Coincidence? I think not.

Consider three news stories from the past 48 hours:

1. Japanese man memorizes and recites the value of pi to 83,431 decimal places, then calls it quits.
2. Sandra Day O'Connor, having almost single-handedly decided the close cases among about 1,000 decided by the Supreme Court in her tenure, finishes her 24th year and calls it quits.
3. NASA crashes spacecraft into comet. Intentionally.

The common thread is this: In each case, the operating entity (the pi guy, Justice O'Connor, and NASA) had reached sufficient milestones that he/she/it was ready to screw around for awhile.