Bowl or Cup?

Mission creep is what group dynamics folks describe what the rest of us might well call L.O.S.T, or Line Of Sight Tasking (I'm still not sure what we call group dynamics without making our moms cry). 

At some point in a project one of the very bright people who came up with the original idea realizes there's yet another function s/he forgot within the transaction and announces 'someone needs to do/be .....' The first person who makes eye contact inherits this new responsibility with absolutely no authority or means to accomplish it. Don't look up! Oops, thanks for playing.

It's part of our lives as individuals, as well, as fretting in the various roles we each play in the drama. I had a plateful (and more) when it was just me, myself, and I. Falling in love and getting married moved me, or us, to egoisme a deux, and then we had children. Solo, spouse, and parent, while also being a child, sibling, and wearing a half dozen other hats. You can't tell the players without a scorecard, especially when we each are covering numerous positions.

Is there a limit to all this multitasking, if that's what it actually is? (I like to think that term is better applied to linked tasks rather than totally different ones, like a product being both a floor polish and a dessert topping.) When do we reach a limit, and how do we know? 

I remember the urban legend about how to cook a frog in boiling water. As I recall, if you place a frog in a pot of boiling water, it will simply hop back out; but, if you place the frog in the pot of water and then slowly raise the heat of the flame under the pot, the frog will never move until it has been cooked. This leads me to wonder how much more moist our nation will become. Perhaps the wetter the better, but doubtful.

-bill kenny