Archives for 2024

Apparently it’s my lucky day!  Opening up an email this morning from our local grocery “Hyper” store Fred Meyer, a division of Kroger, Inc., I discovered I won and they are giving me oodles of cash discounts.  Look at these amazing offers:

• If I buy $20.00 in produce I get $4.00 back.
• If I buy $40.00 worth of coffee and creamer by February 25th I get an ADDITIONAL $4.00!  (Yes, there’s more).
• I get $15.00 my first delivery order of $75.00 or more.

Let me catch my breath… With all this additional income I can quit my day job!  Oh wait, I already did, seven years ago.

How time flies when you’re having fun!

Cerebral People with an unrequited desire for knowledge want answers to the following:

• Why there are no bidets in U.S. Bathrooms?
• What happened 5 minutes before time began?
• Why do insurance companies require us to wait 5 years between much sought after Colonoscopies?
• Why did Elaine Benes threaten the Soup Nazi, depriving Upper West Side patrons of world class Mulligatawny?  No soup for you, Lainie!
• When visiting the zoo, are we the ones in cages looking at the animals run free?
• Why didn’t I buy Microsoft stock in 1986?
• If you can use Tinactin for both athlete’s foot and jock itch, what else can you do with Preparation H?
• Which Milky Way came first, the candy bar or the galaxy?

The quest for truth continues!

Our company, with revenue in the $30-$40 million range, was purchased by DuPont in 2008.  We soon learned some lessons on how a major conglomerate operates; certainly much different than a smaller privately owned company.  There were two overriding principles:

1. Pay exorbitant amounts of money to outside consultants to make decisions we should make internally.
2. Do whatever it takes to make short-term revenue goals regardless of long-term effect; what they call the “we’ll cross that bridge…” plan.

Examples:

1. They paid $500,000 to a consultant to come up with a new name we scrapped in 6 months
2. The Einstein they put in to run us sold our very attractive URL for a single large payout that made our numbers and got him a bonus but, in the long-run, cost us millions of dollars in lost revenue.  He soon retired and left the mess for the next person.

I always…well most of the time…did my best and worked hard to make my goals.  When the inevitable redundancies began, DuPont was very generous, giving long-term employees what amounted to a year’s salary and benefits.  I loved our company, but the spirit that built us was gone and I was not without other opportunities. I would not have been crushed if I was offered one of those severance packages.  In my phony benevolence I even volunteered to save a co-worker by telling them I would sadly accept a pink slip accompanied by a big payout.  But, alas, it was not to be.  My boss told me I was a needed thought-partner and not to be concerned; something I would have loved to hear years before when I had kids at home and was living paycheck to paycheck, but not so much now.

So, the lesson to be learned?  Wives, husbands, family, partners, coworkers:  When you see someone slacking off, showing no initiative and generally doing just okay, but not enough to be invaluable to the group; enough to keep their job but also be first to go when the cuts come, have patience with them.  They might be executing a well thought-out business plan to secure their future.

All this experience sitting at home, an untapped resource.  I am available to help.  If you have $500,000 and need a technology consultant with encyclopedic knowledge of today’s business landscape, feel free to contact me.  I’m sure you still have my pager number or send me a note on My Space.

Four of the more popular GLP-1 medications — Ozempic and Mounjaro (approved for diabetes) and Wegovy and Zepbound (approved for weight loss) — have all shown good results in our never-ending struggle to lose weight.  But the encouraging fact is that all the drugs similar side effects.  The most common side effects include:

• Nausea
• Diarrhea
• Vomiting
• Constipation
• Stomach pain

For approximately the same cost as these medications you can achieve the same results and include your food in the total.  Simply eat all your meals at Denny’s Restaurant!  I know that may not be possible and for it to work you must be constantly experiencing all the above side effects. But take heart!  Preliminary studies show you can seamlessly achieve the same results by eating at IHOP, Applebee’s or McDonald’s.

Mix and Match for a truly memorable weight-loss journey!

Join me in a short flight of fancy.   I know I am retracing old steps but imagine a world where there was no hatred based on gender, religion, ethnic origin, political affiliation, sexual orientation or any other of the infinite reasons we find to hate each other.

I recently tripped as I was walking in the airport and fell flat.  Two men quickly rushed over to me and offered to help.  My first inclination was to hide my humiliation and politely refuse telling them I was fine.  But I wasn’t fine and better sense took over.  I let them each take a side and lift me to my feet.  I sincerely thanked them and they returned to their original path.  30 seconds out of their day and they helped make a stranger’s day a little better.

What if our government representatives spent their time seeking solutions to climate change, rebuilding a crumbling infrastructure, feeding the hungry and housing the homeless rather than calling each other names and swearing vengeance on their political rivals?

I suppose I could work to make small, positive changes and hope the positive energy creates a universe where love, cooperation and peace are the natural order, but I’d  prefer to see all misguided, lying politicians sharing cramped quarters on Rikers Island.

Yes, I can understand where you might see me as a hypocrite, but I prefer to think of myself as Ironic.  Another reason I should run for office.  To be a giant asshole and still think you can save the world with your narrow point of view is a spot on description of an insane politician! 
(P.S. You must also love money as well, and who doesn’t put money first?) 

Wow!  It was just Thanksgiving…Christmas…New Year’s Day…February!  Perhaps it does not give pause to you youthful types under 70.  But for those of us that have, let’s say, gathered more years, it is constantly amazing to us how fast the days go by.  We begin to panic every time we see a bright light ahead, wondering if it’s time to walk into that light.  Not a big deal unless the shine is emanating from oncoming headlights; whew, that was a close one!  

I guess the message is to live everyday to the fullest.  Forgive, be honorable and be charitable, sharing what you have with those that have less.  In fact if you share with me in the next 24 hours your donations might qualify for a Triple match!  

Sorry!  It’s the political campaign season and you can’t be inundated with this much B.S. without being influenced!  But I am only asking for $20.24.

REM is the last of four stages in a sleep cycle that we can thank for cool functions that help make sleep so rejuvenating, like processing emotions and memorizing new motor skills.  But there are a lot of questions around this sleep stage: what exactly happens during R.E.M. sleep and how much of it do we need?  I did a science-adjacent study with my Beats Bluetooth earphones.  I closely monitored my own R.E.M. sleep; following are my conclusions drawn from multiple hours (3) of exhaustive research:

• The calm, steady rhythm of “Losing my Religion” lulled me to sleep.
• Next the insipid melody of “Everybody Hurts” kept me soundly snoozing.
• But When “It’s the End of the World as We Know It” came on I was woken and I felt fine!

My conclusion is the R.E.M. sleep is important and refreshing.  The only disturbing aspect of the study was that Michael Stipe and I were both naked.  That’s usually another dream all together!

(Editor’s Note:  If you totally missed the point of the above post you are either young or not a fan of 1980’s and 90’s rock music.  Take it from me, this was beyond clever).

***This post dedicated to our great friend and expert in all things related to music, Geoff Wolfe.  He would have understood and appreciated it. R.I.P. in R.E.M.

One of the fastest growing chain restaurants in America, Freddy’s Frozen Custard and Steakburgers opened a record 62 new outlets in 2023 including its 500th location.  They plan to open #800 by 2026.  How is it I have never heard of them?  And more important how can I can make a few bucks since they are using my name?
Do you think there’s a lawyer sleazy and desperate enough to take my seemingly unwinnable nuisance case in hopes of getting a small settlement just to make me go away?
Of course.  We have 1 lawyer for every 256 people in this country; third highest percentage behind Italy and Brazil.
Guess I better call Saul!

Looking forward to finding a location and ordering my first Freddy’s.
I wonder how they prevent the frozen custard from melting on the steakburger? 
Life’s little mysteries!

Telling a joke correctly to elicit the desired reaction is a real talent most people, myself included, do not possess.  But we all want to be the life of the party and have people split their sides with laughter when we have our moment in the spotlight.  I would rather be known for being hysterically funny than as a great lover! (Actually that might be a slight exaggeration…can’t I be both?).

So to inject a little humor into this post I am going to tell some really old jokes.  And since you all know them I’ll skip the build up and get right to the punchlines:

“I was talking to the Duck.”
“I wouldn’t send a knight out on a dog like this.”
“Problem is I don’t wake up until 9:00AM.”
“I’ve had this pack of cigarettes for the last 2 years.”
“So I took her to the kitchen.”
“Remember the Alamo!”
“Where’s the toast?”

I got a million of them, folks!

As a citizen of a very senior age I belong to a generation, as are all previous and future senior generations, famous for repeating stories again and again.  Even when we soften the blow by beginning “I know I’ve told you before,” we should be grateful that our family and friends smile politely and follow along in their mind with the oft repeated words they have unwillingly committed to memory.  You can’t be gracious and tell Uncle Harry that we know John Wayne once came into his drug store and purchased a tube of Preparation H, or tell cousin Hortense we had heard many times before that she was barely beaten out for the role of Harem Girl #2 by a young and unknown at the time  starlet, Rita Hayworth.  

But I am not one to point fingers as I am perhaps the greatest offender.   In fact, while on the subject, did I ever tell you about:

• When Leroy Neiman mistook me for someone he knew in Chicago, (Weird because I was born there)?
• When John Cleese mistook me for someone he knew in Chicago, (not so weird because we met in Chicago)?
• When I spent an afternoon with Ansel Adams and some fellow students at his home in Carmel, CA?
• When I came in 3rd (out of 3) on the TV game show Split Second taking home $220.00 and a leather wallet?
• When I had a crush on Rod Serling’s daughter Jodi in 1969.
• When I spent $50.00 per ticket for 3rd row center seats to take Linda on a first date to see Bette Midler at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion? (Sounds cheap, right?  But consider it was 1973 and I was earning $2.35 per hour at The Holiday Inn, Brentwood/Bel Air, struggling to both repay student loans and eat).

If you happen to be the one person to whom I have not repeated any of these stories let me know.  I’d be happy to share them with you 5 or 6 times minimum!