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That’s The Way Things Are

Public Enemy #1

Osama bin Laden... UBL... Usama bin Laden...

No matter how you spell his name, it's true... we got him.

Finally.

It's about time, huh?

10 years later, we finally got him.

I was out with a bunch of friends watching a WWE Pay-Per View, of all things. Yes, I’m a pro wrestling fan… get over it.

I started getting a ton of emails saying that President Obama was going to make a last minute statement at 10:30 PM that night. But it didn’t say what his statement was going to be about.

Naturally, I started to wonder what Obama was going to speak about. I began to debate if it would be regarding Muammar Ghaddafi’s son and grandsons being killed in a NATO airstrike earlier that weekend. Or if there were a brand new development in the Middle East. Or if it was something completely different and something that hadn’t hit the news cycle quite yet.

Never in a million years did it even enter my thought process that Obama would be announcing that the United States had killed a major terrorist threat, much less the most wanted man on the planet, Osama bin Laden. But as the Pay-Per-View ended and we turned to CNN, I soon discovered that was precisely what had occurred (in addition to learning that Obama was already running late to making his statement).

When the news coverage confirmed that was, in fact, what had happened, feelings of shock, happiness, and sadness (yes, sadness as well) came over me. Shock, because it’s certainly not every day that the most wanted person on the planet gets taken out, not to mention that nothing at all was leaked to the public at any point in the months of intelligence gathering stages of the operation or its ultimate execution.

Happiness, since, of course, the mastermind behind the 9/11 plot, as well as other attacks on U.S. citizens, and citizens of many of our allies as well, had been taken out and brought to justice.

…   More

That’s The Way Things Are

Free Cookies!

They look so good and tasty…

And they’re just sitting out there, in the open, for anyone to take.

The cookies and doughnuts at the bakery… at the supermarket… are what I’m talking about, of course.

The pastries at the supermarket are put into unlocked shelves in the front of the bakery section and people are trusted to not steal them and eat them as they shop.

But when I was in the supermarket the other day, I saw a woman who took it upon herself to just grab a few of those cookies and scarf them down, at no cost to herself.

Yes, that’s my politically correct way of saying she didn’t pay for them.

Now, obviously, this isn’t the first time I’ve seen something of this sort in the supermarket, whether pastries in the bakery, or a piece of fruit, or even a bag of chips. But this instance got my mind moving again on the topic. Not necessarily the “stealing” of the cookies in and of itself but, rather, the whole taking without paying thing.

As a society — globally, not just as a nation — we all enter into a social contract with one another (thank you, John Locke). Basically, what this means is, all of us, as people living in the same community and world, agree to abide by certain rules and standards and accept responsibility in many situations to protect other people from things on the negative side of the spectrum.

Clearly, that woman — and the others I’ve seen doing the same in supermarkets — didn’t get the memo.

People break that contract all the time, and on bigger scales, certainly. People steal from electronics stores, clothing stores, rob other people’s homes… and just the other day, a popular jewelry store in Hewlett was robbed, with its staff still inside and working.

And let’s not forget the even bigger fractures of the social contract: people harass, …   More

That’s The Way Things Are

Happy Birthday

Wow, this is going to be a tough one to write.

I’m actually feeling a little queasy as I start to write this, come to think of it.

Admittedly, I’m not entirely sure how to start…

OK, here we go…

Remember a few weeks ago I wrote a column discussing how I’ve had some, shall we say, “interesting” experiences with dating and girlfriends? Well, here’s a specific story on that front… triggered by the fact that my ex-girlfriend’s birthday was last week.

We’ve been broken up for a couple of months now, and I’ve been dating and I’m sure she has, as well — not that I know this for a fact or anything, but it’s a relatively safe assumption.

Still, I can’t help that I’m aware of it and my brain acknowledges it.

It’s how my mind is wired, for better or worse. I can’t help it.

We ended quite terribly. Everything appeared to be fine. We were on the phone finalizing our plans for the upcoming weekend together, which included our Valentine’s Day plans, before she went into the shower.

Yes, we broke up just a few days before Valentine’s Day. I had to return the gifts I’d already gotten for her. Sucks, huh?

Then she got into the shower, came back out, and was an entirely different person. She called me back, crying hysterically. What the hell happened in that now infamous — in my mind anyway — shower?

I could finally decipher her saying that something was bothering her about me and/or us. I’m not sure which, but that much I was finally able to understand from her.

But she wouldn’t tell me WHAT it was. And to this very day, I still don’t know. I tried for the next 24 hours to get her to tell me, but she refused. She said it was “too hard” to tell me, and she “couldn’t tell me.” I …   More

That’s The Way Things Are

What’s The Real Bottom Line?

I stopped by the drive through window at Burger King on my way home one day last week to use a coupon for a free four-piece box of chicken tenders (I needed a snack to hold me over until dinner… I eat a lot… gimme a break). When I arrived at the pickup window, I asked for an extra sauce, and I was told it would be 25 cents additional.

An extra 25 cents? For one lousy extra sauce? Really?

I know the economy is in the toilet and the bottom line for all companies has become ever more important and they’re all pinching pennies — even big companies like Burger King. After all, we’re in what’s most likely the worst economy this country has seen since the Great Depression (which started back in October 1929).

But, is it really necessary to be THAT frugal? With the bulk amounts that Burger King purchases EVERTHING in, relative to the amount of business they do, they surely get everything at an incredibly cheap per unit price, including those sauce packs they dispense. And while I, of course, have no precise numbers to go on, if each of those sauces cost the company more than two cents I’d be shocked.

I was listening to CBS News Radio during a drive home a couple of months ago, when they broadcasted a report on a new economic study. They said that the average American currently eats out approximately three times a week. With the poor economy, though, fast food chains are getting a lot of that business. So, with the traffic for those restaurants remaining relatively steady even in this poor economic climate, obviously, business isn’t that bad.

So where do companies draw the line between pinching pennies (literally, pennies, at times) and customer satisfaction and loyalty? In this economy, many companies are offering discounts on their products — whether it be clothing, electronics, or food — to generate increased revenue, while others take the opposite route and …   More

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