Panera Experiment

More than two years ago, Panera Bread, a European style non profit U.S. bakery chain decided to try an experimental program in a few of it's outlets. One of those chosen for the experiment is in Portland. It's the "patrons pay what they can, even if that's nothing" experiment. Here's how it works. Hungry, poor people pay less than the cost of a meal and offer to volunteer in exchange for soup, a sandwich or a salad. Customers who can afford breakfast or lunch pay for their meal and, if they're able, pay more to subsidize the needy. No questions are asked and everyone is treated equal....or so the policy claims.

When I first read of that experiment my initial reaction was that the entitlement, welfare crazed typical Americans would never pay enough to support the idea. Too many people here expect others to pay for their wants. The number of "poor' who volunteered in exchange for their free meals, for instance, is minuscule.  Well, I was right! Students from the nearby Grant High School mobbed the cafe daily, ordering multiple meals and not paying for them. Homeless people came for every meal. Yep, that's every day, as if the cafe was a soup kitchen. Residents of the neighborhood  have complained of an increase in crime and loitering because of the mobs of entitlement leering patrons. That Panera  store became a freeloaders paradise.

The money from well intentioned customers who paid for their food and drink and often paid more than would be expected, was so far below meeting costs of the outlet. Every  month of the experiment at  Panera the cafe was losing tremendous amount of money. At one point that the cafe was about to close, but that would have been an embarrassment in admitting that too many people out there are freeloaders. So in one last attempt to save the idea, the Panera staff has changed training methods. The door greeter (the "community ambassador") explains the mission of Panera with every customer who comes in. Success stories of out-of-work customers paying for their meals by volunteering now decorate the walls. New signs explains Panera's expectations. Hmmmmm I am skeptical that can change things at Panera.

More practical changes instituted include: having the Panera staff turn away anyone drunk or on drugs,  Panera meeting with the Grant school principal  about the problem and a letter was sent to parents explaining how the students were virtually ransacking the cafe every morning for the "free stuff". Panera asked the school to ban student patronage of Panera before school (when most of the students were eating there). Also,  no one (the homeless in particular) is now allowed to come every day, for every meal.

Ha! Good luck to that too. The strange Panera pay if you want to policy is doomed. When you make it an option to pay, many deadbeat types of people are going to opt not to pay. In fact, the Panera model is exactly what is wrong with the U.S. entitlement state today. The takers now far out-number the givers in this society. "Free for me" is the mantra today of way too many Americans.

Not Nice To Neglect Mom

It's not nice to neglect mom and dad.  Sad to say, as a society becomes more prosperous a bigger percentage of adult children move away from and forget about their parents, often condemning mom and dad to abject living conditions and loneliness. Well, China now has reached the point where this is a big problem, as the one child policy is producing one stinker of a kid who moves away now that he or she has the economic mobility that a more affluent society allows. Boy, China needs some Jewish moms to nag their kids to take care of them.

So in China, the national legislature has just amended its laws on the elderly to require that adult children visit their aged parents "often" — or risk being sued by them. Oh my, mom is being told to sue junior. But the amendment does not specify how frequently such visits should occur. State media say the new clause will allow elderly parents who feel neglected by their children to take them to court. The new law fits the many media reports abound of elderly parents being abandoned or ignored by their children.   For example, the Chinese media (with government approval of those kinds of stories) reported that a grandmother in her 90s in the prosperous eastern province of Jiangsu had been forced by her son to live in a pig pen for two years. News outlets in China now frequently carry stories about other parents being abused or neglected, or of children seeking control of their elderly parents' assets without their knowledge.

It's partly because of the new aging society in China. In early less prosperous economic times the number of residents to reach golden oldie age was much smaller. But now the society is filled with lonely and economically stressed elderly. The breakup of the traditional extended family in China creates a mess because and there are few affordable alternatives, such as retirement or care homes for the elderly, which enables the elderly can live on their own.

Too, the harshness of new China now somewhat discourages the kind of close relationships in the family that remind the kids of the old China axiom that children should care for their parents for as long as they are alive. This is an interesting change in the culture in China. It is sort of an acceptance of the concept that is prevalent in the west, that kids should leave home and make their own families and ways. Yet, China doesn't have the welfare safety net of many western countries. There are few nursing homes, no social security payments to the elderly etc.

Hmmmm Maybe China should recruit some Jewish moms to straighten out that mess.

Gallop Poll

The Gallop poll is one of the most enduring and trusted public opinion polls ever devised. So it's interesting to skim through some of those polls and learn the trends and beliefs of the world. Ok...I was bored and killing time one day so I read some Gallop polls. Anyway, here five of the polls and my own less than scientific explanations for the findings.

- Greece leads the world in pessimism. Forty-two percent of Greeks rated their future lives worse than their current lives. Greeks' hopelessness likely reflects the government's debt crisis and the political and economic uncertainty in the country. But that's because Greece has been a complete social welfare state for years. Eventually, the "free stuff" a government gives to citizens becomes unsustainable and it all ends. I wonder if President Obama realizes the same. He does seem to be a Greek at heart.

- Gallop found that the least emotional people in the world are the Singaporean. 36% of Singaporean report no feeling, either positive or negative, on a daily basis. That's the lowest in the world. I suspect Singapore may be the dreariest place in the world (unless you like to shop or like to surrender to complete control by the government). Filipinos are the most emotional in the world, with 60% saying they experience positive or negative emotion, and Latin Americans are the most positive in the world (In my opinion, probably they can immigrate illegally to the U.S. and live off  the many loose welfare programs here).

- Only 27% of the adult world is fully employed. I wonder what the other 73% do with their time. Maybe they are the ones sending me all those internet scam offers.
-  Fifty-seven percent of Iranians support developing Iran's nuclear power capabilities for non-military purposes, while 40% approve of developing nuclear power for military use. This tends to improve that not only is their nothing worse than a crazy Muslim, unless he is Iranian.
- Worldwide, 32% of adults in 2011 reported having home Internet access, according to Gallup surveys conducted in 148 countries. This is up from 29% in 2010 and 25% in 2009. I guess the conclusion is that as usage rises an informed citizenry and common sense decline and obsession with triviality and idiocy will rise.

Gee, I always suspected I was a little crazy, but it seems that the world may be even more nutty than I.

Aging On Face book

Did you read about the 104-year-old Michigan woman who lies about her age on the social media web site.  No, she doesn't list herself as a swinging 90 year old hottie.  The problem that makes Marguerite Joseph of Michigan not say she is a seasoned 104 year old is that Face book limits the age declaration  on the profile page to 100. Every time Marguerite's granddaughter (Marguerite doesn't see well enough to go on line without help)  inputs her grandmother's birth year as 1908, Face book changes it to 1928. So for the past two years Marguerite has been stuck at age 99.

The story I read about this says that Marguerite is legally blind and can't hear well, but she reads and responds to all her Face book messages with some help. Hmmm This makes me wonder what a 104 year old would post and read on Face book. I doubt she is posting Justin Beiber videos or growing those farm animals in that crazy farm application. So after consultations with myself I have come up with a few things I think Marguerite might be doing on her Face book page.

-  Flirting with those wild and crazy young guys in the 80 to 90 year old age group.
-  Joining that Depends adult diaper support group
-  Chatting on IM about new fangled technologies like, am radio and 8 track cd decks
-  Posting her provocative support stocking hose photos
-  Bullying punk 90 year olds

May Marguerite live another 104 years or at least out-live Face book.

The Female Brain

I read about something regarding research on women's brains. I guess they research women's brains since we men seem to show that we have much less brain matter. But anyway, the research on how fast the brain ages was conducted in four different countries, and each study showed that women's brains age faster than men's. The theory for why this happens (no, it isn't what we men think is the reason.....that all those trips to the shopping malls by women make their brains age more quickly) is that the typical lady lives a more stressful and busy life than her male counterpart.

You know.... women do the laundry, potty train the kids and exert too much energy trying to get the TV remote control from our hands when we are watching football. There may be a few more stresses that women deal with more often than men, but you get the idea. The researchers suggested a rather simple exercise for women to help overcome the extra stress they face each day. No, it isn't to divorce the man or kick him out of the house. Instead, it's a breathing exercise. 

The research shows that stressed people breathe in short bursts from their chests.  So the researchers tell women that in order to relieve stress they should "breathe deeply from their abdomen". That's how people breathe when they are relaxed. Uh, you might wonder why we men pass gas in public and then smile afterward. It may be our stress relief exercise.  You have to expel the gas in order to breath deeply, so we do that before farting. Next time a male pig passes gas from behind, you might just give an understanding smile.

But my own informal research tells me that our male brains are younger because of a number of other strategies we use. Women should make note of these and be more understanding toward their man when he practices each of his stress relief strategies. Ideally, a young brained women would also engage in these activities to keep her brain young and active like....uh....mine.(You can laugh now).

Here are an additional five things women should do to stop their brains from aging faster than a mans.
- Avoid buying all those shoes. If we men can get by on a couple of shoes, so can you.  Invest instead in fishing equipment, football gear and unlimited amounts of tools that you will never use to fix things you can't fix.
- When your man shouts out another woman's name during sex, be understanding that he is just practicing role reversal breathing exercises.
- Stop complaining when he fails to take out the garbage or some other chore and do all of the cooking and cleaning and other housework yourself. They are great ways for a young brained women to avoid stress.
- When your man wears the same underwear two days in a row and picks up that spilled food on the floor and eats it, don't fuss at him. He is just making his immune system stronger and becoming less stressed because of it.
- When he flirts with a pretty young girl don't slap him. Recognize it is not an insult to you. It's just a way of his reducing his stress and keeping his brain young.

I hope you will add these techniques to your life and make your brain as young as men you observe every day.

How Would You Spend Your Last Day On Earth

It looks like we dodged another end of the world prediction with that asteroid passing near us without hitting earth. I think those predictions are about as likely to come true as me winning a 100 dollar lottery...and I don't buy lottery tickets. I keep reading that question that always comes up related to knowing in advance that we and all others would be destroyed, "If today was your last day on earth, how would you spend your time?" It's an interesting question because I think there would be so many different answers to it that the conclusion would be futile to try to reach a consensus. For me, it would be to spend it with my daughter. "What would you do on your last day?"

After you answer that one I have a few more questions about your last day. First, "what would be your last meal?"  I'm not sure what to would be mine but a donut has to be on the menu. And I am not cooking either.  I would want something simple and "homey", food I remember from childhood would be good. Fried chicken comes to mind, and creamy mashed potatoes.

"How would you spend your last night?" There are some who would sink to debauchery seeking sex, booze and a wild spending spree. I think I would prefer to stay in, maybe read and listen to music. Being around others might be too stressful and chaotic for me. But then those who are social might need others every second of their last night. Basically, people would probably do what they usually do on their last night or do something on their bucket list.

"Whom would to call to say good bye, offer an apology or declare your love." Or would you? Some people never do those things and would not be likely to just because they found out the world was ending tomorrow.  As for me, I am not sure. Maybe I am one of those never say people, or perhaps I don't feel I have any unresolved issues to settle. I just don't have an answer for that question.

Well, now that I have you thinking about these end of the world issues I suppose your ready for it to happen....

Some Fortunes Are Politically Incorrect

We have started another year of the Asian calendar, the Year of the Snake. Snake...no that has nothing to do with me. Stop thinking about me and snakes being compatible. The reason I bring this up is that European and American political correctness may be coming to the eastern world in the Year of the Snake. How do I know this? Well, sad to say that one of my favorite things about Asian culture, the like of feel good nonsense and instead presenting a more realistic world view, is disappearing in that great faux Asian traditions of the fortune cookie.

Yes, I know the fortune cookie was invented in San Francisco by a Japanese fellow and has nothing to do with traditional Asian culture, but go to any Chinese restaurant in this country and you get a fortune cookie. It's always to be fun to read the fortune inside (and those lottery number suggestions that never win), just like reading those silly astrological fortunes we don't really believe in. Inside a fortune cookie (oh... but those taste nasty) you could get anything from a Confucius line to a tongue in the cheek remark like "Avoid taking gambles" that was followed by those lottery number suggestions which they expected you to gamble.

But now the world's largest fortune cookie manufacturer has cut the heart out of the fortune cookie by removing romantic messages that one sometimes found inside. I say, what's wrong with reading a fortune that says, “The evening promises romantic interest”. This "no more romance fortunes in cookies because they might offend" is nothing but the crazy Western politically correct response about a fun Asian concept. In this case it's a few complaints from politically correct parents of young children. “Some parents sent us e-mails. They said they didn't want their kids reading them,” said Derrick Wong, a VP at the Brooklyn, New York based Wonton Food in justification for taking the romance out of fortune cookies..

Are they kidding? Do they think anyone really expects those cookie fortunes to be guidelines for a kid to follow? Hmmmmm Protecting kids from fortune cookie messages. I can think of a few other real world threats that might be better addressed instead. Wonton Food churns out five million cookies every day from manufacturing plants, shipping them to stores and restaurants nationwide. It boasts a catalog of about 10,000 fortunes, keeping about 5,000 or so in rotation at any given time. And they claim that the romance fortunes are the worst of the messages inside?

So I assume that parents are teaching their kids that there may be some truth to these fortune cookies messages. That itself is an oddity. In that case I think those parents should be wary their kids not read the words on the little Sweetheart Valentine candy too. Those Sweetheart candy hearts even ask the recipient to "Be Mine" and have the audacity to proclaim "I Love You'. I wonder how the western political correct police have let that that threat to their children go uncensored.
Die romance! But long live the idiocy of political correctness! We must protect our is from romance before it destroys them.

What's Important Mattters

It's hard to believe, but the modern world continues to confuse me more and more. Every day I see insignificance promoted to the significant while the real is neglected or hidden. I think that in the U.S. , and to a lesser but still important degree elsewhere, people are less informed about the unimportant and more informed about the trivial. This seems to me to be a threat to not only a well understood life, but to the survival of the best part of our culture at the expense of the promotion of the most inane elements.

The "latest news" items to capture public fascination here are the information mediums and public obsessing about the fate of a cyclist (Lance Armstrong) who cheated and lied for years about it and a football player  (Manti Teo) who seems to have created an imaginary girlfriend that he later "killed" in order to win support for an award campaign and to win commercial endorsements.  I care nothing about this nonsense, nor about the stupidity of reality TV shows that pretend to be real or about celebrities whose anti social hijinks that are supposed to amuse or entertain me. But everyone around me thinks it is I who is out of touch with reality.

What I worry about are the increasingly large number of people who live in the world of imagination, of pretending, and of insignificance, and who know or care little about the world as it really is. When we stop caring about the real it is lost and replaced by the shallow. Is that not happening already? The world and we who live in it have changed greatly, and not for the better. Our tastes have changed from the cerebral to the silly, our appetite from the important to the inane. Why does our society more often seek the outrageous but rarely the substantive? Maybe the silly technology we are addicted to has desensitized us and made us worship that instead of the human condition.

Nothing real shocks us or offends us anymore, as we equate the phony with the real and make no distinction between the two. Each new electronic gadget and software is another road away from reality and responsibility to others. I wonder if there is a point at which society will awaken and try to recapture reality, but then, I also wonder if it is capable of even recognizing what is real.

I Don't Fell Their Pain

Another one of those "studies" confirms some others that say that crabs, shrimp and lobsters feel pain. I'm not kidding. They pay scientists to study pain thresholds in crabs. The various pain in shellfish studies now claim that crabs, shrimp and lobsters don't have a simple nervous system after all, but rather a complex human like one that responds the same way to pain that we humans do. When testing for pain reaction they found that shell fish sea creatures always avoid stimuli that gives them pain (in this case, an electric shock the scientists administered) in favor the stimuli that does not. The theory is that shellfish must feel the pain if they always avoid it when given a choice between a painful outcome and a non painful one.

I am not sure this is correct. As proof that pain is sometimes sought by creatures, remember that humans prefer the painful and wholly stupid reality TV to more enlightening TV shows. I don't know if those crustaceans feel pain, but the studies done about them and about most others give me a pain in the butt sometimes. Shouldn't they instead study finding a cure for cancer? As to this study about the crabs, I can only wonder what are we supposed to do about it. The studies now claim that shellfish are crying when harvested by pain inflicting fisherman. Hmmm I guess the seafood boats should have pleasure lounges for the crabs to induce their capture by luring them on board with pole dancing crabettes (I think I made up that word) or crab girls drink free nights.

Might we be too sensitive if we worry about the pain that shellfish feel when catching and cooking them? I am sure that other food products we eat, both animal and plant, also feel "pain" as well. If we want to avoid inflicting that kind of pain on our food sources it will be rather difficult to find anything to eat (Ok forget that line. It "pains me" to say it but there will always be a McDonald's or KFC somewhere) maybe humans are micro managing what they eat instead of macro managing their food sources. What is better is for us to reflect upon is to not intentionally harm anyone or anything in our lives beyond what is unavoidable (But I refuse to stop calling cell phone addicts "idiots"!) and to not become obsessed with that which doesn't greatly matter. Do I sound a little crabby today?

Old Time TV

Since I have been ill the past few weeks I have watched more TV than I would like to. When you are constantly nauseated and tired it's hard to read. That's what I have been going through, and the consequence is that it has steered me to the boob tube....what you call TV. I normally don't watch TV that much because there is little challenging on it . Apart from some live news and sports events and a few things I might stumble on, TV leaves me with he feeling that there isn't much of value to see there. It's probably because I am out of touch with and don't particularly like what I modern culture that TV offerings seem stupid, anti intelligent and a time waster. But when too sick to leave the house and unable to read, TV comes into play.

After several weeks of watching some of the programs that TV shows I haven't changed my negative opinion of it, but I did find a channel or two of nostalgia programs that I like. Those old TV series are shown just as they were presented in the 50's and 60's in the innocent days of the world in which they debuted. In my view, the quality of the TV shows of that generation is vastly superior to what is made and broadcast today. Early TV often could be thought provoking and did not rely on sex, violence or special effects in the programs. In fact those attributes were not allowed by the TV censors of the day. I wish those censors could be brought back to today's TV, and I wish real talent would replace the inane garbage that is what TV is today. Maybe then the producers and performers could instead rely on talent, originality and hard work in bringing us a more entertaining and challenging line up of programming. The death of all reality TV would be a good first step to resurrecting TV.

I will spare you any more rants about why TV is so lousy today. I think you may already agree anyway. But one thing I want to mention is how much fun it was to see the old shows from the 50's and 60's in my much older aged perspective. Those old shows all hold up well today, though they do seem innocent. But I think innocence can be a good thing sometimes. What the old shows were and are is an escape to a more pleasant world than to the ugly world TV shows lead us today. Instead of the violent and cruel escapism that is modern TV, the old shows give a more idealized Disney-like world, one in which we can reside for the hour or so when we watch and feel no stress or angst There seemed to be no politically correct agendas in any of the programs I watched. And most importantly, there was nothing cruel or negative to it. No one is humiliated in those old shows, and scandal does not replace substance.

And how nice to see those performers in their youth again.....Charles Bronson as a young escaped convict in a 1955 Alfred Hitchcock TV episode, a baby faced "new sensation" group named The Beach Boys on a Jack Benny Program episode, an up and coming 18 year old actress named Diane Lane talking about her 18th birthday on the old Tonight Show, A young Nat King Cole singing his new hit 'Mona Lisa'.....and on and on.

I don't imagine today's TV will be as enduring as those older versions have been. TV today is fools gold, not the real thing. It seems to me that today's TV shows are more likely to make me sick than to relieve my tired, nauseated viral symptoms. No wonder TV is such a vast wasteland today.

Valentine's Day Blues

February 14, otherwise known as Valentine's Day rears it's ugly head once a year to terrorize men who know the "gift' they have been forced to give isn't what she wants. We men wonder why we have to be the giver and she the getter. Sometimes we fantasize about The St. Valentine's Day Massacre. That's the Valentine's Day in 1929 in in which seven gangster rivals of Gangster Al Capone are murdered in Chicago. We are so afraid of offending "her' that we have nightmares that she is Al and that she machine guns us in our garage as we change the oil in HER car , just as Capone's thugs did to the unfortunate seven that day.

Is there a worse holiday for the male species? That's a rhetorical question since we already know the answer. It's hard to believe but true that apart from Christmas Day Valentine's Day, when we pay homage to chocolate, hearts and a year's worth of guilt, is the most celebrated day in the U.S.
-In 1866, candy manufacturer NECCO made the first conversation heart candies -- then called "Motto Hearts." According to NECCO, 8 billion of these little heart shaped mysterious tasting chalk-like candies are sold between Jan. 1 and Feb. 14. Why is it that when I grab be a Necco heart candy mine never says anything about a woman wanting me, but instead has a rather blunt message just for em. The last one was "Get Lost, Loser"

-15 percent of U.S. women send themselves flowers on Valentine's Day, proving that the social pressure to "get a Valentine" is way over the top and that some women must hate Valentine's day too.
-Only the U.S., Canada, Mexico, France, Australia and the U.K. celebrate Valentine's Day. Any time your country is grouped with France is not an occasion to celebrate.
-More than 35 million heart shaped boxes of chocolate will be sold for Valentine's Day. I suspect at least 5 million of those are sold to fat guys who eat the candy themselves.
-About 3 percent of pet owners will give Valentine's Day gifts to their pets. This is in equal proportion to number of pet owners who care anything about human kids.
-Teachers receive the most Valentine's Day cards, followed by children, mothers, wives and then, sweethearts. Children aged 6 to 10 exchange more than 650 million Valentine's cards with teachers, classmates and family members. However, immediately after exchanging those Valentine's most kids resume their more favorite practices of bullying, name calling or generally beating to a pulp the kids they just Valentined.
-About 1 billion Valentine's Day cards are exchanged each year, behind only Christmas. Hallmark Greeting Cards has more than 1,330 different cards specifically for Valentine's Day. But most women would really rather just have their man show them the money
-The Italian city of Verona, where Shakespeare's fictional lovers Romeo and Juliet lived, receives about 1,000 letters addressed to Juliet every Valentine's Day. This proves that there are a significant number of morons or lunatics with romantic notions.

But despite all I have written here, in memory of Al Capone, I do wish you a Happy Valentine's Day

No Mail Delivered On Saturdays

Well, all that new technology I hate so much has made me hate it even any more with the announcement of the U.S. Postal Service (the snail mail guys) will no longer deliver letters, envelopes, and all those bills I love to hate on Saturday, starting August 1st. No more mail for me on Saturday isn't the end of the world, though it is an inconvenience in that it slows delivery of mail delivered during the week. What bothers me is that it is another thing that has worked well, that the technology of the new has or is killing.

It seems that every month or so I read about another of the old reliable less technological being replaced by whatever new gadget replaces it. This end of Saturday mail is probably a portent that all snail mail delivery will disappear and be replaced by electronic delivery. Just as I prefer reading a paper book to reading on line or on an electronic reader, I prefer to open an envelope see the words and have the option of keeping what I have received in a more tangible way. A paper birthday card, for example, has far more meaning than an electronic one in that way, and because it takes more time and effort to send a snail card. I, uh, feel the love more when it comes in an envelope delivered by the post office.

Sad thing about the impending death of snail mail is that is dying even though it still functions very efficiently. The higher cost is the only factor killing snail mail. It cost more to snail mail today as more people use electronic means to send their messages. Hmmmm Our modern world in microcosm, the axiom- if something is more expensive get rid of it for the cheap. But I think some things are worth keeping, even if they cost more and are not as "efficient" as what wants to replace them. E mail is great, but not for everything. I will surely miss the snail mail concept for the things it best serves. Hiding in a cave while my old world ways disappear seems not so implausible now after all.

No Cells For The Players

Despite my embrace of the computer to keep in touch with my former home town, most of the electronic communication I want no part of and, I am encouraged about some negative high tech communication news today! I read an article today about a local high school, Hillsboro High School, which is leading the trend among some high school coaches here who are growing increasingly wary of the impact that digital media has on their athletes and teams. And what are they doing about it? They are collecting all cell phones and other media before practice and games and banning them on bus trips to out of town games. And strangely, most of the kids on the teams who are involved say they think their lives are better when participating in sports without those phones.

The coaches have done this because they know that the ability to communicate face to face, rather than through short messages punched out on cell phones, is integral in the team dynamic. many coaches here and across the U.S. are concerned that face to face communication skills are being hindered by the technology. Sports is a little bit different than most normal life situations, a little bit old school. You have to be able to communicate in those older ways, as in speaking face to face while on the basketball court. If you don't have that practice, it does pose challenges.

Here are some quick facts about kids and their cell usage. Nearly 90 percent of older teens (ages 14-17) have a cell phone and 31 percent use a smart phone, according to a 2012 study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project. Text messaging has become the main mode of communication among teens. According to the Pew survey, 63 percent say they use text messaging to communicate every day, compared to 39 percent who use voice calls, 35 percent who socialize in person outside of school and 29 percent who exchange messages on social network sites. Wow! By a two to one margin kids communicate with texting rather than talking face to face.

Those coaches know from their interaction with the kids at the sports activities, that the ability of teens to communicate effectively face-to-face is falling by the wayside. What the coaches see is that teens are simply choosing not to communicate face-to-face. As a result, many teens aren't learning verbal skills or how to resolve conflict by talking things out. In fact, a number of kids on the teams that ban the phones say their ability to talk face to face has improved because of the cell phone ban by their coaches.

Just observe teens today and you will see that they often sit across from one another and have conversations with their thumbs. They don't have honest face-to-face dialogue anymore as much as they did 10 years ago, or even five years ago. They have replaced deeper conversations with short electronic updates. This is not good for their future interactions after graduation from school.
The Hillsboro high coach believes banning cells to be a win for all. "We haven't heard one complaint, one moan, one groan," he said. "I think it's helped that camaraderie and getting ready for the game. If nothing else, to have that 30, 40 minutes to spend talking to each other and enjoying each others company."

Now if only the crazy cell adults would realize that too.....

Bad Ole Days

I know I wax with too much sentiment about the 'good ole days' but I just prefer those times to the culture of today. But there were some things from my childhood that absolutely were not better than today's counterpart. Well, like the time I had eye surgery as a boy and was given the standard anesthesia one got to knock out the patient before surgery, ether. Either made me sick for three days after the operation (for "lazy eye'), and I swear the anesthesia was worse than the operation. But today we have those instant knock out drips that wear of immediately after surgery and leave us feeling better than before we entered the operating room.

Some things from our youth will never make a comeback. Thank Goodness for that! Remember the mullet hair do and the Nehru jacket? If not consider yourself lucky and be grateful that those will never make a comeback. Even in the fashion world some things have only one life. If you know anyone who has a Nehru jacket in his closet you can tell him to throw it out because the idea that "all clothes eventually come back into fashion" is a myth.


How about these things that I think we can agree are better left dead than resurrected.
- phones with cords attached
- black and white TV
- dressing in our "Sunday finest" for church
- drinking castor oil for those who needed a laxative
- those frozen TV dinners
- 8 track tape decks in cars
- window unit air conditioning that always made it either too hot or too cold
- family Sunday dinners that included crazy aunts, uncles and unidentifiable relatives
- struggling around the house 25 kilo vacuum cleaners
- hand me down clothes
- cars that broke down regularly
- driving on every vacation because flying was "only for the rich"
- mass community immunizations for disease like polio

There's more of course, but the reality for me is also that my list of things that I am exposed to today that I would also like to see disappear would be twice as long. So, call me a day dreamer, but I still would much rather go back to live in the 'good ole days' and leave you with your modern world.

Bibical Tattoos

The biggest professional American style football game, The Super Bowl, is done for another year. I am not a huge fan of that game because the hype surrounding it becomes so persistent it tends to make me want to run and hide. This year the game was in my former city of New Orleans, the 10th time it has been held there. New Orleans is a great tourist city has some of the best food in the world, is compact and convenient to maneuver, is open 24 hours a day every day with great live music and clubs etc. So because of the venue this year I did watch a little of the game.

What interested me most was not the game it self, but the tattoos of one of the team stars, Colin Kaepernick. Kaepernick has tattoos all over his arms, not so unusual in today's world of immediate gratification and glorification. What's odd about the tats is that they are lines from the Bible. He's got biblical verses tattooed on his arms for all to see. Since no one would be able read the small text without grabbing the guy's arm, I wonder if he put those on for his own enlightenment or for others.

Most people who wear tattoos say they want to make a statement to the world or to some individual. But putting lines from scripture on one's arms seem not to meet that parameter. And why would someone think tattooing a religious message would sway others to follow its dictates? When the mediums asked Kaepernick why he has the tattoos he only says that they are to "glorify God"?

I am not sure that tattooing a body glorifies God. Too bad the journalists never asked Kaepernick to explain how that works. I wish him well and defend his right to mutilate his body any way he wishes. Too, I hope he sticks with his Christian beliefs because if he converts to Islam it's going to be hard to explain those verses. But then, Kaepernick's team lost the Super Bowl Game. Apparently either God isn't a football fan or he wants his message delivered other ways.

Disappearing School Yearbooks

Another old tradition looks like to be a dying one. The college yearbook that has been a staple of every campus for more than 100 years is being replaced by social media sites like Face book, where campus postings are more current and updated. Right here in Oregon, the state University says it may stop publishing the Oregon State University because sales have fallen so low that it can't find a publisher willing to print it. A number of other universities in the United States are also getting rid of that old faithful yearbook that made us all look like the dorks that we really are.

At $50 a book many students are passing on buying one at Oregon State, and only a few even bother to have their photo taken for the yearbook. Last year only 60 students stopped by the yearbook office to have their photos taken for it. As a result, this year's Oregon State yearbook won't even include student portraits. This is another example of the digital electronics age killing the more simpler and , in my opinion, the more noble, traditions, even on a school campus.

Though most students did I never bought a college yearbook when I was a student, but I did purchase them every year when in primary and in high school, both for myself and for when Jane when was a student. Probably, more people feel an affinity to their much smaller elementary or high school than to the huge university campuses (Oregon State has 26,000 students),. Size of school is quite a unifying factor of a school campus. We identify more with what we seem to be more a part of. So I think school yearbooks are not now as endangered outside of the college campus.

But there are people like me who prefer to have a printed version of anything to a digital one. I want to put a book on the shelf of my book case, handle it, and share it with others directly. Digital technology seems sterile to me, and those crazy digital formats become "outdated' so quickly now the digital world is one of frustration. It's not fun, for example, to find a treasured photo that can not be opened because "the file is not compatible to the operating system". Books never become incompatible.

Despite having written all of this I know that kids today grow up in a digital world (poor things!) and have little frame of reference in which to compare paper sources to electronic information sources. They will pick digital because they will never know the joy of holding a book in the hand when reading it. I can only sigh and say that you know not what you miss, digital addicts.

Whopper Funeral

I read recently that a 88 year old man from Pennsylvania, David S. Kime Jr. of West York, gave the food police the Italian salute. He had a fast food funeral after his recent death. Wow! There is a man I admire. David threw political correctness about diet out the door of his hearse and had the driver pass through an buy Burger King Whoppers for every mourner in each car that followed in the Fast Food Funeral entourage. Take that, broccoli lovers! David even had one if his three daughters place a Burger King Whopper sandwich placed on top of his casket when he was interred.

David and I have the same view of what is "healthy" eating and what is not. His daughter summed it up pretty well at the Whopper funeral. "He always lived by his own rules," she said.. "His version of eating healthy was the lettuce on the Whopper Jr." It seems that David was a borderline diabetic for years and had pacemaker, but he began eating what he wanted after his health conscious wife died 25 years ago (probably from spiritual starvation after eating too many veggies). In my view David truly knew good taste from bad.

Maybe I am even more food heretic than David was because you can have my lettuce if we eat a burger together. I'll keep eating greasy burgers until the day I die. David lived by his own eating rules and was said to eat fast food, junk food and politically incorrect non organic fare whenever he had the chance. What the food police don't understand, David did. That is, humans need top feed their souls as well as their minds, and that one of the ways to do it is to eat what tastes good. Just look at those vegetarians and vegans. They all look both starved, frustrated physically and spiritually. Sigh...It's sad to think of what their taste buds are missing.

So live a little but bolder and eat some junk today. It's probably good for you!

Human Obsolescence

I remember as a kid when technology was still very low level we were warned that machines were going to soon compete with us. Even then, we used to hear that "one day technology will replace humans." It was scary stuff, if too far into the future to worry about. Well now we know that no machine can replace you and me or even crazy Uncle Claude. No machine can imitate that guy! But what they can do and are doing at record rates all over the world is to take the place of human workers. They are stealing jobs.

Employers are now using machines to do many tasks that humans used to do. The "machines can do anything better than humans" mantra is already true in many job areas. It's a fact that human workers can not compete with the more efficient and cheaper to use machines, which means unemployment and a lower living standard for us.

What kind of jobs are being taken over by computers? The vast majority are the so called "middle class wage" jobs. This would include jobs such as: secretary, data analysts, telephone operators, mail carriers, bookkeepers, travel agents, cashiers....just about any except me....I'm irreplaceable, largely because I do nothing useful.

Today's computers can gather and sort through huge amounts of information, giving conclusions and recommendations that no human could offer. And that information can be stored on "clouds", to be retrieved instantly for whatever use an employer might have. Let's face it. Software improvement has made machines smarter than we are or ever will be. Apart from judgmental and creative issues, which are not be involved in most work decisions, computers are now ahead of even the most adept humans. And these newer devices are easier to use than ever, making those hated tech repair guys also an endangered species. Glad to see them go...

So employers and governments everywhere in the world (This is supposedly a bigger problem in Europe than anywhere else) are firing workers and hiring computers. I wonder how this will affect we humans at work and when at home? Will we start to compete with computers for attention? Will we be jealous of them? Will we start to feel we are obsolete? Will we be able to find meaningful and financially attractive work to replace the lost jobs? Just some things to think about in the coming age of human obsolescence.

Mating With A Neanderthal

There was quite a furor the other day when a respected Harvard professor of genetics named George Church suggested the possibility that an "extremely adventurous female human might someday serve as surrogate mother for a cloned Neanderthal baby". He contends that the cloning of a live Neanderthal baby would soon be possible and might be good, because using stem cells to create a Neanderthal gnome would benefit those of us who are not Neanderthal's, improving the human gene pool. (My quick unscientific Neanderthal test....If you have more than one cell phone or use your phone more than 10 times per day you're likely a Neanderthal and eligible to breed with another one).
Scientists say the thing that can most quickly ruin humanity is a lack of diversity in the gene pool, so based on that adding a strong Neanderthal link would help us.

Hmmmm This Church guy also says either a chimp or a human female could be the mom of the Neander baby. I think any reality TV show would offer many great near Neanderthal contestants as a great breeding pool. And if no willing mom to be can be found there the audience who watches reality TV will give us even more capable Neanderthal brained types to be give birth. One problem for the new mom though would be that when a cruel stranger says her baby "looks like a monkey" the baby really might look like an ape. Oh, well, if Snookie can hide her ape-like flaws with make-up so can a little Neandi.

Some might suggest this is really a silly idea, and you might even think that I am making fun of it here. Others may question the ethical nature of this. But does society really have any ethics left, anyway? Why not go Neanderthal? It can't hurt. I also wonder how the Neanderthal babies would react when watching the near Neanderthal technological humans they see as those modern apes react hypnotically with their cells phones, i pods, blackberries and the rest. Why, if I were to go to an Apple store how would I be able to tell the human techno apes from the Neandi's? Too, do we need Neanderthal's when we already also have politicians? Adding Neandi's might be too much for the gene pool.

Worse! I see that the Kardashian family might even try to make a new reality show out of this, maybe call it 'Kim Takes Neandi Shopping' or something. I am not sure humanity could survive that..

Internet Community

Since I just read a quote I like allot, you now get it. "People talk about an internet community. But it's not a community in my mind. Community doesn't happen until you smell people." It's both funny and an accurate observation about the internet because the internet is absolutely not a single community. I see it more as a whole lot of communities, mostly of the lunatic version. The singular quality about the net is that there is no cohesion among its elements, people, or content.

Where else can you receive a letter from an alleged African Queen who says she left you 100 million dollars if you'll just give her your bank account number, while at the same time be able to view the results and details latest medical test you took at your doctor a mere 30 minutes earlier. The crazy and the real, the serious and the silly, an outlet to show love or hate, greed or generosity, the latest gossip or the latest news and on and on.....the Internet is so diverse it's hard to evaluate. But it certainly is not a single community.

I think the Internet is sometimes mislabeled as being only one of those endless communities, the social network community. They are the ones that encourage interaction, sometimes focusing around a particular interest, or sometimes just to communicate with each other. But proliferation of social networking communities is also diverse, impossibly diverse. No wonder we have such a glorious mess out there we call the Internet. Message boards, chat rooms, social networking services, informational communities, and those social networking platforms I mentioned before.., is it no wonder we can get lost as easily on line as off.

It looks to me that the internet is as chaotic and confusing as the off line world, a pretty consistent match I think, probably because the internet is still a mostly free exchange platform. Perhaps there is more freedom on line than off, and that may be the main attraction to it we have. It's a good thing, even if it includes your having to listen to me.