Hire Sean Gleeson, the blogger who doubles as a pillow. Adjustable firmness. Reasonable rates! Serious inquiries only.

We’ll be following our family custom, gathering at Bugga and Granddad’s house for some of the best food on God’s earth. My best wish for you is that you do something almost as enjoyable. A Happy Thanksgiving Day tomorrow to you and yours.

The playing cards native to India are called ganjifa. The classic ganjifa deck comprises 96 circular cards, 12 ranks of 8 suits. The card depicted below, the Queen of Hearts, is a hybrid from the late 19th Century, which utilized French suits (spades, diamonds, clubs, and hearts) instead of the classic ganjifa suits.

I discovered ganjifa cards in the course of designing my super-secret new game, which I’ve decided will have an Indian motif. I won’t be using the ganjifa cards, I’m sticking with the familiar rectangular deck of 52 placards. But the ganjifa are interesting, so I thought you might like to see them.

I hate to be so secretive, but I’ve been working on some really great things I can’t tell you about.

I have begun making a new original online card game. This one isn’t for a client, it’s just something I’ve been wanting to make for a long time. I can’t describe it now in great detail, or else someone else might steal my idea before I launch it. But it will be an innovative variant of video poker that will be fast-paced and highly enjoyable. I hope to license it to gaming sites when it’s finished.

And my brother Kevin approached me with an idea for a retail website. I’m afraid I can’t spill the beans on that right now, either. But it’s a promising idea for selling a unique item. If the project gets done, it will be a fun site to make, and to visit.

Is there anything I worked on today that isn’t a big secret? Well, I can tell you I cooked a delicious supper of eggs, potatoes, and toast. That will have to do.

In counterpoise to the American Cancer Society’s annual Great American Smokeout, I am starting an annual tradition of my own, featuring a gallery of ten Great American Smokers. In our opinion, these American statesmen, scientists, artists, and heroes tower above the whiny quitters whom the ACS would have you take for role models.

It may be that you have a favorite Great American Smoker whom I’ve left out of this series. If so, leave a comment. I’ll be doing ten every year; I’ll get to yours eventually.

And if these profiles of our nation’s luminaries enjoying our native leaf inspire any of our readers to take up smoking, well, go ahead and light up. It’s still a free country.

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“The Straight Dope,” a syndicated column by Cecil Adams, specializes in snappy answers to puckish questions (e.g., How do porcupines mate?) But the Straight Dope website just posted a four-part overview of copyright law (here, here, here, and here) that is as good a primer as any I’ve seen on the topic. If you have any curiosity about how intellectual property law works, this is a good introduction.