If you have children, cherish them. They are a gift. There are many couples who would love to be in your position.

CHILDREN

The best thing since sliced bread!

5 FAMOUS PEOPLE I WISH I COULD MEET

Freddie Mercury in his prime

George Carlin when he was at his funniest

Walter Payton after Super Bowl XX

John Cleese after filming A Fish Called Wanda

David Tennant for being such a great Doctor Who

OVER USED ACTORS

Currie Graham. He simply isn't that good and I'm sick of seeing him in all my favorite shows; NYPD, House, Desperate Housewives and CSI. Oh my God! I just saw season 1 of 24 (it was awesome) and Currie was in that too!

STEPHEN KING

I really love most of his books, but quite frankly there are times where I wish he would just get to the f-ing point. I'm determined to finish the Dark Tower series, but it is not an easy task. Ask Mr. King about a simple football game and instead of just getting the score and maybe some highlights, you'll get a history of the game, details of each and every down and maybe the back story of why some of the star players got into the game in the first place. Sometimes a lot of detail is good and sometimes it isn't. :-)

Too many people forget that their headlights are not just for them to see better, but just as importantly for others to see them better.

In Illinois, it is the law for you to have your headlights on if you are using your windshield wipers (i.e. it's raining). Countless people forget this (see above).

We all know the universal hand signal when we are pissed off at another driver, what about having a universal hand signal when we are sorry, especially after mistakenly giving the first hand signal?

How is it that without fail each and every day that I am driving, I find myself behind at least one person with a brake light out? Shouldn't there be a universal way to alert someone to this? You certainly can't knock on their window at a red light, they'd think you're trying to car jack them. Maybe something online through each state's DMV. Yeah, right.

A visitor's very wise response to my random thought above:
"The obvious answer is to have a blinking light on the dashboard of the offending car stating that a brake light, or other light is not working. It should not be the responsibility of another driver to notify the offending car, his or her car should notify the driver with an internal warning of some kind."


DRIVING AND CELL PHONES

As much as I hate to see drivers talking on their cell while driving, a law making it illegal to talk on a cell phone without a handsfree device is just plain stupid. One claim is that this law will allow drivers to keep both hands on the wheel. Since when is it illegal to drive with only one hand on the wheel? Also, there are countless other things the driver can do that are equally if not more distracting that talking on a cell phone. The law has good intentions, but poor follow through. Of course, this is just my opinion.

MOVIES

Why do movie theatres insist on showing commercials before movies? Haven't we paid enough to see the movie?

Can we all agree that concession prices at movie theatres are far too high?

THE INTERNET

Thanks to the Internet, companies are more accountable since they are now more accessible.

You can find the answer to about any question on the Internet, but will it be the right answer?

SPORTS

No team in any sport should make the playoffs without a winning record. You end the season at .500, go ahead and pat yourself on the back, but you don't deserve to be in the playoffs. I was reminded of this thought when two NFC teams entered the 2004-2005 NFL playoffs at 8-8. And a hearty congratulations to the Chicago Rush of the Arena Football League. They won the 2006 Arena Bowl XX Championship. However, they entered the playoffs at 7-9. A big no-no in my book. Don't get me wrong, I'm still a big Rush fan.

FOOTBALL

When a team has the ball deep in their own end and then they receive a penalty, instead of marking them half the distance to the goal, why not make the first down marker further away?

Can NFL referees be inducted into the Football Hall of Fame? If not, they should be.

Pat Robertson, enough said.

SMOKING

Why do most smokers feel that discarding their cigarettes on the ground is OK?

Why do most smokers feel that throwing their cigarettes out their car window is okay?

If two people are talking outside and a third person joins them, I think it is rude if the third person decides to light up without asking if the other two mind.

Who would you rather be driving behind, a person playing their music really loud or a person smoking a cigarette? Give me loud music any day!

AIRPORTS

Can we all agree that food prices at airports are far too high?

Every day I hear or read about a study of some sort and that from the study we can say that a certain percentage of people will act a certain way because 3000 or so people were polled. How is it that we can draw such generalizations from such a small study? Aren't there over 200 million people in the United States alone? I'm certainly not an expert in statistics, but that just doesn't seem right to me.

MUSIC INDUSTRY

The Smithereens recently released a Beatles tribute album (Meet The Smithereens) and it is available on Apple's iTunes Music Store. I checked it out and it contained one of my favorite Beatle songs, "All My Loving". The 30 second sample sounded really good so I bought it. I like their rendition, but how in God's green earth did they get the words wrong? It is so bad that I can't listen to it anymore. Come on Smithereens, you're better than that.


The single most over-rated performer in my lifetime is easily Madonna. In my opinion, her music is mediocre and her acting is worse.


When will the music industry realize that the price for a CD is ridiculously high? Perhaps they finally have with the advent of Apple's iTunes Music Store.


Why do CD's need to have stickers sealing them closed and then shrink wrapped in plastic? Isn't once seal enough?

PUBLIC SAFETY SOFTWARE

"TxMessenger is the Superior Product. Motorola has no clue of this, though they have been told several times."  -  C.B., California