Top Ten Ways to Screw up your Life!

1.  Don't believe in Jesus!  Follow after Muhammad or Buddha.  Who cares about being in Heaven anyway?  Hell may be like a motel6 compared to a Hilton...

2.  Absolutely do not listen to your parents!  Why should they know any more than you do?  Do it your way.  Just put cotton in your ears so you won't hear "I told you so".

3.  Keep on sending those same people back to Washington!  Sure they've been wrong on everything from sending jobs overseas, borrowing all of China's money, and letting anyone cross the border... but they've got to get something right sometime - they're wayyy overdue!

4.  Don't get any exercise!  It's overrated. 

5.  Forget that college education!  Illegals are coming here for the same job you can do!  They don't got no edumucaationn and don't even speak english!  You can live in a rented mobile home with a bunch of others too.

6.  Always blame everyone else for your problems!  Sure they did it to you!  They should at least send a card begging forgiveness.  Assume "victimhood" and demand compassion from others.

7.  Watch all the television you can.  It's the best role model machine in the world.  You should be just like them and then you'll be rich and famous!

8.  Put all your energies into entertaining and thrilling yourself.  It's all about you anyway.  Try all the video games, alcohol, and drugs that are possible.  Hit the nightclubs and show everyone what a fun person you really are!  Thrive on addictions...

9.  Never, ever, ever save any money!  You're not going to need it in the future.  We'll be just like Star Trek and get what we need from the replicator.

10.  Always live in the past!  Keep those regrets and guilt-ridden thoughts on the forefront.  don't worry about setting any goals for your life!  It's the past that is important.  Be your own historian!

The Good Wife

     Businesses are hiring contract labor because they've put a high a cost on employees.  Business Majors have taken over and put too high a price on employee's activities in the workplace and taken no consideration for good management/employee relationships.  I remember when UPS Logistics came in to BellSouth and sold them a time management study.  Groups of UPS people with stopwatches rode with employees and timed everything done during the day.  All the time was crunched in a numbers machine and out popped a whip to beat employees over the head with.  AT&T kept the plan, so every job we do now has an associated completion time and if we go over the allotted time we are unsatisfactory, below expectations, etc.

     Now, if I worked in an manufacturing plant where my activities were the same all day, that would be somewhat understandable.  I don't!  I work in outside telephone maintenance where every job is different.  Every house is different, every business is different, every landscape the wires go over or under is different!
Noise can affect a copper wire in a myriad of ways and in different locations.  Telling me how long it will take to correct before I arrive is asinine!  You just can't price out each job because each job is different!  But management knows that and it's really just a whip to keep us working fast and furious so we don't get run off.  But, we're going to get run off anyway.  That allotment of time for activities means money and business wants to keep it all.

     What if your doctor was on a time management allotment.  Do you want to be run through the operating room because he only has ten minutes to take out your "whatever"?  A "hurry up" mentality only lessons quality and puts stress where it doesn't need to be.  Plus, you just can't put value on everything a person does because you'll end up missing something!

     I took this a step further in my thinking and the following is a fictional illustration...What if marriage was in trouble because men were hiring "contract wives"?  Some college kid priced out what a wife costs and said it was too much, gave her a pink slip and decided to "contract out" that work.  Maybe he reasoned she took 50% of the income and by hiring different people to perform each "wifely duty" he would come out ahead.

     Let's say the idea caught on and it started happening all over the country.  What would happen?  Disaster is an understatement.  I'd guess the complete breakup of the family unit and marriage as an institution.  Sickness and disease would multiply and the guys who did it would end up miserable, wishing they had a good wife again!

     I ran a few numbers myself and the cost gets very high - very quick...
Private cook....$28,000
Housekeeper...$18,000
Child care worker...$18,000
Financial manager/consultant... $12,000
Teacher (for kids)...   $40,000
Best friend and everything else... priceless!

     A good wife is hard to find, the Bible says her value is "far more than rubies" Prov. 31:10  Good employees are also of incalculable worth!

 

Protection is for Everyone!

     I've been re-reading Pat Buchanan's book, The Great Betrayal.  It fits into the mindset I've had lately about the economy and jobs.  America is in a great orchestrated decline and we've done it to ourselves. We are so manipulated by the media that we keep electing the same sorry politicians from both parties.  The "free traders" who brought us terrible laws like the Trade Expansion Act under Kennedy all the way to NAFTA and GATT under the Clinton & Bush years!

     In theory "free trade" should work, if you have an equal playing field.  There isn't one!  Other countries don't play by the same rules.  Why is it liberals and conservatives alike are so determined to end our country?  America has given away all our manufacturing jobs for cheap goods from China and Mexico.  My parents worked in the Alabama City cotton mill.  It's gone.  Republic Steel employed a lot of people in Gadsden, gone!  There used to be sock mills all over Ft. Payne, Alabama.  Most were closed the last time I drove through town.  Think of all the factories gathering dust around this country!

     I remember the Arrow shirt factory in Boaz.  They had a factory outlet store, where you could buy good shirts for $5.00.  A lot of people worked there till it was moved to Mexico.  It was probably argued then that products sent back would be cheaper to buy.  I was at Kohl's this morning and an Arrow shirt was selling for $26.00.  I will never wear another Arrow shirt!  Then, Tyson in Boaz, was caught bringing in illegals from Mexico to work in their chicken plants...

     There is no patriotism anymore.  At least not from business!  There are plenty of folks loyal to the dollar, yen, euro, etc.  "But we will convert to a service economy" claimed Robert Reich, labor secretary under Clinton.  The problem is that service sector jobs don't feed a family nor pay for a house.  Both parents have to work and still end up below the poverty line.  But we still will stand up with our hand across our heart saying the pledge of allegiance!  The propaganda machine is still up and running.

     Until we toss the myth that protectionism is bad for our country, we'll never recover!  We have got to secure our borders!  Let's stop illegals from coming in and jobs from going out!  If the new politicians can't get it right, lets throw them out too!

Pick the Apple?

     I have to admit that Microsoft made me take a bite of the Apple.  I've used Windows operating systems from the start of computing days.  I went through every version of windows, throwing money down the Microsoft computing pit.  Each upgrade required more memory, a faster processor, new software.  The files  the programs used changed each time too and most were not backwards compatible.  And, the viruses...  The system was always full of holes and needed one security update after another.  You had to keep the hardware drivers up to date as well, a never ending process.  One simple incompatibility from one program or driver to another and the system crashed.  It was crazy!  Think of the time lost just trying to figure out what went wrong and where are those backups?
  
     I stuck with them through XP and finally gave up.  My hardware was old(not much but enough) and it was just not worth it any more.  There had to be something better.  My son encouraged me to try Ubuntu, a free version of linux.  So I did, and it worked on my old hardware and it was fast!  Faster than Windows!  I admit, there was a little learning curve, but just surfing the net and using simple programs wasn't different from my old system.  From there, I tried Suse Linux.  It was a little easier to use but still wasn't what I wanted.

     Around that time, Anna needed a Mac laptop for school.  We got her one from the Apple Store at the Summit and fell in love with it.  Now, I have a Mac too, with EyeTV.  We can watch the local Television stations on it and the picture is just as good as our Sony in the living room.  I've yet to get a virus, updates are rare, and it seems to do everything I need.

     Now, the bad part.  I read recently about Apple's factory.  It's in Shenzhen, China and is owned by Taiwanese company Foxconn.  Foxconn employees 800,000 workers worldwide, all mostly in China.  Employees work up to 12 hours/day, six days a week.  They have forced overtime and according to one source, "can only leave when the boss gives permission".  Over the past year, 10 workers have committed suicide and there have been other attempts.  For all their hours, they're paid from 50 to 100 dollars per month.  They live onsite so social activities are limited.  It just doesn't sound like a nice place to live and work.  If we don't do something now, that may be the American factory look in fifty years!

     I guess that's why so many of our jobs have gone overseas.  Corporations can practically have slaves.  Labor costs plummet so profits soar.  Humanity is sacrificed for cash!  American companies are jealous of dirt cheap labor.  They resent their own labor force-the working people that built their business, while the execs played on the golf corse or in the boardroom.  Employees are not just a "human resource".  They're made in the image of God and corporations will answer for how they've treated them!

     James 5:4 says, "Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts."
I didn't even get to the Bible verses about greed!  So, what to do?  Pray for overseas workers and the American corporations that employ them.  And maybe, if you see a "made in China" sticker, put it back on the shelf.

Remembering a Better Company!

     I was torn today between blogging topics.  I spent most of my career working for BellSouth.  They were bought out by Texas based SBC under the guise of mega conglomerate AT&T.  Since that purchase (probably for the wireless side of the house) my company spirit has hit rock bottom.  So, I wanted to come down really hard on the evil empire and their draconian methods of management.  Therefore, this is definitely not the right time to talk about it.  I'll reserve that for later.

     I will talk about BellSouth.  In my mind, they were a quality company who provided good customer service.  I worked in many departments having been an Engineering Clerk(2x), Maintenance Administrator(2x) Coin Collector, Lineman, Centralized Repair Service Attendant, Service Technician(3x), Cable Splicer, Facility Technician, and Electronic Technician.  I held so many titles due to only having three years service when Judge Green broke up the Bell System.  It created havoc in the industry and for several years I took any title to hold on to a job.

     BellSouth management could be difficult to deal with at times but disputes were generally settled quickly.  There was always the opportunity for dialog - up as far as you wished to go.  Management still saw employees as human.  It was more of a family type atmosphere.  I'll have to say that in my twenty-eight years with them, I only had one bad manager.  He had problems with just about everybody, eventually getting into a fight with a contractor on the side of a major highway!  Then, he was gone, and everything was better.

     BellSouth always took care of the outside plant.  If there was a bad section of cable, it was replaced - customer service came first!  I didn't know an employee who would leave someone out of service.  The work was often hard.  I worked in Calhoun, Etowah, Marshall, Morgan, and St. Clair counties of north Alabama.  Those areas are very rural in places with difficult terrain.  I remember almost passing out in Piedmont on a 105 degree summer day while placing "C" rural wire across a mountain.  I remember working twenty-four hour days in cable maintenance getting folks telephones back on.  We had to break ice off the poles in Ft. Payne so our hooks would go in after a winter storm.  And I remember the difficulties of driving a bucket truck on Sand Mountain during the blizzard of 93'.

     But times are different today, we've got our "numbers" to keep up...  Sometimes you never know what you've got till it's gone!  Remembering the old days and a good company...

Have a Great Day!

     We were leaving church Sunday when one of the parking attendants raised his hand and shouted, "have a great day".  Without thinking, I replied back, "you too"!  Then I thought, "I don't have that power"!  If I could give a good day, why stop there?  Why not a new house, new car, peace of mind, financial freedom, a real conservative in the White House...  It just doesn't make sense to even use the phrase.

     Everyone from people at church to every cashier you interact with says it.  As I was leaving a customer's house today, after repairing the telephone line, he told me to "have a great year".  I thanked him, happy that I could save all my other "great days" as lesser coupons when the year blessing runs out.  Would they roll over like my AT&T minutes?

     Unsure of where this phrase originated, I did some research.  Surprisingly it first appeared in two different books in the 1200s.  I didn't recognize either.  It was in Chaucer's 1387 Canterbury Tales.  Used sporadically in the early 1900s, it didn't catch on big until the the 1960s.  Counter culture groups(hippies) used it as a parting phrase.  By 2000, it had morphed into being synonymous with "goodbye".  It is almost exclusively used in America with Europeans feeling the phrase obnoxious.  I'll have to say that I'm almost there too.  It could be, some people say it but don't want me to have one.  Does that mean there is no nice day coming to me?

     I walked out to get the morning paper recently, and saw a car tire on one of my sprinkler heads.  A lady was parked, waiting on the school bus to pick up her child and for some reason, pulled onto the grass.  She was looking back up the street behind her as I walked toward the driver side window.  Still looking away from me, I knock on the window...  She turned around, rolled the window down, obviously not wanting to interact with anyone that morning... I probably didn't use a real nice tone of voice when I said, "do you know your tire is on top of my sprinkler head?  Do you know that I have replaced it twice since living here because car tires break it?  The look on her makeup-less face told me she didn't know the answer and didn't particularly care.  She said, "I'm sorry - you have a nice day" and rolled the window back up!  This was a perfect example of someone saying it and not meaning it.  She didn't want me to have a nice day at all.  I did anyway...  I put some sand under my sprinkler head last time, so it survived her abuse.   Hey, plan ahead, so you'll have a nice day!

The Best Weatherman!

     I woke up to heavy rain and thunder this morning.  Being a weather bug, I turned on the TV to the news on Fox6.  They had the only local news on Saturday morning.  I had a cup of Duncan Donuts coffee in hand when Fred Hunter came on to tell me what was happening outside.  Imagine my annoyance when he zoomed in on Holly Pond and spent four minutes discussing the heavy rain in north Alabama.  I didn't care about Holly Pond!  He didn't show me the big picture!  Why is that so hard for weather guys?  I want to see what's happening, why it's happening, and which way it's moving!

     Maybe they want you to stay tuned for the next hour while they give you small pieces of the weather puzzle.  My favorite meteorologists are James Spann(ABC 33/40) and Tom Skilling (WGN, Chicago).  James knows our area best and takes his job very serious.  He can relate historical weather facts and uses the technology in his toolbox very well.  Tom is the best at giving you the big picture in the shortest amount of time.  When you watch Tom, you know what's coming and why.  I can watch either one and know the forecast pretty well.

     My worst awards go to Mickey Ferguson(can't stand it when the kids come on) and Fred Hunter(see earlier problem).  All the Birmingham local channels have pretty good #1 guys, it's the backups that sometimes don't deliver.  TV meteorologists are just presenters anyway.  Actors, if you will.  They have to look and sound good or they wouldn't be on TV in the first place.

     As far as delivering information, none can stand up to the info available on the internet.  A minute online will give you everything needed in a weather forecast, sort of "doing away" with the middleman.  You will still need a weather radio for the bad stuff because those conditions change on very short notice.

     If you'll make a new favorites folder named Weather and bookmark the following links, you will be ahead of the weather game.  I first of all use the national weather service forecast at...
                               Http://www.noaa.gov/
When you get there, type in your zip code and press enter, that's the first bookmark for your new folder.  From that page you can click on radar and satellite images for your local area.  The radar that I like best is the Wundermap.  It is at...
                               Http://www.wunderground.com/wundermap/
It allows you to zoom in to street level to see approaching storms and map controls at the bottom give you animation, storm tracks, weather stations, etc.  Another great site is the College of Dupage at...
                                http://weather.cod.edu/satrad/index.php


Controls at the top give you various views.  I like the 1&2km images along with the Rgnl.  Intellicast has a good interactive weather map at...
                               Http://www.intellicast.com/local/WXMap.aspx?weather=hdRadarSmoothPaletteA
And, since I've already mentioned Mr. Spann, 33/40 has a nice weather blog at...
                               Http://www.alabamawx.com/

     That should be enough to get you on your way to becoming weather informed.  If you've got some favorite weather links, email me or put them in the comment section.  Thanks for stopping by!