As TEMS viewers already know, I’m going for a week-long vacation with the First Mate for the first real down time I’ve had in three years.  The boss insisted on it, although she also wondered whether I’ll be able to resist getting on line and writing for that long.  We’ll have to see.  What’s the over/under on how long it will be before I post something while on vacation?  Vote in the poll:

Of course, while on vacation, I’ll have plenty of opportunity to catch up on reading, a luxury that full-time blogging sometimes eclipses.  The three books I’ll take along just arrived this week, and the first two have a particular interest to our family.  First, Larry’s Kidney tells the story of how a man traveled to China to donate a kidney to his brother, and the travails he endured to do it.  Sally Satel’s collection of arguments on whether to offer compensation for kidney donations, When Altruism Isn’t Enough, should be provocative, too, as the First Mate has received two live-donor kidneys without compensation. I discussed this with her nephrologist, who had some surprising opinions about the issue.

Lastly, I’ll try to squeeze in the new biography of Curtis LeMay, an oft-maligned, oft-celebrated figure in American military history, titled simply LeMay. We’ll see if Warren Kozak sheds light on the man usually credited with carpet-bombing, and who helped America win World War II.

Update (AP): Consider this an early alert for our Greenroom contributors that there’ll be plenty of room for promoting posts to the front page next week. Keep the content coming, or I warn you: I’ll be forced to resort to a week’s worth of Meghan McCain posts to fill the gap.