Microsoft files for patent on creating smiley face

Microsoft frowned at for smiley patent You've got to be kidding. Apparently Microsoft has applied for a paten that translates a sequence of characters into a smiley face :-) I've typed that in with colon, dash, right parenthesis.
The patent number is 20050156873 and was filed January 2004.

You realize that there should be tons of prior art for this, of other programs that do the same thing predating the patent. Frivolous? patents have been filed for a good many things though, and successfuly received. I guess the hard part would be defending it in court. Well, I think I'm going to go and write up an application for a method of entering information into a computer using an array of buttons with the letters of the alphabet inscribed on them. I think it'll really catch on. ;-)