True story: One time a friend and neighbor of mine who worked for the World Bank was slated to go to Africa on some big fancy World Bank trip to Africa. In order to go on this fancy World Bank trip to Africa he was prescribed a potent batch of anti-malaria pills. As you may or may not have heard about anti-malaria pills, they can sometimes have adverse effects on the person taking them. Like hallucinations. This poor guy, for reasons he never fully explained, decided to check his e-mail--deep in the throes of medicinally-induced hallucinations and night-terrors. Long story short: he called one of his clients a terrible, terrible name. And to facilitate his hasty retirement from the World Bank, copied his entire department on the e-mail, boss and all.

If only he had Mail Goggles. 

What, you may be asking, are Mail Goggles? Simply put, Google's latest offering is raddest thing to ever arrive in Rad Town: a filter that strives to keep you from sending e-mail that, deep down, you don't really mean to send. You know, like when it's 3 AM and you've just emptied your cabinets of Johnny Walker and Ben AND Jerry before settling in to check your Gmail--and maybe ping that ex you've been thinking about stalking--before hitting the sack (a little moment I like to call "Wednesday").

Google wants to help you NOT send that e-mail! Behold:

The way it works, I gather from the official Gmail blog, is that you can choose when it's active. If you're routinely prone to, say, judgment-debilitating weekend behavior, then just have your Gmail account give you a little Mail Goggle quiz wduring certain judgment-debilitated hours. Presto! You can't send that e-mail unless you really want to.

Of course, if your will to self-sabotage is as strong as mine, you can always give up on the e-mail and send a really incriminating text message. Complete with photo.