Unsurprising news today: somone's thinking about impeachment proceedings against the President. You knew it was a matter of time, premature as it might be. It mostly serves as a reminder from Bob Graham that he is alive and running for President.

It worries me that trolling for impeachment charges may be the new thing with each administration. It's already hard enough to do anything given that every pundit worth their swizzle stick will be on you if you make a mistake, but throw this in and how can you expect anyone to govern?

Even less surprising is the French coming up with a native term to use in place of e-mail. The new term for the French is "courriel," which is apparently a contraction of the term "courrier electronique." I will say that, if forced to choose, I'd take courriel over the full-length phrase. That you'd even have to choose is ridiculous, but completely in line with the French "defense" of their language.

I say we take the French on at their own game.

READER CHALLENGE What French word, adopted into English, would you get rid of, and what term would come up with to replace it? Email me with your ideas and I'll post what I get.

Locally, the big story is of a Wellesley woman who, suffering from a lengthy case of post-partum depression, called 911 while in the car with her husband, got out of the car, carjacked a commuter, and led police on a chase that ended up Route 95 in Peabody (about 15 minutes from where I grew up). You may have seen a link to this story yesterday on Obscure Store.

While many folks are focusing on the woman, I was interested to read what the carjacking victim said. He originally pulled over because he thought that she was involved in some sort of domestic dispute and wanted to help. He then figured that he should have minded his own business when she took off in his car (and with his dog, who got through the ordeal unscathed).

But how did the guy get help? By flagging down another motorist. Now, if minding one's business was really the best lesson here, he'd have been on the side of the road until a cop came by or he found a phone.

I'm all for being prudent, but the "mind your own business" school of thought has always hit a nerve with me. Kitty Genovese aside, I remember one parent I met with when I was working at BU who claimed that she taught all her kids never to get involved in things (in this case it was a major vandalism incident). She seemed very proud of this fact, and I really had to fight calling her on it. In the back of my head I think the student in question was looking at medicine, which makes me hope I'm never ailing on the street with him passing by.