It's becoming a cliche to say that the day held more bad news about the economy, but the facts are staggering. Record-breaking losses, astonishing devaluations. Everyday more layoffs, everyday more closures.

Today, Tom texted that his company exercised its first round of layoffs, without warning. He said the general rule is not to answer the phone on Thursday afternoons.

At last, we at our company are starting to notice that we're working harder to get business and we're having a harder time keeping it as client budgets and programs get cut midstream. But, we're still plenty busy. I personally have enough work to keep me busy for weeks, although I have to admit that most of it is not directly billable.

Despite the progressive disappearance of boutiques and other specialty stores, and the occasional sting when a friend has been spared in a round of layoffs, I still have this surreal sense that the depression is a serial drama playing out on the communications streams. When I look away from the devices, everything appears normal. Restaurants and coffee shops are packed, people are still planning vacations, and they're still paying ten dollars every day to park in a lot next to the office. Etc.

Tonight, Andrew and I met at the art museum for dinner. It was a full house and the pace of dinner was a crawl. With 15 minutes left before the museum closed, we checked our bags and sprinted up the escalators in search of things that look like demos. We settled in the Oceanic & Aboriginal section, meditating on strokes and dabs set to swarm. Then they kicked us out.