morning Briefings

A Final Farewell: How Randy Pausch, a 47-Year-Old College Professor Came to Teach His Family About Love, Courage and Saying Goodbye. Dying of pancreatic cancer, he showed a love of life and an approach to death that people have found inspiring. His lecture has become a reminder that our own futures are similarly — if not drastically — brief. His fate is ours, sped up.

– Jeffrey Zaslow
The Wall Street Journal

Your pain and suffering are real because they are yours. You must embrace them and realize that they, too, are a gift of life because they take you out of yourself and, for a moment, make you one with all others who have known loss or pain or suffering.

– Kent Nerburn
Letters to My Son: A Father’s Wisdom on Manhood, Life and Love

Farewell to a titan: Carl Karcher, who parlayed a modest hot dog stand into a multimillion-dollar fast-food enterprise, died Friday. He was 90. ‘I interviewed Carl regularly in the mid-1980s. Everyone who met him received two things: a coupon for a free Carl’s Jr. hamburger and a copy of the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi,’ according to

– The Orange County Register’s
Jan Norman

One day in a moment of great crisis, I came to understand the words of my [dying] father, ‘If I die, it will be glory; if I live, it will be grace.’ That faith was his evening star–the faith in a power greater than man.

– William O. Douglas
This I Believe

You should regularly review your credit report, keeping an eagle eye out for such things as unrecognizable names, a change of address, accounts you don’t recall opening or past-due notices on accounts that you did open but no longer use. An additional barrier to identity theft is a “freeze’ on your credit report, meaning that the credit bureau cannot release your report to anyone without your approval.

– Terri Cullen
The Wall Street Journal Complete Identity Theft Guidebook: How to Protect Yourself from the Most Pervasive Crime in America

First American to eliminate 1,300 jobs: Title insurer will cut about 4% of its workforce.

– The Orange County Register, September 5, 2007