Beam us Home, Scotty

Returning home after traveling for ten days in the Rocky Mountains gives one a mixed sense of relief and regret.  The relief comes from a feeling of returning to the familiarity and safety of one's home.  The regret stems from the knowledge that the adventure is over.

Life is full of contradictions: I love being home; I love being in new places.

The problem with traveling is the actual process of traveling.  I enjoy seeing new places and meeting new people, but getting there is agony.   Planes, trains, automobiles are crowded, slow, and uncomfortable conveyances.  I look forward to the day when we can instantly "beam" ourselves to different places, like they do in the Star-trek movies.  

Public modes of transportation are the worst.  It seems like they allot fewer inches of seating space per person every year.  You would think that they would acknowledge the the fact that nearly 50% of the customers are XL.  Why do they want people to hate flying?

Southwest, which once boasted the most comfortable seating, has sacrificed the legroom so they could add a few more rows.  Their "open-seating" policy is  eroding.  Now you can jump the line for a few more bucks.  They don't feed you, anymore, and an adult beverage costs $7.   You elbow out a little old lady so you can beat her to the emergency exit row where you can get a precious extra few inches of legroom. The old hag glares at you as she passes down the aisle and mutters something about ungentlemanly behavior.  Hey, you say to yourself, this is what happens  -- when they treat you like cattle, you act like cattle. 

The journey started in Boston at 4 AM when our faithful friend George arrived to drive us to Logan Airport.  We have a complicated symbiotic relationship when it comes to air travel.  I always offer to drive friends and relatives to and from the airport and suggest that a quid pro quo on our next trip would be great.  This works out pretty well.  Since they built the Ted Williams tunnel, our trip to the airport is about 20 minutes during non-rush hour traffic.  For the record, our daughter was waiting to pick us up when we returned.  George and Jeanette had gone on their vacation to Azores.   I don't know how they go in, bit a few days after we returned we were back at Logan to pick them up.

Two of the best innovations of the century are the establishment of the Cell Phone Lot and airline flight tracker.  Now your driver knows how much your flight has been delayed, and can wait for your call or text to say "we have our bags."  Presto they are there at your terminal in a few minutes.  This makes it much easier than in the old days.   

One of my ideas for a retirement business was "Vacation Minders."  This would be a service where I offer to drive people to the airport and pick them up in their own vehicle and also check their houses, water the plants, etc. (No pet care).  I figured that some of the affluent families in the area would find that a useful service.  It would cost less than hiring a limo and having a trusted neighbor checking up on a daily basis would take some of the worries out of being away.  But as a procrastinator, I have never taken this idea off the drawing board. 

Maybe next year.  

A Quiet Day

It’s quiet around here this morning*.  No phones ringing from unwanted unidentified callers, no WiFi internet connection, no Cable TV.  None of the noise that we take for granted – SiriusXM music on the PC, no news, no Judge Judy, no fear-mongering about weather.  

FIOS is down.

We were able to call the Verizon Customer Service number on my wife’s I-phone.  A computer-generated woman’s voice wanted to have a dialog with me, but kept saying “I did not understand what you said.”  I guess we are in one of those near “dead” zones that Verizon never mentions in their TV ads when they are showing robust coverage to mobile phones in this area.  

We managed to get though the sequence of steps required to test the line.  Verizon assures me that their network is up and running, so the problem is with me.

I have performed all the tests and steps that the homeowner can do.  I have rebooted set-top boxes, reset the Wi-Fi router, unplugged and re-plugged the phone system.  

Nada, nada, nada.

The customer service line at Verizon is worse than a root canal.  You have to engage in an otherworldly dialog with the computer pretending to be a real woman.   "For security purposes" it asks you information that you cannot know unless you have your last month’s bill in hand.   I believe this is a stalling technique to make you get off the line and call back later, starting the whole process again.  It does not give you any alternative to answering the impossible questions "What is the three digit number on your phone bill?"  (since everyone knows they have to have their bill in hand to make this customer service call).  

Instead of hanging-up to go search through my bill drawer, I recalled the advice of a friend who, whenever she is confronted by an automated voice system, says “Agent!”  When I did this, the system responded with a clatter of beeps and boops>  Then I got the “We are experiencing a heavy volume of calls, all of our agents are busy with other customers, your call will be answered yadda yadda yadda. " 

Finally, after a 20 minute wait on hold (subjected to the worst quality of recorded noise/music ever heard by humans**) I got to talk to a live person.  She assured me that the problem was not with the Verizon Network (so why are you having a heavy volume of calls at 8am???) 

After making me check that everything is plugged-in, she finally agreed to send a technician sometime between now and Easter***.  I really didn’t have any choice but to hang-out here all day waiting. We've already been quiet here since about 8 PM last night.  

BTW, I missed the much anticipated season premiere of “Fargo” on F/X; since the DVR  didn’t work either!

My theory is that there are only two employees at Verizon; one answers the phones and the other does service calls.  This is the only explanation I can think of for the inordinate wait times.

=====   

The Tech arrived at 3pm.  He seemed to know what he was doing.  He determined that a power surge had fried the humma humma board.  He replaced the board, used my bathroom and then left for the next gig.

Voila, we were back on-line.  

In retrospect, we agreed that it was actually not so painful to be un-connected for a few hours.  We did not miss any news: There is still a missing airplane somewhere in the Ocean, there was a bombing last year at the Boston Marathon, they still have not found a cure for psoriasis.  I got a lot of paperwork filed away, backed-up my PC, did laundry, started writing my memoir (working title: “What I learned about Semicolons.”)

Last night, they repeated “Fargo” on F/X, so today, I do not have much to complain about. 

Have a nice day. 

Footnotes

* This was actually written yesterday, but could not be posted until I got my Internet connection back.

**Music sounds choppy when mobile signal strength is low.

*** OK, actually she said “sometime between now and 9pm.”

Emperical Thoughts

If I was the Emperor,  I would institute just and merciless punishment to anyone who carelessly or willfully impairs the free flow of traffic.  

There are several offenses that would draw long jail terms –  purposefully or accidentally causing traffic jams at peak hours, organizing or participating in any “Walk for [fill in the blanks with your favorite  cause], protesting for any cause in a way that disrupts traffic.  People who run out of gas or breakdown during rush hour would be ticketed and fined; repeat offenders would lose their licenses.

These royal edicts may seem Draconian to some folks but they enforce a basic tenet of civilization: roads are designed to improve the speed of travel from point A to point B.

I think "Thou shalt not willfully impede traffic" should have been one of the commandments,  or at least mentioned somewhere in the Constitution.

The Irony of St. Patrick’s Day

Yes, I plan to publish this poem every St Patricks Day... until I write a better one.

The Irony of St. Patrick’s Day

Fake Irishmen wearing silly green ties
Calling with bad brogues
For a wee dram of green beer
In bars festooned with shamrocks
Pipes and cartoon leprechauns they
Sing-a-long to a verse of Danny Boy
Like tone deaf drunken goats,
They set the dogs to barking
With their droning tura-lura-lura

Amateurs: they end-up
Puking on their Italian loafers
Waking-up late for work
The next day in a hangover fog

Grandsons of the famines
Endure this minstrel show
With a mirthless grin
We stay to ourselves
Washing shots of Bushmills
Down with a beer
Glad not to be thinking
About the days
When Irish need not apply.

Why Humans are Doomed

I have been a fan of  Arnold Shwarzenegger ever since his defining role in The Terminator in 1984.  The role of an emotionless cyborg (a machine designed to look human) was perfectly matched to his acting skills. 

In that role he was able to deliver memorable lines that betrayed no passion or caring only a haunting promise/threat "I'll be baack."  

In Terminator,  Skynet is created in 2029 because Humans, apparently realizing that they could not trust other humans, decided to give control of world communications to an artificial intelligence that would presumably watch over the world and keep humans from killing each other.  But, Skynet decides that humans are not to be trusted so the machines set about to kill-off the human race.  

A stubborn group of human rebels is led by John Connor.  The machines figure out that if you could go back in history to 1984, you could kill John Connors' mother before she gives birth, and that would eliminate the would-be leader of the resistance.  

When the rebels find out about the plan they send back their own guy to interfere with the terminator's relentless pursuit of Sarah.   Kyle (the good guy from the future) and Sarah have intercourse in the course of the escaping and hiding, so the plot becomes interesting when we realize that Sarah is pregnant by John's friend from the future.   

Unless you are a fan of science fiction where time travel is fairly common,  maybe it is a stretch to get your mind around the concepts, and the contradictions of theoretical time travel.  The machines should have known that sending the Terminator back was futile, because the present time for them was already the result of the past; thus you can't really change things.   

It's really much easier to just go with the flow of the story - as they say in poetry "the willing suspension of disbelief."
(some day it might be interesting to do an analysis of other time travel stories to compare different depictions about the way actions can effect the space time continuum.)

So, Why we are Doomed

Recently the US Air Force guys in charge fired or demoted dozens of high ranked officers whose jobs were to oversee nuclear safety.  It turns out that the job is boring.  These guys were sleeping on the job, partying to excess and cheating on exams that tested their knowledge of safety precautions.  

The breadth of the problem is shocking, especially in the face of so many worldwide terrorist groups who would do most anything to get their hands on some nuclear explosives.

It brought home the realization that humans cannot be trusted to do boring jobs.  This is why we design  machines that will do them without complaint.  

You see where I am going here, right?  It is only a matter of time that someone decides to turn on Skynet and we -- nasty brutish and short humans -- end up-being exterminated by our own Roombas.

Looking Back

This was a chapter in my diary called: Highland Days.
During one of my "underemployed" periods in the early 90's
I worked at the now defunct Highland Superstore in Natick.
I think I lasted there for a few months...

". . . At least the Christmas shopping season will soon end.
Not much longer will I have to present my sensitive soul to
the terrors and rampages of Retail shoppers - or as we call
them, "tire-kickers, lookers, and other swine."  I have come
to dislike shoppers who take too long to make up their mind,
and are too fussy.  I have learned to hate the words, "just
looking..." and find ecstasy in the phrase, "I'll take this
one."

Nor will I be forced to endure the constant query of my
fellow sales "associates" as we stand, like sentinels in a
desert kingdom and ask each other, "So, are ya makin' any
money today? I'm dying here.) Somehow it seems more
palatable to be dying as long as everyone else is dying too.
If one salesman does better than the others, we all stand
around grousing about how he is a filthy customer-thief
or how silly he looks in a toupee, or why doesn't she lose a
few pounds and wear less make-up.

Hey, it's human nature.  We are commissioned retail salespeople.
The bottom of the food chain.  We feel superior to no one -
except the cashiers, even though they are smarter than we are
and make more money and get more breaks.  We salespeople
shamble through the store, like vultures in search of a
carcass.  When we find an unsuspecting victim, we swarm,
nipping at others who try to beat us out.  We get into
fistfights and shouting matches, while poor confused
customers flee from the madness, only to be pounced upon by
other roving gangs of salespeople.  I'm telling you, its a
jungle."

See, I Told You So

The other day, The Boston Globe published a  piece about the amount of donated money that finds its way to the intended recipients.  [Mass. AG: Do homework before donating to charities, 11/29/13]  

"Just 34 cents of every dollar collected by professional solicitors in Massachusetts in 2012 ended up with the charities they were representing, according to a new report by Attorney General Martha Coakley."

In response to my past annual screeds on this topic, many of you have called me cynical.  But, as it turns out, my cynicism fell way short of Reality.  The greed of people who run non-profits is just as insatiable as that of the most self-aggrandizing capitalists.  Many leaders of non-profits are paid over $300k per year.  

I don't think this is right at all.  The missions of these organizations have changed from  doing something good to fund-raising.  And don't get me started about the grandiose salaries of college presidents (funded by overworked and underpaid parents trying to insure that Jr gets a sheepskin.)

Only 34 cents out of every dollar donated is going to the real mission of the organization.  This is a scandal that ought to be fixed.

Some Lack the "Fan" Gene

Hooray for Red Sox fans. 

Your team won the 2013 World Series.  I enjoyed watching the last few weeks of baseball.  I must admit: I am a fair-weather fan.  I don't buy tickets to any professional sport.  (As I have said before, I don't pay to watch other people work).  And I did not watch a single regular season game for more than half-an-hour. Most of the year, baseball games are tedious, but when there is a title on the line, any sport can be worth watching.    ( The chief exception to this rule is golf, which to me is the most boring "sport" to watch (or play) ever devised by man.  And that includes synchronized swimming.)

I did not wake up today happier than usual.  I did appreciate the entertaining spectacle of the Post-season games, but it has no more to do with me than if I went to a good movie or stage performance. I don't identify with a group of total strangers who get paid to play a game.  How can I identify with them?  Some of them were the enemy last season, fer the love of Pete.  Only a handful of players have been Red Sox employees for more than a few years.  My team?  Hardly.  

Don't get me wrong, I don't disparage people who are die-hard fans.  I just don't have the same patience and self-esteem needs.  I know people who willingly spend more than the price of a case of good scotch for seats at a baseball or football game - outdoor events which maybe played in the rain and freezing cold with no guaranty that your favorite team will be entertaining or even good. Where the beer is expensive, the seats are small, maybe the guy next to you hasn't bathed or brushed his teeth in weeks, and when you leave it takes another hour to clear the congestion around the stadium.   

I guess I lack the "Fan" gene that invites you to bestow magical blessings on sports workers for no better reason than the fact that you like the uniform they are wearing.  Some people need to cheer for something, and lord knows, the political leadership in this country has given us precious little to cheer about.

But don't let my grumpiness spoil your day, you loyal, needy fans. 
Go online and buy more Sox memorabilia that you can wear proudly to show your loyalty. (It helps the economy and cushions the coffers of local merchants, because you never know when the players will go on strike, again.)  

Enjoy the Day, the thrill of Victory and the strutting arrogance of your joy -- keep acting as if YOU had done something special.

A Voice of Reason

Today's Boston Globe Op-Ed ran a column by Farah Stockman titled "A Better Way to Tackle Health Law."  To me, this piece expressed a rarely heard moderate voice of reason.  She correctly blames GOP extremists for needlessly creating the recent shutdown/debt-ceiling crisis, in a fruitless effort to reverse Obamacare.  But here is the news part: she actually admits that the law is full of flaws, and she even describes some of them,

"For instance, there is a danger that the law makes it too easy for employers to “game the system” by choosing to pay the penalty for failing to provide health insurance instead of the premiums. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that some 7 million people might lose their current insurance because of that. Smart people who are worried about Obamacare ought to be talking about how to solve that problem.

Others fret that employees themselves might opt to pay the relatively small fine instead of signing up for a health insurance plan. Since they can’t be denied due to pre-existing conditions, there is the risk of moral hazard: People might sign up only when they are sick. That would make the system too expensive to sustain.

And perhaps the biggest looming challenge is how to handle the cost. We still don’t know whether the program will end up saving the federal government money in the long run, or end up costing lots of money.

Stockman speaks for many of us who hate the unreadable, cumbersome law and the parliamentary trickery that skanked it through the back door, instead of an honest vote.  Much as I am contemptuous of the cynical process and the thousands of pages of obfuscatory verbiage,  I am supportive of some of the reforms that the law addresses.  I like the single payer idea, especiallly for pre-existing conditions coverage and the attempt to offer subsidized health care coverage to those who want it but cannot afford it.   In general, I don't think the government should be telling employers and insurance companies how to run their businesses.  

As for those who believe the sky is falling or the runaway locomotive is about to collide with destiny, I can tell you that we have had most of these key reforms in Mass for the past seven years, and all hell has NOT broken loose.  

Stockman nails the solution here:

"The uncertain impact on the federal budget is a cause for concern — not just for the doomsday cult caucus, but for everybody. Wouldn’t it be nice if fiscal conservatives focused on problem-solving about that? Every new law has flaws, especially one as complex as this. The problem is that neither Democrats nor Republicans have an interest in fixing what’s broken here. Democrats don’t want to admit anything is broken and Republicans don’t want to admit it can be fixed.

So we are likely to live with the flaws in the Affordable Care Act for years to come, as long as Ted Cruz can make a bigger name for himself trying to end the law rather than mend it.

Sound reasonable?
    

Heads versus Hearts

This seems as true today as it was when I posted it in January 2010


As we roll into a new decade, Americans are basically divided into two groups. The first group sees the world changing for the better. We call these people Progressives. They tend to be naive and hopeful. They view the ever-changing cultural norms with equanimity. They see possibilities, they regard 'having fun' as a worthwhile goal. Fundamentally, they believe that things will work out if we just try to get-along and treat each other decently. They feel superior to the other group because they are driven by compassion to share the wealth (especially the wealth of the rich fat cats) with less-fortunate souls. They regard human laziness and stupidity as an unfortunate result of a bad dice roll. By contrast, if one is lucky enough to be born good looking , healthy and smart enough to take advantage of opportunity, you must always keep in mind that you were not entitled to it; you were given a break and you must pay it forward.


The second group - the ones we call Conservatives - are a grumpy bunch of stick-in-the-muds. They spend their workdays trying to get ahead. Then they stay awake at night afraid of slippery slopes and camels' noses in tents. Cons clearly see the negative aspect of anything that smacks of change. They love traditions and old authoritative books and parchments. They think everything worth knowing was already known by the Founding Fathers; new fads and ideas are regarded with suspicion and skepticism. They don't see the point in having fun, because people hate us and we need to stay on guard. They think they are superior to the other group because they are driven by their heads instead of their hearts. They see most taxation as stealing money from hard working people and giving it to ignorant slackers. They feel they are entitled to what they have, and hard cheese if you were born into the servant class, but that's the way it goes.


Normally, I think of myself as a fence-sitter between the two groups, usually falling on the side of the progressives due to a tendency to feel empathy and to acknowledge the relativity of moral truths. Conservatives are driven by their heads, thus they see human existence as a zero-sum equation where someone has to lose for you to win. For them everything is black or white, right or wrong. They regard fence-sitting-seers-of-grey with contempt.

Throughout the 8 years of the Bush-Cheney administration we were treated to the monotone nattering drumbeat from ultra progressive partisans, ranting negatively about everything that "W" said or did. It was tiring but often laughable for the extremes that the Libs would go to find fault with the President.

Now the cons, apparently feeling that turnabout is fair play, are filling the blogosphere and airwaves with silly criticisms of everything Barack Obama has done since his inauguration. Examples abound:
He is blamed for the ineffectiveness of the economic stimulus package (which was started during Bush's term), he is blamed for not bringing the troops home, for supporting a surge in Afghanistan, and the record unemployment is clearly his fault - all accomplished in just 9 months in office!
Lately, the criticisms are even nastier. You would never know that the Christmas day Northwest underwear bomber failed to complete his mission if you listen to some Conservative commentators. They are falling all over themselves accusing Obama of crimes and misdemeanors, sins of omission, commission and admission.
It's laughable. They used to say of Bush "He kept us safe" because there were no successful repeats of the 911 terrorist attacks in the USA. But Obama has been criticised as weak because of recent reports of foiled plots. (Hello, Cheney himself testified that there were several foiled plots after 911.)

Cheney, Limbaugh, and others talk about the Christmas day incident as if the bomb had exploded. They say Obama doesn't care about the safety of Americans - Which is about as block headed as it gets.

Most Americans are not as worried about crazed terrorists as they are about getting ripped off by some identity thief or taxed to death by out-of-touch elite legislators.

The main thing for which Obama should be criticized is this abomination of legislation called health care reform. As a candidate, Obama promised transparency, but has been silent while his pals in congress concocted this monstrosity of a reform bill behind closed doors. Candidate Obama pledged not to sign any legislation with earmarks, ("...we can no longer accept an earmarks process in which many of the projects being funded fail to address the real needs of our country.") Yet, nothing has changed. Deals were made in exchange for votes. Obama has has failed in his promise to us on these most important issues.

Already, two prominent Dems in the senate, seeing the tide of public opinion swelling against them, have already said that they will not run (and probably lose) in the next term.

Update: The recent shutdown and debt limit crises fan has flung shit in every direction.  Hard line Conservative Republicans are generally blamed for causing the impasse (They cynically changed the rules in the House to prevent anyone but the Speaker to call for a a vote.)  But the White House and Dems are not unscathed - since they cynically decided to close down government functions that would hurt innocent citizens.   Professional Pols on both sides are hoping voters will forget these shameful shenanigans by the next election.  I plan to vote against every incumbent.

No One is Minding the Data

In the Boston Globe this morning is a short article on the struggles at Staples to meet it's revenue goals.  While still profitable, Staples - the company that invented office supply superstores - is closing unprofitable outlets and will be cutting costs via management layoffs.   

The piece reminded me of my recent (disappointing) experience with Staples.  It was last month, when Mass was having a "tax free" weekend.  I decided that it was time to buy the new Google Nexus 7 tablet that I had been thinking about.  Truth be told, I first went to the Google website, where they offered free shipping.  But when I went to check-out, they wanted to charge me the normal sales tax.  There was no recognition of my state's "no tax" holiday and no option to avoid paying tax, so I cancelled the transaction and went to my normal go-to store for electronics - Staples.

The online site Staples.com did have a message that assured me that they recognized tax fee holiday, so I could order the product tax-free and go to my local store to pick it up to avoid delivery charges.  OK, I thought, let's book it.  But,  then I was leery because the Staples product description for the Nexus did not specifically say that it was the NEW version that had been released in July.  I spent another 15 minutes trying to compare the Google specs to the Staples specs.  Finally, confident that my online shopping cart the right product, I went to check out. .....Hmmn, for some reason the Staples rewards number they showed on the website for me was different than the number I have on the card in my wallet.  When I tried to check to see if any of my many previous purchases were getting rewards points, I was unable to get a simple report of purchase history.  In effect, the message was: we do not have any history for you. Which means: None of your purchases have been counted.  Frankly, I was pretty annoyed to think that I had been showing them my rewards card at the cash register for years, and the data was going into an effing  black hole.    Annoyed as hell, I decided to cancel the transaction.

Now, I was perplexed.  My two first choices for Online shopping were a huge disappointment.  

For giggles, I decided to see what old-line Sears.com had to offer.  I was surprised to find myself  rapidly taken to the correct product description and the same price as offered by Google and Staples.  They had a banner indication that this would be a tax free purchase.  They had a nice little summary of my reward points.  I was impressed that the website of this ancient company was easier to navigate than the Internet 2.0 companies.  I decided to buy the product for pick-up at the local Sears to save delivery charges.  Bink Bink, easy peasy.    A few days later, I got an e-mail confirming that my order was being shipped to the local store, and I would be notified when to pick it up in a following e-mail.  Then, the next night I got a call form an automated robot telling me that "the computer you ordered is no longer stocked." And then some gobbledigook that I could call the store and get something different.  They had cancelled my order!  
It was a perfectly awful bit of customer service: a garbled hodgepodge of a message,  The offered no valid reason  - they did not even give me a number to call.  Goodbye.  

After all this, I started wondering why I needed a Nexus 7 anyhow.  In the end, I decided I really didn't need one after all.  So the bottom line is: No one got any money from me.  Worse for them, I am so annoyed at these three companies that I will not shop online with any of them again.  (I may still go to the local brick and o mortar Staples for their loss-leader paper rebate deals.)

If my experience is typical, the future of e-commerce is in trouble.  It is clear that even in 2013, corporate management is clueless about the importance of accurate, integrated and up-to-date data to support the whiz-bang technology.  

Google didn't know about states' tax free programs. Staples had fuzzy product descriptions and they can't seem to integrate the rewards program to the sales operations.  And, Sears has wasted a lot of money building a web-site that works like butter,  then sending me a confirmation of shipment and then cancelling my order and annoying me with a crap automated customer service voice messaging system that must have been a leftover prototype from 1977.  

None of these companies followed-up, despite the fact that I filled-out opinion surveys and feedback emails to each of these stores.  I was never responded to - in any way, not even a canned apology letter.  This is why I think they must be clueless.  Rule 1, Try not to piss-off the customer.

The VP's of these outfits probably need to try to use their own online websites.  They might be in for an annoying experience.

Did Someone say Striper season is over?

I love salt water fishing.

  

especially when we catch fish.

Thursday turned out to be a great day for boat fishing.  The high tide was late morning so we did not have to get out on the water at the crack of dawn.  It started out cool (sweatshirt weather) then by about 11AM it was tee shirt warm.  The water was smooth with a light breeze.

We had no luck until we encountered a school of mackerel, whereupon we managed to land 7 or 8.  We hooked about twice that many but they got away before we could get them in the boat.

The fish keeper was not pumping fresh water and unfortunately, the mackerel died before we could get to where the striped bass were.

So, instead of "live bait fishing" we had to cut up the mackerel into chunks.  No problem:  Captain Clarke knew a "honey hole" where the Stripers hang out.  They went after the fresh cut bait with gusto.  Clarke landed a huge (40") fat boy.  I reeled in the biggest striper I had ever caught - in fact the first one of "keeper" size.  There were several other (smaller) strikes as well.

Despite the fact that I enjoy eating striped bass, we released all of the stripers, as they seemed too magnificent to chop up.  They gave us a good thrill, which you probably need to be a fisherman to understand.

Food Wrapped in Paper

In the news today, so-called fast food workers in some locations are planning to strike as a protest against low wages 

"Workers at the nation’s best known fast-food restaurants in seven cities across America are planning to walk off the job Monday to protest what they say are wages that are too low to live on. In a move orchestrated with the help of powerful labor unions and clergy groups, the workers plan to strike for a day to demand their wages be doubled."   (Foxnews)

I am generally against strikes of any kind, since they are disruptive to the customers instead of to Management - with whom the beef resides.  I see it as a mild form of terrorism, where you inflict pain on innocent victims, because you are too weak to fight the source of your aggravation.

But the thing that grabbed my attention was the phrase "Fast Food."

In my recent experience "Fast Food" is an archaic term which refers to a past era.  Sort of like "records" and "drive in movie."
I recall the time, perhaps a decade ago, when you would stop into a Mickee Dees or Burger King and the cashier would be asking for your order before you had decided what you wanted.  Several registers would be manned and the line moved like a hot knife through ice cream.

But that is not the way is is now.  Granted,  I do not go to one of these establishments unless I am travelling.  (Whatever else you might rightfully say about the food, McDonald's brews a pretty good cup of coffee.) 

In virtually all of my recent visits to such places, the "drive-thru" line is usually at least half a dozen cars deep; I go inside.  Actually I prefer being inside, rather than eating in the car. Invariably,  I have found a line of people ahead of me, with only one beleaguered cashier taking orders. A dozen or so workers are feverishly scudding around the kitchen area.  Yet, my order usually takes at least 5 minutes to arrive, sometimes closer to ten.  Usually there is enough time to strike-up a conversation with other waiting patrons and come to a consensus about the acceptable number of tattoos that the employees should be allowed to display. 

This is is not what I call Fast.

But, back to the subject at hand: Low wages.
I am in favor of upping the wages for people who work in restaurants.  McDonald's has an annual employee turnover rate of 75%.   I wouldn't mind paying a bit more for my Big Mac if the price increase allows them to attract a better quality employee.
It is always a bit disturbing to know that your food is being prepared by the least educated, lowest paid and least motivated people on the planet.

Summer Camp Memories

The neighbor's 12 year old son, Mathew (who shovels our driveway when we are away during the winter)  has been shipped off to two week camp in NH.  Seeing the FB photo of Matt on his bunk, reminded me of the old Alan Sherman classic,  "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah"  The Youtube recording is linked below.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ea2EuozaJ7s

If it doesn't make you chuckle, you


A) ...Probably have the sound on mute
B) ...Are currently at camp and it's raining
C) ...Lacking a sense of humor
D) ...A grumpy classical music buff who does not like song parody


As a kid growing-up on the suburban streets of Watertown in the 50's, most of us did not get to go to summer camp.  We were not poor, but there were four of us and our parents did not think that middle class kids  needed to go to "away" camp, when the town offered a day program where kids could learn to weave gimp and play baseball and learn crafts.  I'm sure my parents did not intend for us to learn some of the things we actually did learn from the park instructors, how to play poker for money and how to smoke cigarettes.  I often thought that Jimbo got us all smoking so he could bum Lucky Strikes from us.    My older brother claims to have had a brief affair with one of the female park instructors who was at least 5 years older than he at the time.

Our kids were able to experience Summer Camp.  My older daughter was allergic to horses; she  wrote every day for us to come and get her when we finally did drive up to fetch her, she had met a friend, changed her mind and stuck it out.  I am proud of her for that, but I do not think she opted for camp again.  When I asked her recently what she recall from her camp days, she couldn't recall any details.  PTSD, I guess.
  My younger daughter went to a place she called Camp Rottonwood in NH.  I forget the real name.  We would get a letter that started out "They are making us write home.  Please send more stamps."  She hated camp too, but kept going back on successive summers, mainly because her best friend was going too..  One of my nieces suffered a terrible injury to her leg when her horse banged into a fence.  That cut short her camping career.

Still, I think I would have liked it if I had been able to go to camp as a kid.  I missed-out on the canoeing, diving, hiking, horseback riding, ghost stories around the campfire and adventures, nocturnal pantie-raids on the girls' camp, that sort of thing...Perhaps, I am romanticizing the Summer Camp experience?

The View From the Fence

 Americans are basically divided into two groups. The first group sees the world changing for the better. We call these people Progressives. They tend to be naive and hopeful. They view the ever-changing cultural norms with equanimity. They see possibilities, they regard 'having fun' as a worthwhile goal. Fundamentally, they believe that things will work-out if we just try to get-along and treat each other decently. They feel superior to the other group because they are driven by compassion to share the wealth (especially the wealth of the rich fat cats) with less-fortunate souls. They regard human laziness and stupidity as an unfortunate result of a bad dice roll. By contrast, if one is lucky enough to be born good looking , healthy and smart enough to take advantage of opportunity, you must always keep in mind that you were not entitled to it; you were given a break and you must pay it forward.

The second group - the ones we call Conservatives - are a grumpy bunch of stick-in-the-muds. They spend their workdays trying to get ahead. Then they stay awake at night afraid of slippery slopes and camels' noses in tents. Conservatives always see the negative aspect of anything that smacks of change. They love traditions and old authoritative books and parchments. They think everything worth knowing was already known by the Founding Fathers; new fads and ideas are regarded with suspicion and skepticism. They don't see the point in having fun, because foreigners hate us and our way of life -- thus we need to stay on guard constantly.  Fun is for the weak minded Progressive sheep.  The central issue for Conservatives is the role of government.  They are convinced that all Progressives want a "Nanny State" where the Feds control every aspect of citizens' lives.   They see most taxation as stealing money from hard working people and giving it to ignorant slackers. They feel they are entitled to what they have, and hard cheese if you were born into the servant class, but that's the way it goes. Conservatives think they are superior to the other group because they are driven by their heads instead of their hearts.


Normally, I think of myself as a fence-sitter between the two groups, usually falling on the side of the progressives due to a tendency to feel empathy and to acknowledge the relativity of moral truths. Conservatives are driven by their heads, thus they see human existence as a zero-sum equation where someone has to lose for you to win. For them everything is black or white, right or wrong. They regard fence-sitting-seers-of-grey with contempt.

Throughout the 8 years of the Bush-Cheney administration we were treated to the monotone nattering drumbeat from ultra progressive partisans, ranting negatively about everything that "W" said or did. It was tiring but often laughable for the extremes that the Libs would go to find fault with the President.

Since he  was elected,  the cons have been  filling the blogosphere and airwaves with silly criticisms of everything Barack Obama has done since his inauguration. Examples abound:
He is blamed for the ineffectiveness of the economic stimulus package (which was started during Bush's term), he is blamed for not bringing the troops home, for supporting a surge in Afghanistan, and the record unemployment is clearly his fault.  The recent attack on the Benghazi embassy is another example where the opposition is bound and determined to embarrass Hillary Clinton and President Obama for snafus that they say were covered-up to help Obama get re-elected.

Many on the right wing have drifted to the fringes and embrace all sorts of conspiracy theories about the extreme path that the Obama administration is following to turn the US into a socialist state.  They say he wants illegal immigrants in the country so he can have more voters.  If you point out the non-citizens cannot vote, the anti-Obamite will just laugh at you and refer you to thousands of  cases of alleged voter fraud, which they say is only committed by Democrats.  ( In my personal experience I know of only one case where someone used a loophole to vote twice.  He is a Republican.)

The main thing for which Obama should be criticized is this abomination of legislation called health care reform (AKA: Obamacare). As a candidate, Obama promised transparency, but has been silent while his pals in congress concocted this monstrosity of a reform bill behind closed doors. Candidate Obama pledged not to sign any legislation with earmarks, ("...we can no longer accept an earmarks process in which many of the projects being funded fail to address the real needs of our country.") Yet, nothing has changed. Deals were made in exchange for votes. Obama has has failed in his promise to us on these most important issues.

Happy 4th of July?

Today, the lead story in the newspaper is the ousting of Mohamed Morsi, Egypt's duly elected President,  by the military generals.  In English we might call this a "Coup D'Etat", but the generals call it "the will of the people".  They say the people want a "do-over" of last year's election.

Personally speaking, I am conflicted.  I'm glad to see that the citizens of Egypt reject the Islamist government dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood.  But I am leery of military takeovers of a government that everyone agrees was elected in a fair contest.  As we have seen in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and elsewhere in the Middle East,  the enemies of our enemies are not always our friends. 

This creates a big conundrum for the Obama administration.  (Many people in this country would also like to see a do-over of the last election.)  The USA is again seen to be supporting the wrong group.  Oops.

And, we give the wrong guys in Egypt one point five billion dollars in aid annually, while kids in the USA have rumbling bellies because their head start programs have been slashed.  

Anyhow, I have concluded that this Independence thing is a bit overplayed, when we recognize that even here in the land of the free and home of the brave, elections are decided by mostly uninformed voters who watch too much TV. The winners in elections are less interested in  the needs of their constituents but rather represent the fat cats who funded their election campaigns. 

Probably not what the signers of the Declaration had in mind.

A Good Day

On this date in 1942 - 71 Years ago - , a woman in Cambridge gave birth to her second child, another boy.  She was quite relieved to find that the child was healthy and had all the "normal" requisite digits.  No small factor in her relief was the fact that she had been carrying him around 3 weeks beyond her due date, thus accounting for the weight of the baby - 10 lb 11 oz.

The story of that birth had been recounted every year on June 29th.  The elements of the story never varied:

- The frightened look on the taxi driver's face when she got into the cab - ponderously pregnant -  with her little overnight bag, and asked him to hurry to the hospital.

- The busy night at the maternity ward.  The contractions were starting to come frequently, but there was no available delivery room, so the young mother was placed in a wheelchair rolled into a small room ( she said it was a closet) and told to cross her legs to keep the baby from coming.  At one point a nurse sat on her knees.

- But the baby -- after loitering for three weeks -- was now determined to take his first breath.  Somehow a table was found and the birth took place, without further incident.  The details get somewhat fuzzy at this point since the mother was by now drugged into unconsciousness.

- The dad finally arriving at the hospital, after getting relieved of his night shift responsibilities at the post office, and the nurse looking at his big Irish face, didn't need the name.  She brought the pudgy baby boy to the window as soon as she spotted him looking through the glass.  He always remembered the woman near him remarking, "That's not a newborn!"

As the child matured into adulthood, the thing most people remarked about him was that he was almost always late.  For everything except meals.

During his senior year at high school, he was late 50 times, despite the fact that his house was only about 200 yards from the front door of the school. 

As an adult, he was diagnosed as a chronic procrastinator. Despite the fact that he lived within a short walk to the commuter railroad station, he always drove into the city when going to work.  It was impossible for him to get to the station at the time when the train wanted to leave.  He generally came to work late.  He probably would have been fired for tardiness if it were not for the fact the his procrastination also applied to leaving work.  Thus he came in late and worked late, so he got enough things done to avoid termination for being tardy.

Other than the aforementioned problem with deadlines and schedules, his life was generally unremarkable.  He was never president of anything nor was he ever accused of a crime.  His life was fairly mundane, stable, even predictable.  Still he felt lucky. He had many happy moments, remained in fairly good health despite his penchant for beer and bread.  Other than having crossed the borderline from fitness to obese,  he was not troubled by the myriad of trials and tribulations that he read about everyday in the newspaper.  

His one minor claim to fame, was the coining of the word natanate. 
This came to him many years ago when reading the section of the paper titled "On This Day in History", where he would note that actor Gary Busey and comedian Richard Lewis shared his birthday.  He realized that there is no word in the English language to refer to someone who was born on the same day.  Thus: natanate became his contribution.  One of these days he plans to address the word for someone who was born on the exact same day, but being a procrastinator, well, you know...

Now he is retired, and the words tardy and late hold no meaning for him.  He comes and goes as he pleases.  He stays up late at night  and gets up when the Siamese cat yowls in his ear to come down and put some canned food in his dish, or when the noise outside becomes unbearable -- usually from the infernal gasoline powered contraptions used by lawn service companies.    

On the morning of his birthday, he arises, feeds the cat, starts the coffeemaker, cooks 4 strips of bacon in the microwave, and makes himself a sandwich with 2 slices of heavily buttered toast.
He thinks: this is what I would call the start of a good day.

I wonder how my natanates are doing.

A good day fishing

A good day fishing is as good as it gets!  

My friend Clarke and I both caught fish today. It was a perfect day to be out on the water.  Clear skies, low wind, smooth water.   I got my first ever bluefish on a 7" black mambo minnow lure.  It measured 30"" and weighed at least 15lbs.  I decided that it was actually too big to take home, so I released it.  Definitely the most exciting  fish I have caught on the ocean.

"It felt like I had hooked a jeep"

 Clarke landed a nice fiesty Striped Bass. Too small to keep, but he enjoyed getting to use his new lip grabbing tool which helps land the fish, remove the hook with minimal damage to fish, which was also  released.  Striped Bass need to be 28" to be a keeper.

Clarke loved his new lip grabber

We rewarded ourselves with a post fishing treat:  Fried Clams at the Clam Box in Ipswich.

April Thoughts

April is Poetry month.  April Showers, pennies from heaven, rain in Spain, hosts of golden daffodils, lilting shadows hiding the lowly toad.  Haiku poets, those poetasters who cannot sustain a conceit for more than three lines of 17 syllables will predictably bore the crap out of us with their endless attempts at defining the sunrise

Worthy poets will debate the merits of classical (net up or net down) forms.  Most poets will face another dreary season of uncompensated labor, while watching professional baseball players earn huge amounts of cash for playing games. 

It is a month of transitions:  Thoughts of poetry are overpowered and cast roughly to the ground in a headlock of temporal concerns.    This is the brief window of time when down-to-earth preparations will determine the state of the garden in august. We have started seeds in the basement under lights. Here in New England we have bravely (or is it naively?) put away our orange plastic shovels and are busy syphoning the gasoline from the snow blower tank into the lawn mower. 

   

Sweaters and long-sleeves are still at the ready, but shorts and Tee shirts have been taken-out  from winter storage.  The screen porch is ready.  It will soon be the favorite room in the house -- for coffee and bacon sandwiches in the morning; then reading and frosty beers in the late afternoon.  We have started letting Mocha – the 5 year old male Siamese out in the fenced-in yard for short run-arounds.  He’s been confined to the inside world all winter and enjoys venturing outside, stalking chipmunks and squirrels despite their ability to evade his grasp.

April is the cruelest month, according to poet TS Elliot, probably because of the vagaries of the weather – one day’s sunny promise gives rise to expectations of relief from the chill of winter then a day later yanking us back to reality with arctic blasts.    

 It is the last month when you can safely eat oysters until September, according to the tales of old wives.

But life is too short to pay attention to old crones.  The mouth waters at the very thought of a plate of a dozen chilled blue points served on the half-shell on a summer night with a Tanqueray Martini straight-up with olive. 

My Favorite Irish Verse

Yes, I plan to publish this poem every St Patricks Day... until I write a better one.

The Irony of St. Patrick’s Day

Fake Irishmen wearing silly green ties
Calling with bad brogues
For a wee dram of green beer
In bars festooned with shamrocks
Pipes and cartoon leprechauns they
Sing-a-long to a verse of Danny Boy
Like tone deaf drunken goats,
They set the dogs to barking
With their droning tura-lura-lura

Amateurs: they end-up
Puking on their Italian loafers
Waking-up late for work
The next day in a hangover fog

Grandsons of the famines
Endure this minstrel show
With a mirthless grin
We stay to ourselves
Washing shots of Jameson's
Down with a beer
Glad not to be thinking
About the days
When Irish need not apply.