100 foods

One of the popular diversions spawned on the Internet is a list of 100 foods, apparently selected at random by some bored journalist(s).  For some reason, people find it entertaining to check-off the foods that they have tasted and send the list to their "friends".    I guess the idea is to impress your friends that you are adventurous enough to actually eat boiled snake eyeballs, or tongue of newt.

Photo courtesy
www.edibleblog.com

Now, at the risk of being thought of as a total grump, this seems to me a bit silly. Juvenile, even.   It was  interesting when evil Watergate plotter G. Gordon Liddy admitted in an interview that as a youth, he once killed, roasted and ate a rat, because he thought it would make him fearless.  And, as mentioned in his  autobiography, a young Barack Obama, then living in Indonesia was introduced to eating dog, snake and insects (which he recalled as crunchy)  This is interesting stuff.

  But, mere lists of foods checked-off do not give the reader any information about your character or motives.  Who gives a rat's patooty that you have eaten Twinkies?

The rest of us are only interested in the story behind the meal?  We want the tasty details of setting, the personalities of your server, chef, host.  There should be an element of danger or passion or mystery associated with the dining experience for it to be worthy of sharing the disclosure with friends - even FBF's.

Cricket Salad

So do not present me with boasting lists that you have tried 60 of the hundred items.  Tell me about the most fabulous meal or the worst thing you have tasted and why you did it.

On a List of "America's Most Adventurous Eaters"  my name would be way, way down near the bottom - and in small print.  I have no exotic stories to report, except maybe  the time on that camping trip with Dick Cheney where the guide was shot and killed --  accidentally of course --  and the rest of us cooked and ate him.  You can't make stuff like that up.

Fenway at 100

Big deal: Fenway Park is 100 years old today.  The media folks are glad to have something to seize on that will fill time and space and also utilize old grainy footage of Babe Ruth and Ted Williams.  So pardon me for jumping on the bandwagon.  

Since you ask, yes I have a lot of memories of Fenway growing-up as a kid from Watertown.  Dad took us to games, and I loved the hot dogs and peanuts, watching the greats like Ted Williams and Jimmy Pearsol.  We also collected and traded baseball cards which always retained the smell of the sheet of Fleer's bubble gum that came in the same packet. I once lost a rare Ted Williams in a flipping contest when my brother's Dell Crandall (then catcher for the Boston Braves got a "leaner" that beat my "incher" toss.

When I was 14 my buddy Dave Randall and I got our first jobs, working at Fenway Park.  We were hired by the company that cleaned-up after the games.  I think the pay was 85 cents and hour.  Our first (and , as it turned out - only) workday was a night game. After much debate, our mothers decided to allow us to go into Boston on the streetcar.  We got into the park during the 8th inning and watched the game.  Then we spent about 6 hours as part of the crew sweeping the stands.  (I learned some valuable sweeping skills that night which have served me well all my life.)  We didn't get through working until after 2am, and did not get home until the early hours of the morning.  That was 56 years ago and I think the MBTA stopped running after 1AM in those days.  Maybe we walked home; maybe we hitchhiked back to Watertown.  Needless to say our mothers had waited up for us, and were not happy.  We were forced to resign after only 1 evening of work.

I have not actually attended a game at Fenway in about 20 years. I have long since been priced-out of actually buying tickets to baseball games. ( It's not that I can't afford a ticket, its that I don't think it is worth the price to watch a bunch of overpaid baseball workers pretend to be "playing" a game.)

The last time I went to a game - my friend George had an extra ticket - we sat in the stands along the right field line.  I think they were playing the Orioles.  It was one of those typical boring games where nothing was happening, so the crowd was getting antsy.  Some fans in the bleachers started the wave.  Some broke out beach balls.   One gal sitting a few rows behind us had recently had an operation to enlarge her breasts.  She started to flash them whenever she thought the camera might be pointed in our direction.  As one of her friends explained,  "She's mighty proud of those $800 puppies."  I was not sure whether it was $800 each or for the set.  They were indeed attractive, if you like that sort of thing.
Pretty soon, many of the fans in our vicinity had taken up the chant "Show us your tits."   She obliged them several times, to cheers and whistles.  I couldn't help feeling bad for a dad who was not shouting and whistling who was sitting with his son who looked to be about 7 or 8.  They were trying to watch the game.  And I thought to myself, this is not the place to bring a kid.

Now, when I watch the games on HD TV, I relax in my comfy chair, sipping inexpensive beer, eating freshly cooked food, and if I need to take a bio break, I just hit the pause button, and never risk missing one of those rare, exciting moments in the game.  Usually, I click away during one of the incessant pitching changes, and forget about the game.  Or I doze off into a peaceful slumber.  And did I mention that the parking in my driveway is free?

Rhetorical Confirmation

I was gratified yesterday when I read in the morning Globe that the pope is still Catholic
("On his 85th, pope reaffirms his faith")  Gratifying, because I can confidently keep this rhetorical question in my arsenal of  standard responses to the bartender when asked, "Would you like another beer?"

Unfortunately, I was unable to find any reportage that could confirm my strongly-held belief that wild bears do indeed defecate in the woods.

Litter Marketing

A few days ago,  I was backing out of my driveway when I noticed a bright yellow piece of paper taped to my front screen door.  It was raining heavily, but  I stopped, got out of the car and splashed through a few puddles in the walk to retrieve what surely must have been an important communication.

Not so.  It was a flyer from a painting company.  "TIME TO PAINT YOUR HOUSE?" it wondered in bold 36 point Times Roman font.   Needless to say, it annoyed me to have been trespassed upon and judged in this manner.  OK, so my house could use a touch-up here and there, but I found it offensive just the same.   I looked up and down the street to see if others had been similarly insulted.  It was clear that the flyers were only left at the houses which the leafleter had deemed in need of a fresh coat.

Earlier this spring there are a couple of landscape entrepreneurs who drove around town throwing baggies full of stones into people's driveways.  Inside the baggie is an ad for their oriental gardening service. 

When did it become legitimate for stranger to drive down your street and tape things to your doors, or toss things in your driveway?  I guess it's just an extension of sticking flyers under your windshield wipers in the parking lot at the mall or super market.  I may be cranky, but I have always regarded these pieces of unwanted paper as, well, litter.

Generally, personal solicitations - whether they be at my door or on the phone – are met un-disguised hostility.  You can imagine how I feel about those who have the temerity to littler my driveway and doorways with marketing material.

If that isn't the definition of Spam, then what is?

I have a suggestion for the Selectman - stop trying to raise our taxes and make litter marketing a fine-able offense.  Lots of money can be levied in penalties, and the culprits leave their phone numbers as evidence.

I'm sure the culprits who littered my neighborhood feel that this is just a legal way for them to get their message out cheaply.   But it is an invasion of my space.   If I am on vacation, no one picks up the litter - If I was a crook, I would just cruise around looking for homes where no one had picked up the paper or phone book.  Not long ago some bright marketing genius decided to deliver a promotional copy of the New York Times to every home as a tease to show non customers the benefits of home delivery.  Three days later the papers were still sitting in the driveways of people who were away.  They might as well have put out a sign that said Nobody is home - Break in here!

I have spent a lot of money this year, but not one penny went to any business that left unsolicited marketing taped to my door or shoved under my wipers or tossed in my driveway by drive-by salespeople.

No Youngsters Need Apply

Today in the Boston Globe there was a nice article about a Needham MA company that welcomes and retains older workers instead of sending them out to pasture.  Yes I thought it was a belated April fools prank too, but it is legitimate.  The company is called Vita-Needle.  There are 49 employees. the median age is 73. 


The piece, written by Katie Johnson was encouraging for those of us who are "old, retired and restless":

"Now many other companies are learning what Hartman and Vita Needle have long known: A white-haired workforce can be hard-working, dependable, experienced - and economical. Nationally, the over-65 workforce is projected to grow 64 percent, to 12 million, by 2020, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics; by then, 7.4 percent of the workforce will be over age 65 - more than double what it was in 2000.
The notion of employing more older workers is growing in popularity, according to a 2011 study by the Economist Intelligence Unit, a business analysis company. It found a majority of corporate executives see the increased longevity of workers more as a business opportunity than a liability.
And companies are learning to make accommodations that assure success. In a 2007 pilot project, for example, auto company BMW equipped older workers in a German plant with magnifying glasses and chairs, and made other small adjustments - and found decreased absenteeism and increased productivity.
At Vita Needle, employing older workers is viewed as a significant cost-saver. Most members of the 49-person workforce are part time, with starting pay a few dollars above minimum wage, with no health insurance, sick pay, or retirement benefits. It works because most of the older workers are covered by Medicare and draw income from Social Security.
Hartman also gives out companywide bonuses at the end of the year, sometimes equal to a few months’ pay."

Wouldn't it be nice if there were more companies out there that valued the experience and cost benefits of employing seniors?  Some of us would prefer a nap break to a coffee break, but we show-up, we git r done, and we don't ask for benefits.  Send offers to my email address above. 




http://articles.boston.com/2012-03-31/business/31281861_1_older-workers-needles-workforce

Future Games

I do not approve of the premise of the popular "Hunger Games" stories.  Pitting teenagers against each other for the entertainment of the masses is just wrong.  I know what you're thinking:  Hey we do it all the time, it's called high school sports.  Yes, but we don't force them to actually kill the opposition.

I have long been an advocate of getting old people to do government-sponsored  fighting.  It just makes sense to stop wasting young innocent lives and instead get really angry old guys to do the fighting with each other.  Geezer Games might be a popular sport.

In his novel "Twenty Thirty"  Albert Brooks envisions a society nearly 20 years in the future, where killer diseases such as Cancer and Alzheimer's have been eradicated by cures discovered  circa 2014.  The population of octogenarians has grown well beyond predicted lifespans.  The burden of medicare and social security  to support the new cadre of un-dead has bankrupted the government.  Young people are forced to enter virtual indentured servitude to support aging parents. Generational conflicts inevitably evolve into open warfare between the old and young.

Both Brooks' pre-apocalyptic vision and the world where Hunger Games exist seem all too possible as our national leaders in both parties are stuck on short-term selfish concerns.  It seems inevitable that the legacy we are leaving to our grandchildren is a polluted, over-heated planet, ruined economies, and the real specter of endless global conflict as a population control measure.  

One of the recent reality shows (National Geographic) features "Doomsday Preppers."  Folks who call themselves "Preppers" range from citizens who believe in being stocked with emergency supplies in the event of a local, short-term disaster, such as weather or other act of God, to those who are actually preparing for Armageddon or polar shifts or pandemics.  Preppers are a subculture whose fears and plans have created a whole specialized market, blogs and newsletters.  

As a fan of science fiction I have read numerous accounts of the post-apocalyptic future.  None of them seems worth the effort of preparation to me.  If I have the choice of a future, I think I would rather fight another geezer to the death for sport than to hide out in a  bomb shelter with no TV or cold beer.