Internews founder and president, David Hoffman, is counting down the days with marbles.

Hoffman points to a basin full of marbles he keeps in his office. His two younger daughters, by a second and recently ended marriage, gave it to him. They used actuarial tables to calculate his life expectancy and put in the bowl one marble for each week the tables say he has left. Every Monday, he takes one and puts it in his pocket, carries it all week, then on Sunday throws it away. He takes this week’s marble from his pocket and rubs it, then says, “There are plenty of marbles left.”

~Johns Hopkins Magazine, June 2005

If I tried this, I’d be tempted to add marbles every now and then instead of taking them out.