Could a word processor kill an otherwise productive collaboration?

My colleague and collaborator does not write mathematics. He is of that generation that jumped directly from the IBM Selectric to Microsoft Word. I, on the other hand, have been writing LaTeX markup using vi on a VT100 since I was an undergraduate, and, after a brief and very unsatisfying affair with Wordstar in the 1980s, have never seen a reason to change my document-generating style. Okay, well, I use emacs now instead of vi, and emacs pops up in a windowing environment instead of a terminal, but nothing substantial has changed.

My colleague really doesn't get that there's a huge difference in the way one writes using these two different approaches. I can't be productive with Word, yet he refuses to even consider editing a simple text document with wordpad and claims he can't even read it if it does not conform to some minimal WYSIWYG formatting. I had a brilliant scheme: I would write up our paper in latex, use latex2rtf to generate a rtf file, and then he could edit that file using Word. "Do not waste any time formatting this paper!" I screamed at him through the interwebs. "Just type in any changes to the text and I will do the rest."

It is not working. He has no clue what it means to not format. The most recent draft from him (our 4th) is still rtf, but he has entered a shitload of new references with Endnote. There are new headings and subheadings, italicized of course. There are indented margins, there are tabs. There is a fancy title page. It looks like ass. I can either cut and paste everything, including the new references, into a new latex document, which will take for-frigging-ever, or I can just suck it up and edit everything in OpenOffice.

OpenOffice, by the way, has a nasty habit of irretrievably corrupting files that have ever even smelled like Word or rtf.

Edited to add: I have just found rtf2latex2e. I am not optimistic, but I will give it a shot. FAIL.

Notes on the State Fair.

• There's this stuff called sunscreen, and it's really good. You should use some. You should also put it on your 8-week-old child.
• If you and your spouse take up an entire 8-ft park bench, you should put down the deep-fried twinkies and walk up and down the Midway for a while.
• If you ride the Scrambler after eating corndogs, funnel cake, mac-and-cheese on a stick, a turkey drumstick, and cotton candy, please run (do not walk) to the nearest trash barrel. Do not hurl directly onto the crowded sidewalk.
• No one needs nine ShamWows. No one. I don't care that they threw the last three in for free.
• Fill out all the address cards you want. You will not win the car/hot tub/gas card/screened-in porch/water softener/massage/whatever. You will, however, find yourself on every calling list in the state. Have fun with that.
• Wipe the seat. What the fuck is wrong with you?
• Bulls have giant balls. Get over it.

What do you think?

The Angry Kid has a 50/50 chance of inheriting an autosomal-dominant degenerative neuromuscular disorder. While not life-threatening in any way, it would affect her quality of life at least somewhat.

When she was conceived there was no way to test for the disease; even the genetic markers were unknown. Now there is a simple blood test. Should we have her tested?

This one's for you, William.

One of the "ugly cake" entries at the Red State Fair:

I'm open to suggestions.

To: Angry Professor
From: Graduate Student in Another Discipline
Re: I need help

Dear Dr. Professor,
I have read with great interest your work on [X] and how it shows [something that it doesn't show]. I'm particularly interested in the analysis of some data using the procedures that you advocate. I have downloaded the [third party software], but I don't know how to use it or to interpret the results. Could you please help me and tell me what analyses I need to perform after I get it to run?

Regards,
Graduate Student

Here's one from the "What were they thinking?" files.

I still give chalk lectures. This happens in my graduate classes and sometimes in my statistics classes. LSU adheres pretty strongly to the chalk tradition -- none of those smelly whiteboard markers for us!

Chalk is disgusting. It gets everywhere, from my notes to the seat of my pants. (The latter, apparently, happens when I lean against the chalk tray to take questions.) My hands feel like rocks, and require post-lecture scrubbing and moisturizing before I can return to my office.

When I noted this item in the "you buy it or we throw it away" section of The Company Store's catalog, I had to laugh.