Have you ever heard someone say, “I wouldn’t miss it for the world” and thought “that person is full of crap”? There isn’t much I wouldn’t miss if someone offered me the world. In fact, if God called me tomorrow and said, “If you miss work today, I’ll give you the world,” you can be fairly certain I’m calling in sick. Of course, since I have the world, I wouldn’t really have to call in sick. Who’s going to fire the man who has the world?

With Ricky Williams’ return to pro football last night amid the requisite talk show lashings, I wondered what’s worse: an athlete who can’t play with the team because he or she gets suspended for taking steroids or an athlete who, at the last minute, simply decides he or she doesn’t want to play with the team?

I just returned from my first vacation in three years and experienced an interesting message phenomenon.

For some reason, there’s a large contingent of folk who seemingly don’t trust the automatic out-of-the-office email response. No less than five people left me a voice mail message a few hours after sending an email and presumably receiving the automatic reply. Yet none of them mentioned the email or couched the call as a courteous follow-up. Why? Do they think the out-of-the-office reply is a mistake? That I’m avoiding email and not avoiding phone calls? Or that two forms of messaging will make them stand out from the crowd like a really good ad? There needs to be a study done on this.

How many vacations have you taken this past 5 years? For me, four. I’d bet that’s typical of most Americans.

Today, President Bush has started his 50th vacation since he became President 5 years ago. I’m not exaggerating; it’s really his 50th vacation. He averages 10 vacations a year. And why not? It’s not like there’s anything pressing going on. Just a SCOTUS nomination, new terror bombings, a recess apointment to the UN that no one wants (not even Republicans)… yeah, good time for vacation.