So I just found out that the attorney in the office next to my wife's is worth, combined with his mother, nearly US $4 billion. The Schaefflers are in a 5-way tie for the 83rd spot on Forbes' World's Richest People 2003 list. We're both stumped as to why he would waste time pretending to work at a law firm in Dallas. Me? I'd be planted on a beach on Kaua'i.

Now I know why I like "I Drove All Night" by Celine Dion so much--it's a Roy Orbison song. It was driving me batty; I knew this wasn't an original song by Celine, that I had heard it before. I remembered liking it from those past listening sessions. I knew it was a male voice kicking around in my head. Then it just suddenly clicked. I'm digging out my Orbison cassettes and CDs when I get home...

Damn you, Daimler-Chrysler. Thanks to your commercials, I cannot get Celine Dion's "I Drove All Night" out of my head. Now the MP3 is in rotation in iTunes. She has a set of pipes on her, I'll say that much. (from her latest album)

A barber shop. That's what I want. Not a salon. Not another Supercuts, Great Clips, Sports Clips, or any other generic salon-style chain that have all but killed the Great American Barber Shop. I'm tired of salons. I'm tired of Great Clips, Sports Clips, Supercuts, et al. Salons are for the ladies. Men don't see stylists; we see barbers. I want real barber chairs, hot shaving foam, straight razors. The operation overseen by a cast of crusty old SOBs who know how to talk sports, politics, hunting, fishing, power tools, cars; you know, guy stuff. Call the chamber of commerce, suggests my spouse. Ask them if they know of any in the town. Well, what do you know? :) Just opened this past October, the Back N Time Antique Barber Shop is what I've been looking for. The staff isn't old, or crusty, and I've only been there once, so I can't speak much as to if they are SOBs. But we talked March Madness and hockey. Complimentary sodas. Complimentary snacks & candy. Antique furniture, especially of the barber-shop variety. They have an old cash register that would take at least two guys to carry out the door, more likely three--if it wasn't bolted to an antique cabinet. An old shoeshine stand stands guard by the front door, which is flanked by barber poles. Oh, right--the haircut. Aces. I got a great haircut in the kind of atmosphere I grew up with. I will definitely be seeing Steve, Fred, Ace, and Jimmie Z again.

Jerry Jerk, er, Jones, has released the NFL's all-time leading rusher from the Dallas Cowboys. Players take note: this is how Jerry rewards your (well-paid) service to his organization. After 13 years, 3 Super Bowl wins, and the rushing title, Emmitt is now out in the cold. The only reason Jones kept Smith around for the 2002 season was so Number 22 would break the league rushing record in a Cowboys uniform; again, glorification for Jones' ego. In case you haven't guessed, I'm not a Cowboys fan, and have not been since we moved to Dallas. I remain, however, an Emmitt Smith fan, and I hope he gets what he wants: a shot at another Super Bowl as a team's number-one back. Everyone in Dallas will be in tears that Jerry let Emmitt go, but they'll spin it as simply a financial matter, that Smith is costing the team too much money. Jerry has long hinted that he doesn't think Emmitt has what it takes any more to be a number-one running back. Gee, Jerry, maybe if Emmitt had an offensive line that could block elderly grandmothers, much less Pro Bowl linebackers, that would've helped the past three seasons. And a quarterback that could throw accurately and consistently wouldn't hurt either.

Burger King has joined McDonald's on my places of never to eat again.

So, back in January, the New York Times' editorial page headline screamed "The War Against Women," the letter therein lambasting the Bush administration's moves with regard to the right to life. The Times chose to use the term "anti-choice" in the editorial, rather than "pro-life." This fails to honor the news-writing custom of adopting a group's preferred terminology in referring to its aims. Therefore, I (while not a newsperson, per se, but at any rate...) shall no longer refer to the opposition as "pro-choice," but rather as "pro-death," since that's what they really are. Coke or Pepsi is a choice, the life of a child is not.

Well, after taking a couple of sick days, I'm beginning to feel normal again. The anti-nausea and anti-spasmodic drugs the ER doc prescribed for me have been helping immensely. I can feel my appetite coming back as well, eating 2 bowls of chicken and relatively bland stuff (water chestnuts, celery, white and green onions) at Genghis Grill, before dropping my sister off at the airport for her flight home. Yesterday, for kicks, I got on the scale, and discovered that I had lost somewhere between 7-10 pounds in about 48 hours. I say 7-10 because I generally float within a 5-pound range when I weigh myself. Plenty of rest has gone a long way toward recovery, and I should be back in the saddle at work tomorrow. For those that knew, thanks for your kind words and thoughts.

And it really, really, really sucks when you end up at the ER at 11:45 on a Saturday night because you're so dehydrated and you can't get fluids in by drinking water or Gatorade because you keep puking it up. Two IV bags of fluids, 3 blood samples, 2 x-rays, and 1 urine sample later, we learn I've got some kind of nasty virus because my white cell count is over 20,000. This is not a good thing. I was released about 3 in the morning. After stopping at the 24-hour Tom Thumb pharmacy nearby and getting my new drugs and a 2-liter of Sprite, we crashed into bed some time around 4. Steady improvements all day today, no more throwing up, which makes me happy because I really, really, really hate that. Bland food is all I can eat, so it's been dry toast, crackers, and rice. I'm feeling tons better, though not still 100%. While we had talked about what kind of fun, exciting things we could do with my little sister while she is in town visiting, this little adventure was the furthest thing from our minds. :)

If a ban on partial-birth abortion, decidedly a conservative issue, is a "sop to the far right," why isn't a campaign finance reform bill, decidedly a leftist issue, a "sop to the far left?"

Can someone answer me why a French Canadian is singing “God Bless America” during the Super Bowl pre-game show? “My home sweet home?” She’s Canadian! She lives in Canada! Her home is Canada! Is is that hard to find a talented American singer to sing “God Bless America?”

At least American girls sang the national anthem. And quite nicely, I might add, not showboating or over-acting/singing in trying to show off their vocal skills. Hats off to the Dixie Chicks.

There are reasons why Patricia Heaton continues to be one of my favorite actresses. She’s absolutely fabulous on Everybody Loves Raymond, and she continues to stand up for traditional Judeo-Christian values.

Last Monday, Heaton walked out of the American Music Awards before she was due to intoduce a retrospective montage. Why? Because she was digusted by “an onslaught of lewd jokes and off-color remarks.”

"I'm no prude, but this was such a vulgar and disgusting show," Heaton said.

Heaton summarizes my own thoughts exactly:

"The entire evening became about bleeping. It was as if they were trying to become more like the MTV awards. But it's one thing if this kind of stuff is on MTV at 10 at night. It's quite another if it's on ABC at 8 o'clock. I don't know what Dick Clark was thinking."

Heaton fired back, when asked if she’s worried about any sort of “you’ll never present again” backlash: “Who cares?”

Major retrophisch kudos to Patricia Heaton for taking a stand against the Hollywonk culture.

As a transplanted Texan, one of the things that has bothered me since our move here in ‘98 has been how Cowboys-focused Dallas sports fans are. This year has been no exception; with “America’s Team” winning only 5 games, it has been wisely speculated for the past month if Dave Campo would remain the Cowboys head coach. This is how sad this town is when it comes to their NFL team: one news station interrupted a tornado warning to announce Campo’s firing earlier this week. A tornado warning! Now we know that Bill Parcels is the new head coach, blah, blah, blah.

Hello, Dallas? The Mavericks are kicking the tail out of every other team in the NBA, sitting alone atop the league. The Stars are trading the #1 spot in the NHL with Detroit and Ottawa on a nightly basis. You have championship-contending teams! They just don’t play in Texas Stadium.

Maybe now that the Cowboys’ season is over, you’ll pull your collective head out of Jerry Jones' butt and realize that. Go Stars!

Michael calls it on Chris Hanson's observation. Take note, emailers of the world. At work, I am forced to use Entourage as my Exchange client under OS X. One thing that is nice about Entourage is the preference that lets you turn off the formatted, Outlook/Exchange-type email that includes HTML, and have plain-text, Internet email, complete with quotes. It's not pure text; HTML mail still gets through, but it offers me enough of the plain-text, Internet email experience that I feel like I'm using a real email client.

Personally, I have long maintained that HTML belongs in browsers, not my email client. One of the reasons I use Mailsmith is that it never shows HTML in my email, stripping it in to plain text, if possible, and at worst keeping it as an HTML attachment I can open in my browser.

Scot Hacker wrote an excellent article that sums up all of my reasons why you shouldn’t use HTML in your email, and he offers tips on several email clients/services for turning HTML formatting off. Bookmark this one, boys and girls. (Thanks, Lee!)