I promised a long, drawn-out rant, didn't I?
Well, it has been tabled indefinitely. Sorry!
However, it can be summed up very briefly: in 2002, I need to love more. This sounds rather sappy without the background story, but the background story is lame, so I will leave it at that. In the meantime, however, sound bites:

First, international economics: Well, the Euro is the official currency of n nations, replacing the Deutschmark, the drachma, the escudo, the French franc, the Belgian franc, the Luxembourg franc, the guilder, the lira, the markka, the peseta, the punt, and the schilling as the official currencies of the various nations of Europe. The Register has a status report on the changeover; most of the old currency should be out of circulation by next Thursday or so.
FYI: The symbol for the Euro is €, and it can be encoded in HTML using the Unicode encoding €. One Euro is currently worth 65 pence, ¥118, US¢89, or CAN$1.14.

Second, on a technical note, AIM is hole-y. Holes in the Windows client are nothing new, of course, but they greatly bolster the case for the much improved Trillian, because the people at Cerulean have been much better at checking the bounds on their buffers than the folks at AOL as of late. So, Trillian. Go now. If you're running a Mac, on the other hand, I hear Fire! is pretty good.

Next, and finally, because I'm short on time, personal junk. I'll use a list format:

1. I go back to college on the 11th, a Friday.
2. A 56k modem does not provide a lot of pipe, especially when shared.
3. I saw Lord of the Rings last night, and if you replaced the various races with people wearing different colored sashes or something, and maybe changed the whole "one ring to rule them all" element a bit, you could call it Braveheart 2, and everyone would love it. I mean this in a good way.
4. Haley plays the Rapid City Borders on Saturday from 8 to 10 pm. Tell your friends; she's keeps getting better.
5. Finally, I still suck, and you're still incredible, as far as I'm concerned. You know who you are.

That is all for now. I hope this uploads okay, because I won't be able to validate it...

UPDATE: Big props to Joan for checking me on Haley's show date. It's really tonight, at the usual time.
If you have well wishes, available prayer time, or some good voodoo magic, please throw your positive chi to a young lady named Christie Sandvik. Also, drive safely.
Many thanks,
The Management.