Why, despite the suckfest at Fenway, I continue to love baseball

A couple of weeks ago, I was at the neighborhood pharmacy, chatting with a few folks as we waited for our prescriptions.

The topic, as it so often is in Boston, was the Olde Towne Team, whose fortunes, since their epic fail last September, have been on the decline.

This was before the Red Sox made their trade of the century, and managed to unload a quarter of a BILLION dollars worth of payroll. They accomplished this by getting the Dodgers to take three erstwhile superstars off the Red Sox fans, one of whom was a Grade A whiner, one a hostile POS happy to rest on his laurels, and the third a poor schnook who’d underperformed and over-injured himself while collecting a more than hefty guaranteed salary.

In all likelihood, this unholy trinity will go on to once again reclaim their superstar credentials, implicitly suggesting that it was Boston that was the problem, not them. (Wa, wa, wa…)

I appreciate that this is a tough town to play in, but that’s why these guys get the big buck contracts. In exchange, you’re expected to produce on the field, charm the members of The Nation off the field, and put up with equal parts of praise, sucking up, advice and excoriation, from everyone from silver-haired grannies flipping you the bird at red lights to two year olds who pull the binky out and give you an attaboy for the catch you made in last night’s game. It is that kind of town.

So now the Red Sox are back in our good graces. Now, when they’re mediocre, we can comfort ourselves that this is a bridge year, a rebuilding years, and that we’re no longer trying to emulate those crazy spenders, the Yankees, and buy success.

Of course, we will continue to lament – as I did with my neighbors at Gary Drug -  this year’s suckfest at Fenway. (Which followed up on last year’s suckfest ending, when the supposed greatest team assembled since the 1927 Yankees went into a fall swoon from which they have not yet recovered.)

For the record, I did get to five games this season, most of them wins, and I did enjoy myself, as I always do at a live game, even when the Red Sox are choking and croaking. (That said, the best thing I saw this season at Fenway was the Springsteen concert on August 15th…)

But despite the abject season that we’re still going through, I remain a baseball fan.

There are just so many reasons to love baseball, I don’t understand for a minute how anyone can find it so colossally boring. (The boringness, I would argue, is even part of its charm.)

If for no other reason, there are the team names.

Sure, the major league teams are pretty drab. The Boston Red Sox. The Chicago White Sox. The Oakland Athletics.

Even the names that have something to do with the city they represent – the Seattle Mariners, the Milwaukee Brewers – are pretty much lacking in color.

But not in the minor leagues.

Who wouldn’t want to see the Lowell Spinners, the Worcester Tornadoes, and the Chillicothe Paints play ball? I wish I’d been around to see the Worcester Coal Heavers.

And then there’s the Sugar Land Skeeters.

Now I bow to no fan in the low opinion I have of that ego-maniacal lard-ass Roger Clemens. I didn’t like him when he played for the Red Sox – the original high paid whiney baby – let alone when he left the confines of America’s Most Beloved Ballpark. But I will give him credit for making me aware of the Sugar Land Skeeters.

Those who follow baseball may be aware that Clemens, having gotten off the hook on the steroid charges – which, much as I despise the man, don’t believe should have been investigated in the first place – is making something of a comeback by pitching for the Skeeters. At age 50.

There is much speculation about why Clemens is pitching.

Did his legal battles so exhaust his wealth that he needs the walking-around money? Does jumping back in as a pro postpone the date when he becomes eligible for the Hall of Fame, by which time voters may no longer care about who did or didn’t use performance enhancing drugs. (Yawn…)

Anyway, all the psycho-drama and gossip also make baseball more interesting than other sports. Not that the other major league sports lack for it. It’s just that baseball plays out over such a long season, and against the backdrop of so much lore and history, that there just seems to be a lot more of it. (Seriously, name another sport in which the general manager, hoping to escape the press, left the ballpark wearing a gorilla costume. As did the Red Sox former GM, Theo Epstein. And name another sport in which the manager brought in a player not much over 3 feet tall to confound the other team’s pitcher, as did Bill Veeck when he sent Eddie Gaedel up to the plate. Gaedel walked.)

Baseball players also seem to have better names than other athletes.

Admittedly, basketball gave us Alonzo Mourning. And it is hard to top football’s Y.A. Tittle.

But baseball has provided Champ Summers. A pitcher named Dizzy. A pitcher named Dazzy.

And as part of the Red Sox-Dodgers deal, we’re getting a pitcher named Rubby DeLaRosa.

Rubby!

It does not get much better than that.

For the month of September, I will be largely tuning out the Red Sox.

I will no doubt watch a bit of each game, for the pure pleasure of watching baseball (and catching up on the psycho-drama, of course.) While it’s theoretically possible that the Red Sox will “make” the post-season as the second wild-card, with a one-and-done playoff opportunity, it is highly unlikely. (If they couldn’t do it last year with the greatest team since the 1927 Yankees…)

But I will mostly be biding my time until the playoffs start.

There are any number of teams that I will be quite happy to cheer on, starting with the Chicago White Sox. (I am, after all, half Chicago.) I can get behind Tampa Bay, the Tigers, the Angels, A’s, the O’s.

In the National League, I’m even less choosy. Anyone who’s playing against the Yankees – assuming they win the American League Championship - will, of course, become “my” team for the duration.

Don’t know what I’ll do if it ends up being the Yankees vs. the Dodgers.

I’ll have to go with the Dodgers,. But while I wish them no ill, I do not want to see those Red Sox alumni make the difference. I don’t want to see Adrian Gonzalez win the series for the Dodgers with a walk-off homer. Or Josh Beckett pitch a winning game. I don’t have to worry about Carl Crawford doing anything. And will admit it would be downright funny to see Nick Punto, the journeyman who somehow got himself thrown into the deal with the high-wattage stars, stick it to the Yankees.

But I’ll guess I’ll cross that baseball bridge when I get to it.

Til then, I will occasionally partake of the Fenway suckfest, knowing that, if nothing else, tickets will be even easier to get a hold of next year than this.

Is this a crappy idea or what?

If you think it might be worth your while to advertise in the bathrooms at University Towers Apartment Building (Ann Arbor), Dance Theatre Studio (ditto),Bel-Mark Lanes Bowling Alley (and ditto), and Port Chester-Rye Brook District Library (that would be New York, not Ann Arbor), the Brothers Silverman – Bryan and Jordan – have an interesting propositions for you.

They’ll print you ad – or a coupon code that a prospect can read with his smartphone – on rolls of toilet paper and place them for free in willing venues. Venues like University Towers, Dance Theatre Studio, Bel-Mark Bowling, and the Port Chester-Rye Brook Library.

And you thought that there was one place you could get away from advertising – other than advertising of the ‘for a good time, call Gigi’ sort.

Seriously, I don’t mind the ads that you increasingly see in ladies rooms (and presumably in men’s rooms) that are on the wall. Or even on the inside of the stall door.

But on toilet paper?

Come now.

Is there anyone on the face of the earth that wants to increase the time they spend in stall in a public facility by even the nano-second required to read ad copy on a TP – let alone scan a coupon for free pizza delivery into their iPhone. Seriously, between trying to hold the broken door closed and balance yourself over a pee-splattered seat, who has a free hand to hold and operate their phone to begin with.  Ewww.

Hey, I don’t even like to use colored TP, let alone something that’s been printed on. (And I don’t care if the ink is “soybean-based” and “privately tested” to make sure that it’s “safe for all users.”)

But the Silverman boys, who are no dummies – one’s just graduated from the University of Michigan, the other’s at Duke – think they’re on to something. As does Entrepreneur Magazine, which has named them one of the finalists in the College Entrepreneur of the Year Awards for 2012. (Of course, maybe Entrepreneur just figured that having them on the list was going to garner them more coverage than the guys who’ve come up with ideas for a better suture or sustainable energy.)

Not that the toilet paper doesn’t have the requisite green angle:

Did you know that over 15% of deforestation is
for toilet paper production? That is why all of the
toilet paper we use is made from 100% recycled
materials. By carrying our product you not only
save money, but also go green and help make a
difference. (Source: Star Toilet Paper.)

You save money as a venue by getting free toilet paper, by the way. The advertisers pick up the cost.

If you are a bar, apartment building, theatre, stadium, office, or any place with a public bathroom visit the Carry Our Products tab to learn more about how you can save thousands of dollars with our FREE toilet paper.

Admittedly, I can see advertisers doing this once as a novelty act, but after the initial “thrill” is gone…

I’m especially wigged out to see that restaurants are using it to advertise.

Seems to me that if someone’s taking an emergency dump – and, let’s face it, no one takes a planned dump in a public place – they’re not going to want to read about a two-fer for fish tacos. This does remind me of a story my husband tells. Years ago, he was in a men’s room and a father was waiting for his two little boys to finish up their business in the stalls. The kids were both happily chirping away about what they were going to have when dad took them to McDonald’s. Most of us, however, are not thinking or talking food when we’re in the process of elimination, are we?

But Ann Arbor’s Northside Grill is willing to give it a whirl:

"It's just getting rolling," said Jim Koli, Northside's owner. He took a chance on the new concept because "it was unique and at a certain level it was absurd enough that it would be interesting to do." (USA Today)

Perhaps it’s just me, but I find this even more disturbing than the signs that warn restaurant employees to wash their hands before returning to duty.

And perhaps it’s just minority me who thinks this is a crappy idea. According to Start TP’s “research”:

• 75% of people said they would read advertisements and coupons on toilet paper and over 98% of people reacted positively to seeing advertising in the bathroom.
• People are more likely to buy from a company they see advertise on our Printed Toilet Paper.

I have to admit that I am one of the 75% of people who would read an ad. But I am also in the 2% who would not react positively. Then again, I’ve always been something of an odd-ball.

Of course, in our advertising-must-and-should-be-everywhere world, this is just the sort of ghastly idea that might catch on. Bad enough that our public buildings and highways have to be brought to us by someone. Now it’s our public restrooms.

And what next?

Maybe some one will figure out how to put advertising on the moon. (Full moon = full page ad; extra for harvest, less for waning. Blue moon thrown in if you sign up for 12 months.)

Surely, houses of worship are missing out on a revenue producing opportunity if they can’t figure out sponsorship opportunities: ads stamped on communion wafers, this Torah brought to you by.

How about helping bail out ailing school districts by printing ads on report cards? (Want to do something about those D’s? Call Kaplan today.)

There’s just no getting away from commercialization these days.

And I thought it was weird the first time I went to England and used toilet paper (was it in the British Museum) that had HRM crown and imprimatur stamped on it.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Original story source: Boston.com

Are you smarter than the average squirrel?

Needless to say there was absolutely no way that I was going to be able to resist an Economist article with the sub-head “Why people are stupider than squirrels.”

Bad enough I’m moth-to-flame for those frothing online comments about what morons liberals are, now I have to worry about The Economist comparing homo sapiens unfavorably to a rodent – even a bushy-tailed and cute one like a squirrel.

Once I read the article, I was relieved to find out that I am – phew – not one of those deemed dumber than a squirrel. That honor is reserved for those who pay a lot of money to store crap that they are never, ever, ever in a million, trillion, years going to use again.

But storage – make that self-storage – is a big business. Ten percent of American families use these facilities. And there are 50,000 of “these facilities” scattered across this great nation of ours. And they are chock full of the crap that we apparently, recession or no, can’t help ourselves from buying and hanging on to, as we:

…keep acquiring stuff that cannot be consumed and never rots or rusts: plastic toys, metal garden furniture, porcelain knick-knacks.

There are a lot of reasons to put things in self-storage:

• You’re on the move and you need a place to temporarily park your stuff. This in spades as people lose their homes but want to keep all the possessions that made their house a home, hoping they’ll be into their next place before the kids outgrow the Big Wheels that they decided to stash.
• Granny just passed away, and you know she had stuff that’s really valuable, and/or sentimentally valuable, and you know you’re going to want it some day, but you don’t quite have the psychic energy to go through it quite yet. (Do I want to save that Cudahy’s Rexoma cup or sell it on eBay? And what about Great Uncle Henry’s high school yearbook? The still-good BarcaLounger where Grandpa passed on to his reward? Surely someone will want to recline in that, and the plaid’s not half-bad.)
• You live in a little place in a big city, and there’s just no place to store anything.

It is that last condition that has, in the past, gotten me seriously thinking about putting some things in storage – things like my Christmas decorations, which I don’t need all that often.

But I can never really justify the cost. Not to mention that I always manage to remind myself that it’s a good thing to chuck stuff out.

Although I don’t practice what I preach, I do believe that every year, we should all pretend that we’re going to be moving. And then ruthlessly go through our earthly possessions and toss out, resell, gift, or donate anything that you don’t use, don’t like, don’t need…

I do this pretty much every year with my clothing and, since my replacement rate is far less than my discard rate, every year going through my clothing gets easier. Of course, every once in a while I start looking for that blue sweater I always liked, only to remember that it went in the St. Francis House bag last season. (And, boy, would I feel like a heel if I saw someone wearing it and asked for it back.)

But I also try to do it with other things, as well.

This year, I did start working through the kitchen where I find to my amazement just how much gear I have accumulated over the years. An awful lot for someone who seldom cooks and rarely entertains. Surely, someone, somewhere could use that bowl. That someone for a bunch of stuff was our cleaning lady, and I’m delighted that she’ll be getting some use out of that very nice serving bowl – the one with the pale blue stripes – that my friend Peter gave me a a few – make that twenty – years ago for Christmas.

As I went through the kitchen, of course, I kept thinking that, in a few years time, my nieces would be setting up places of their own. Surely one of them would like those lovely fruit plates, or the teapot shaped like a house. So I’m never quite as ruthless as a should be.

One thing I have learned, however, over all these years living in a not-so-large condo: if you want to bring something new in, you have to get rid of something old to make room for it. Let me tell you, not having a cellar or an attic really does help you cut down on crap accumulation.

Plus I believe there comes a point in the life of anyone who’s not a certifiable hoarder when they really do want to start deaccessioning, as much if not more than they want to keep acquiring. For most of us, that point I suspect is somewhere in our fifties or sixties.

But for those who’ve put stuff in self-storage:

For some reason, they seldom chuck any of this rubbish out. This baffles economists, who assume “free disposal”, meaning that things that aren’t needed can be thrown away without making anyone feel bad about the loss. The fact that so many hoarders pay lots of cash to keep things shows the assumption needs a rethink.

And keep things they do. Although most people go into self-storage thinking it’s for a short-term:

… usually [stored stuff] stays where it is. Contracts are often only for a month or so, yet hoarders stash things away for far longer. At Big Yellow, a British firm, 37% of space is filled with stuff that has been there for over three years.

And most of this stuff is, no doubt, crummy plastic toys that the kids have outgrown. The electric frying plan that just needs a new plug. Outdated text books that smell of mildew. Things that, once you’ve lived without them for over three years, you can probably live without for the rest of your life.

So why keep paying?

Inertia? Nostalgia? The latent hoarding gene?

A cynic might compare human squirrels unfavourably to the wild sort, which usually remember to dig up their nuts come springtime.

And that’s why humans are stupider than squirrels.

Sigh…

It’s that time of year when I’m still dreaming I saw Joe Hill last night

This year, I’ve decided to do what laborers do on Labor Day: I’m taking the day off.

But not before embedding a link to last year’s Labor Day post which, in turn, begets the prior year’s. And noting that my sentiments don’t change all that much from one year to the next.

Happy Labor Day to all, especially to my brother Rick. (Solidarity forever, bro.)

Coffee break: yet another enraged ex-employee with a gun…

We’re in New York City, our first getaway since my husband’s cancer surgery in May.

We won’t be doing much – as much walking around as Jim is up for, mostly in the area we’re staying in, the Upper West Side.

So we may not actually end up near the Empire State Building.

But we surely will see it.

And we will be thinking of the killing there last week, of Steve Ercolino, who was shot just outside his office building, in the shadow of the Empire  State Building, by a former colleague who’d had issues with Ercolino, and who apparently blamed him for the loss of his job and the downward spiral of his life.

Our sympathies naturally (and appropriately) lie with Steve Ercolino. Whatever he was in the office – whether it was Mr. Mellow, fun to work with, go with the flow or tough guy, Type A, obnoxious jerk – he did not deserve to be gunned down by Jeffrey Johnson, on what Ercolino probably thought was just going to be another routine day at the office. Until he spotted his nemesis pointing a gun at him. So his last seconds on earth were knowing that the co-worker who had once threatened him, with whom he had scuffled on the elevator at work, and against whom Ercolino had reportedly taken out a protection order, was making good on his threat. And didn’t just shoot him once, but added a coup de grace to the head. Sad, just sad, for Ercolino’s family, colleagues, and friends.

With candor that I suspect he will come to regret:

A  former coworker described Ercolino has someone who was “very hard working” with a “strong personality.”

“He’s just very opinionated,” said Nicholas D’Aurizio, a designer at the company. “Really great at what he did. He just wasn’t the easiest person to be working with.”

“I’m not surprised at all because of the personality of the victim.” (Source: WNYC News Blog.)

D’Aurizio, apparently, didn’t get the word that you’re not supposed to say anything even vaguely bad about the victim, let alone something that almost sounds a bit blame-the-victim-ish.

In any case, even if Steve Ercolino was abrasive, a dick, at work, that doesn’t mean he wasn’t a loving son, terrific brother, cool uncle, and fun friend to those that knew him in “real life.” And it sure doesn’t mean that he deserved in any way, shape, or form to die this way.

This is, however, a cautionary tale in these our times when people are so strung out, so alienated, so stressed, so despairing, that they snap. And, unfortunately, so many of those who snap seem to have a gun in their hand when they do it.

Jeffrey Johnson – who was shot and killed by the police as he calmly walked away from murdering Ercolino - was 58 years old. A loner, living with his cat and supposedly spending his days doing “best artist in 8th grade” illustrations of voluptuous blondes, Mustangs,and fighter planes. Unemployed for a year. With no expectations that he would ever work again, at least doing what he wanted to do.

It’s easy to imagine Johnson’s working himself, day by day, into a frenzy over his prospects, the dimming of his days, and turning Steve Ercolino – the younger, better looking, more successful guy who probably did get the girl and drive the Mustang, and with whom he’d wrangled at work – into the root cause of all of his myriad problems. Especially if your brains a bit jangled to begin with, it’s easier to blame someone else than to look inward: maybe I’ve lost my knack, maybe the styles have changed, maybe I need to figure out what to do with the rest of my life if this ain’t it…

Most of us aren’t psychologists, trained to identify fellow workers who may be volatile and dangerous, capable of ‘going postal’. And even if we do spot the ‘warning signs’, what are most of us equipped to do about it?

It sounds like Steve Ercolino was clued in enough to get some kind of restraining order against Johnson. Was there no one at this company – and I would not in a million years expect that someone to be the VP of sales – who might have been able to help figure out how to ameliorate, rather than aggravate, a bad situation between two employees. It may still have ended in Johnson’s being let go, but maybe under circumstances where he could have viewed his loss of employment as something that “happened,” rather than something that was caused by a particular person.

But it also sounds from my sundry readings that designers are routinely treated like crap in the high-pressure fashion industry. (And employees in pretty much every industry risk running into a-hole, bullying bosses, even if it’s not the industry norm.) So maybe Jeffrey Johnson was just in the wrong business, in the wrong company. The perfect storm for a deeply wounded and mentally unhealthy individual.

If someone had been a tiny bit nicer to Jeffrey Johnson, if someone had reached out to him, if someone had even had a glimmer of the mental state he was in, might this tragedy have ended in something other than a hail of bullets?

You really do need to be careful out there. Humans are fragile, some more so than others, and need to be handled with care.

Meanwhile, the Ercolino family’s left with pulling themselves together, trying to reconcile their son’s stepping out for breakfast and ending up dead.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Other sources: NY Times, Newsday, DNA Info, NY Post

Banned in Foxboro

I’ve never been to a Patriots’ game. And I can’t imagine the circumstances under which I would attend one. (Actually, that’s not quite true: if I had seats in Bob Kraft’s protected-from-the-elements luxury box, and a room in whatever upscale hotel abuts the Playing Field of Champions, I would consider attending a game.) But, having gone to a Springsteen concert at Gillette Stadium a few years back, I fully understand the complete and utter horror of getting out of the parking lot and onto Route 1 (built, I believe, in 1920’s when only 5% of the population owned a car, and they were all flivvers), only to sit in traffic for an additional hour as you wend your way to a real highway.

There are actually people who tailgate after events at Gillette to avoid the ghastly danse macabre to get out of the parking lot. Talk about No Exit.

I also understand that there are folks who live in the vicinity who have to carefully plan their Pats-at-Home-Sundays – either leaving home early and returning home late, or just hunkering down and hoping that they don’t run out of milk or go into labor.

To make up for some of the trouble that game-day traffic brings on them, some of the locals have been running impromptu parking lots in their driveways and/or on their lawns.

But the Town of Foxboro is now banning the practice.

Not everyone is lauding this move:

“We are carrying a lot of burden for the town’s benefit,” said [local farm owner Nancy] Lawton, who does not sell spaces but lets friends use her driveway for the games. “I think they deserve a little money for their trouble. I think it’s their right.” (Source: Boston.com)

On the other side:

“It’s been a growing issue because of the high volume of traffic,” said Edward O’Leary, the town’s police chief. “We had to do something.”

I’m sure it’s annoying if the folks next door are causing a lot of commotion and crapping up the neighborhood, but how much worse is it than the general crapping up caused by football traffic?

It strikes me that this would have been better settled if each block decided whether they wanted to allow paid parking or not. But maybe that just wasn’t feasible. (Maybe good old fashioned, neighborly moral suasion and/or the spirit of one-for-all-and-all-for-one  just doesn’t work.)

Meanwhile, how are they going to stop someone from letting friends and family park in their driveway? Or people from claiming that the person who just slipped them two tens and a fiver is actually long lost Cousin Zeke, who’s parking for “free”? Will they have to post a cop on every corner, refusing entry to anyone who can’t prove they live there? What if you’re trying to have company come over that day – nothing to do with a Pats game? Would you have to produce a list of those who would be waved in?

Sounds like a ban might be as big a pain in the butt as allowing the hawkers to earn a few extra bucks.

I live on the other end of the block where the Cheers bar is located. On the night of the final episode, Jay Leno (I think – but maybe it was David Letterman) ran his show from the street out front.  Our block was cordoned off, and only ticket holders, and those who could prove residency, could get in. It was, needless to say, a complete cluster. We had a friend visiting, and had to provide his name and a description to the security folks so that they’d let him in. Then we caught some kids trying to break into the back entrance to our building. Apparently, they thought if they could get over the gate, it would be not much of deal to bust down the back door and make there way out the front entrance, eluding the police. And getting to see the cast of Cheers yucking it up with Leno. (Or Letterman.) So I do understand that it can be unpleasant to live near a popular venue.

On the other hand, with the possible exception of Nancy Lawton, whose family farm has probably been in Foxboro since before Paul Revere’s ride, I suspect that most of the people who live in the environs of Gillette Stadium moved in knowing full well that they were living close to a place that hosts regular football games, as well as occasional concerts.  Which means that, on game day or show time, they’re going to be annoyed and inconvenienced whether or not the guy next door is stuffing cars into his driveway or not.

Without actually thinking about it too much one way or the other, I’m not quite sure which side I come down on.

But if I threw a coin in the air to decide, I come down on letting those running a parking lot for the day continue to do so. (Even though I suspect that 99.99% do NOT report the parking fees they collect as income.)

Why should Bob Kraft – who married money, and used that running start to lever a lot more of it – make all the dough? On top of the colossal amount that people know doubt pay for tickets, they have to pay another $40 to park in the Gillette parking lot.

So let’s make a stand for the little guy with the flag, waving strangers into his driveway and charging them $25 to park there, and making their post-game getaway a tiny bit easier.

But, hey, I don’t live there.

And unless I’m sitting in Bob Kraft’s box, I doubt that I’ll even make it down there for a game.

Pop, pop, Tootsie Pop, Dad.

Just when you think that there are no goofball, mom-and-pop outfits left – especially those that are household words (other than the few, the proud, the pink slipped companies I’ve blogged about over the years: the peeps who make peeps and Zippo lighters) – when up pops an article in the WSJ on Tootsie Roll Industries.

First off, I have to say that I do NOT like that “Tootsie Roll Industries” name. Come on, industries???? They make Tootsie Rolls, Sugar Daddys, and Junior Mints? How industrial is that?

I know, I know, candy is an industry, and I’m being something of a heavy metal industry bigot here. But how much more happy-making the company name would be if it were Tootsie Roll Candymakers, or Tootsie Roll Confections. Fortunately, they make up for it a bit with their URL, which is just plain tootsie.

Anyway, Tootsie’s been around for a good long time, well over 100 years, and they haven’t rested on their laurels. Over the years, they’ve built out their brand by buying up the companies that made Dots and Black Crows (now called Crows for some PC reason I don’t quite understand), Sugar Babies and Sugar Daddies, wax lips, and Charleston Chews. (For those who take trains out of North Station, now you know why the Charleston Chew factory is derelict.)

When I look through the Tootsie portfolio, I’m wondering whether they might not be in collusion with the dental industry.

It can’t just be my imagination. Tootsie really does seem to specialize in filling-loosen-ers. All they’d need to do would be to add Bonomo Turkish Taffy, Frenchies, Bit O’Honey and Squirrel Nuts, and they’d about have the cavity-refilling niche zipped up.

Although I do like Tootsie Pops, I’m not the biggest fan in the world of the eponymous Tootsie Roll. If they’re completely fresh, that’s one thing, but they do have a habit of drying up – especially those mini-ones. The waxed wrapping sticks when you try to peel it off, the those desiccated little suckers are hard to get down.

So I have my doubts about “105 year old Minnie Larson of Muskegon, MI,” who, according to the Tootsie site:

…says the secret to long life is "peace and quiet, a single life, and an endless supply of Tootsie Rolls."

Maybe they grow teeth stronger up in Muskegon, MI. Or maybe because of its proximity to Tootsie HQ in Chicago the Tootsie Rolls are fresher. But I have my doubts about any 105 year old who’s still chomping down on Tootsie Rolls. On the other hand, Minnie doesn’t actually say that she eats them. Just that she relies on an endless supply. Maybe she does something else with them, up there in Muskegon, in all that peace and quiet. Maybe she’s living in a log cabin made of shellacked Tootsie Rolls. Maybe she uses them for craft projects. Maybe she uses them in jello-molds. Which may explain why she’s single.

Anyway, at 105, Minnie Larson is not all that much older than Tootsie’s CEO, 90 year old Melvin Gordon, one of the country’s oldest and most reclusive CEOs:

The 116-year-old company, run by one of America's oldest CEOs, has become increasingly secretive over the years, severing nearly all of its connections to the outside world. Tootsie Roll shuns journalists, refuses to hold quarterly earnings calls, and issues crookedly-scanned PDFs for its earnings releases. The last securities industry analyst to maintain coverage of the company stopped last year because it was too hard to get information.

Melvin runs the company with his wife Ellen, at 80 a mere broth of a girl. (Ellen was the connection for Melvin: her father ran the business.) The Gordons – with all that old time candies on their roster – clearly value things old. The non-Gordon board members range in age from 65-74.

Mr. Gordon likes to joke with visitors about the Tootsie Roll's robust shelf-life, and he and his wife have worked hard to ensure that the company stays out of the clutches of competitors.

As noted above, that robust shelf-life is really nothing to brag about. I suspect that many a tooth’s been broken, many a filling removed, by some unsuspecting purchaser conned by the robust shelf-life, without considering the cost of that robust shelf-life.

On the other hand, the Gordons appear to have rather robust shelf-life themselves, and are considered in fine fettle. And why not hang on as long as you can?

The Gordons control the company, primarily through their majority ownership of its powerful class B stock, each share of which is worth 10 votes to common stock's one vote….With their control of Tootsie Roll comes perks. Mr. and Mrs. Gordon each get an official salary of $999,000 a year, which the company says is a cap on executive salaries for tax reasons. The pair together received total compensation of $7.6 million last year. That includes bonuses as well as $1.2 million the company spends annually for the Gordons' use of a company plane to visit factories and to commute between their home in Massachusetts and their Chicago apartment, which the company pays $10,000 a month to rent.

As with the Tootsie Roll, however, the Gordons’ shelf-life is not infinite. Nonetheless, they don’t seem to have a succession plan – their offspring apparently don’t want to run Tootsie – so there are investors who’d like to have a go at it, and it’s unlikely to remain stand-alone once the elder Gordons are gone.

While profits of the half-billion dollar company are down, the company is consistently profitable and, at around 8%, last year’s profit was not completely pathetic, either. Plus Tootsie’s sitting on $67M in cash.

That’s yummy enough that someone is going to want to take a bite out of Tootsie. And roll in into some mega conglomerate.

I hate to see these quirky little family companies die out, but so it goes.  As long as the new owners keep pumping out Junior Mints, I’m happy.  At my age, the rest of their wares are pretty much off-limits.

Restoration: Cecilia Giménez’s not so dab hand.

Well, I always maintain that Pink Slip doesn’t do politics or religion. But, as my sister Trish will tell me, you don’t need to be Nate Silver to figure out my politics, or the Pope to figure out my religion (or lack there-of).*

But this post is not really  - 0r not totally - about religion. It’s about art. And restoration. And self-delusion. Followed by self-realization.

Ecce Homo, which depicts Christ just before his crucifixion, was not exactly what anyone would classify as great art. But it had been on the wall of a church in Spain for over one hundred years, and, apparently, the parishioners liked it.

One of them, 80 year old Cecilia Giménez, was so upset about its deterioration that she decided to try her hand at restoration.

That’s before on the left and after on the right, by the way.

There’s quite a swirl forming around this.

I’ve read that when Giménez’ work was discovered, some authorities suspected vandalism. Then they claimed that Giménez was acting on her own, with no permission/authority to do her, ahem, touch up. And that they are considering legal action against her.

But Ms. Giménez later defended herself, saying she could not understand the uproar because she had worked in broad daylight and had tried to salvage the fresco with the approval of the local clergy. “The priest knew it,” she told Spanish TV. “I’ve never tried to do anything hidden.” (Source: NY Times.)

I’ve also read that Ms. Giménez had a moment of epiphany, and outed herself to her town’s cultural affairs director.

Whatever the story is, it came out when descendants of the artist, Elías Garcia Martínez, started making plans to restore the work. Only to find they were a tad too late.

Some folks are carrying on as if Giménez had defaced a Velasquez, a Goya, an El Greco, rather than painted over a decidedly pedestrian example of the Cloyingly Sentimental, Saccharine to the Nth Degree, School of Religious Art.

You don’t even have to be someone who stuffed her St. Joseph Missal with holy cards to recognize it. Every saint, male and female alike, looked exactly the same: pale, insipid, and – if I may – holier than thou.

You could only tell who was who from the clues: lamb = St. Agnes; wheel = St. Catherine; lily and/or miter bend = St. Joseph’s. Sometimes the color scheme was the hint. If he’s wearing green, it’s St. Jude (young, beardless) or St. Patrick (old, bearded, wearing a mitre but not carrying a miter bend).

Only in the world of Cloyingly Sentimental, Saccharine to the Nth Degree, School of  Religious Art would St. Francis of Assisi, an ethereal mystic, look exactly like St. Francis Xavier, who was rugged enough to have traveled all over Asia, building dozens of churches and baptizing hundreds of thousands of pagans. The only difference: Francis A has a tonsure and a bird in hand; Francis X has a full head of hair and is carrying a crucifix.

If you question my judgment of the art of Elías Garcia Martínez as being unduly harsh, I give you Exhibit B, a prime example of the Cloyingly Sentimental, Saccharine to the Nth Degree, School of  Religious Art. (Note to cousin MB: this Madonna is eerily reminiscent of Blinky-Eye Jesus, is it not?) Anyway, my point is that Cecilia Giménez wasn’t desecrating a great work of art, albeit it was no doubt something that gave comfort to pious worshippers, among whom Ms. Giménez could no doubt be counted.

Everyone can’t be an artistic genius, of course, so the comparison is unfair, but ecce a work of religious art by another (quasi) Spaniard, El Greco. No mooning piety here, my friends.  Just someone who actually looks like a human being: pained, frightened, wondering ‘what next’ and ‘why me’. And remarkably virile, I might add. (Although with the hands of a pianist, not a carpenter.) Which is in sharp contrast to Ecce Homo.

Well, if Elías Garcia Martínez  is no El Greco, neither is Cecilia Giménez. Although I’ve got to say that, if I cover over the mal-formed mouth, there’s something to like about her Christus: he’s actually making eye contact, rather than staring off into space. And am I the only one who sees a touch of Modigliani here?

Anyway, I certainly don’t think that Ms. Giménez should be prosecuted. By gunking over a piece of bad art, she may have done the world a favor. But I do think that her brief career as an art restorer has come to a screeching halt.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
*You are perhaps familiar with the local expression ‘baptized a Catholic, but born a Democrat.’

And a tip of the painter’s beret to my sister Trish, who pointed this story out to me, with the comment “reminds me of those ads that used to be in the back of Parade magazine - are you an artist?” My sister Kath’s take on this: “She turned JC into a yeti.”

Restoration: Cecilia Giménez’s not so dab hand.

Well, I always maintain that Pink Slip doesn’t do politics or religion. But, as my sister Trish will tell me, you don’t need to be Nate Silver to figure out my politics, or the Pope to figure out my religion (or lack there-of).*

But this post is not really  - 0r not totally - about religion. It’s about art. And restoration. And self-delusion. Followed by self-realization.

Ecce Homo, which depicts Christ just before his crucifixion, was not exactly what anyone would classify as great art. But it had been on the wall of a church in Spain for over one hundred years, and, apparently, the parishioners liked it.

One of them, 80 year old Cecilia Giménez, was so upset about its deterioration that she decided to try her hand at restoration.

That’s before on the left and after on the right, by the way.

There’s quite a swirl forming around this.

I’ve read that when Giménez’ work was discovered, some authorities suspected vandalism. Then they claimed that Giménez was acting on her own, with no permission/authority to do her, ahem, touch up. And that they are considering legal action against her.

But Ms. Giménez later defended herself, saying she could not understand the uproar because she had worked in broad daylight and had tried to salvage the fresco with the approval of the local clergy. “The priest knew it,” she told Spanish TV. “I’ve never tried to do anything hidden.” (Source: NY Times.)

I’ve also read that Ms. Giménez had a moment of epiphany, and outed herself to her town’s cultural affairs director.

Whatever the story is, it came out when descendants of the artist, Elías Garcia Martínez, started making plans to restore the work. Only to find they were a tad too late.

Some folks are carrying on as if Giménez had defaced a Velasquez, a Goya, an El Greco, rather than painted over a decidedly pedestrian example of the Cloyingly Sentimental, Saccharine to the Nth Degree, School of Religious Art.

You don’t even have to be someone who stuffed her St. Joseph Missal with holy cards to recognize it. Every saint, male and female alike, looked exactly the same: pale, insipid, and – if I may – holier than thou.

You could only tell who was who from the clues: lamb = St. Agnes; wheel = St. Catherine; lily and/or miter bend = St. Joseph’s. Sometimes the color scheme was the hint. If he’s wearing green, it’s St. Jude (young, beardless) or St. Patrick (old, bearded, wearing a mitre but not carrying a miter bend).

Only in the world of Cloyingly Sentimental, Saccharine to the Nth Degree, School of  Religious Art would St. Francis of Assisi, an ethereal mystic, look exactly like St. Francis Xavier, who was rugged enough to have traveled all over Asia, building dozens of churches and baptizing hundreds of thousands of pagans. The only difference: Francis A has a tonsure and a bird in hand; Francis X has a full head of hair and is carrying a crucifix.

If you question my judgment of the art of Elías Garcia Martínez as being unduly harsh, I give you Exhibit B, a prime example of the Cloyingly Sentimental, Saccharine to the Nth Degree, School of  Religious Art. (Note to cousin MB: this Madonna is eerily reminiscent of Blinky-Eye Jesus, is it not?) Anyway, my point is that Cecilia Giménez wasn’t desecrating a great work of art, albeit it was no doubt something that gave comfort to pious worshippers, among whom Ms. Giménez could no doubt be counted.

Everyone can’t be an artistic genius, of course, so the comparison is unfair, but ecce a work of religious art by another (quasi) Spaniard, El Greco. No mooning piety here, my friends.  Just someone who actually looks like a human being: pained, frightened, wondering ‘what next’ and ‘why me’. And remarkably virile, I might add. (Although with the hands of a pianist, not a carpenter.) Which is in sharp contrast to Ecce Homo.

Well, if Elías Garcia Martínez  is no El Greco, neither is Cecilia Giménez. Although I’ve got to say that, if I cover over the mal-formed mouth, there’s something to like about her Christus: he’s actually making eye contact, rather than staring off into space. And am I the only one who sees a touch of Modigliani here?

Anyway, I certainly don’t think that Ms. Giménez should be prosecuted. By gunking over a piece of bad art, she may have done the world a favor. But I do think that her brief career as an art restorer has come to a screeching halt.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
*You are perhaps familiar with the local expression ‘baptized a Catholic, but born a Democrat.’

And a tip of the painter’s beret to my sister Trish, who pointed this story out to me, with the comment “reminds me of those ads that used to be in the back of Parade magazine - are you an artist?” My sister Kath’s take on this: “She turned JC into a yeti.”

Am I Blue? Worcester Airport tries again

When I was growing up, a frequent destination for the ‘spins’ my father was always taking us on was Worcester Airport, where we went to see – in my father’s words – “the Piper Cubs come in.”

Even in its heyday, my hometown’s airport was not exactly a transpo hub.

I do believe I flew into Worcester Airport on one occasion, but I have no recall of it.

After my grandfather died, my parents – with their four year old and almost two year old in tow - went out to Chicago for his funeral. I have no idea how they/we got there – unless my sister Kath remembers, I’ll have to consult with my Aunt Mary – but my father may have driven pell-mell out old Route 9 (this was before the construction of the interstate highway system). Or they/we may have taken the train. Or they/we could have somehow flown there from Worcester Airport. This would have been highly unusual. We went to Chicago every other year for vacation – on the off-years, some delegation of Chicago came to us – but it was always by car or train.

I do, however, know that after the funeral my father had to get back to work, while my mother stayed on with her family. And I do know that, when she did head home to Worcester, she flew.

One of my mother’s classic stories was being at LaGuardia Airport, and having to take a bus to Idlewild*that would be JFK to those of you who don’t remember where you were when JFK was shot –to catch her flight to Worcester. The bus stop was apparently not very convenient to the terminal, and she had quite the struggle getting two little ones,and a couple of heavy 1950’s suitcases – no roller-bags or lightweights in that era, when a piece of luggage outweighed its contents – across some heavily trafficked roadway to reach it. (All of this compounded, of course, by her just having lost her father, who died quite suddenly while still in his early fifties. And, oh, yeah, she was pregnant with my brother Tom, too.) Fortunately, some nice man – our hero – came to her rescue, schlepping the bags while my mother schlepped the kids. And we made it home to Worcester.

That trip was, in fact, the only time I was ever on an airplane until 1973, when I flew from Logan to Heathrow. (Never all that mechanical, I couldn’t figure out how to use the seat belt.)

Anyway, over the years, Worcester’s Airport remained kind of a pokey little puppy. Airlines – think Piedmont – occasionally flew in and out. My mother made occasional forays in and out of Worcester via plane. But it never seemed to make all that much sense for the Heart of the Commonwealth to have all that much of an airport. Anyone who wanted get out of town – and, admittedly, there are plenty of them - could fly out of Boston, Providence, Manchester, or Hartford. That Worcester Airport is not close to any highway – it’s nestled in a combo wooded-residential area – plus was on a hill that’s fog-shrouded half the time, didn’t exactly lend itself to Worcester’s becoming an air hub.

One of the wooded, residential areas the airport was nestled in, by the way, was the one I grew up in. Our ‘hood was curious in that it was very densely packed and urban if you looked in one direction, and complete country if you looked in the other. No gradual suburban drop off for us. Turn left out the door and there’s Morris Market, Sol’s Maincrest Pharmacy, Vic the blind barber, the Paree Beauty Salon, Teddy the tailor, and all the other little commercial outfits (including the double-wide three decker that sold cemetery monuments from its front yard). But if you turned right, ah, wilderness: Hendy’s (Henderson’s Pond), the crazy old lady farm, and The Airport Woods. Woods that stretched from our backyard, right up to the runway. We’d sometimes take walks: destination Worcester Airport, where we would get a soda (which we would have called a tonic) or a candy bar from the hoppin’ vending machine.

A while back, there was a movement to run a connector from the turnpike to the airport that would have cut right through my old neighborhood. I’m sure that “they” thought this would be easy-peasy, since the neighborhood isn’t at all posh, and the houses that would have been torn down weren’t worth all that much.

Of course, “they” didn’t know who they were f-ing with: a bunch of Main South, “Holy Angels” pig-heads who had always lived on Grand View (which was neither grand, nor had a view), and who planned to always live on Grand View. So there.

Anyway, Worcester Airport has languished for years.

A few years ago, The Banshees (sister-cousin girl gang) had a winter weekend getaway to Worcester. Since there was no place to shop, we drove up to Worcester Airport. Talk about a ghost town. There was a young woman manning a rental car desk, and that was about it. (It was so desolate, I wouldn’t have been surprised to have seen an axe-murderer swing through.) Not even a Piper Cub in sight.

But every once in a while, some half-baked airline sets up some service. The last one, I believe, went bankrupt, and Worcester has been without commercial service since last winter.

But last week I saw this bit of news:

The chief executive of JetBlue Airways is paying another visit to Worcester Wednesday, as the city of Worcester and the Massachusetts Port Authority continue to woo the low-cost carrier, hoping to convince the airline to serve Worcester Regional Airport.  (Source: Boston.com)

Well, there’s nothing half baked about Jet Blue. And Worcester, which never, ever, ever lacks for boosterism – surely, you’ve heard that “we’ve” been an All American City. More than once. So there. – held a luncheon for David Barger, attended by the local poobahs:

…Lieutenant Governor Tim Murray…Worcester mayor Joseph Petty, Kevin O’Sullivan, the president of Worcester-based Massachusetts Biomedical Initiatives, and other college administrators, business executives, and civic leaders from Central Massachusetts.

Worcester not having commercial flights is just such an itch that “our” poohbahs just have to keep scratching.

I hope they get Jet Blue, or someone, anyone, to fly there. If only because I have now decided to add flying in or out of Worcester to my bucket list. That trip back from my grandfather’s funeral in Chicago just doesn’t count. I want to look out the window and see Our Lady of the Angels, Hendy’s, and the place that sells the grave markers.

Hope for a fog-free day.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
*Or vice-versa.

What $1M will get you in Ocklawaha, Florida

Looking for a little getaway place in Ocklawaha, Florida?

This unprepossessing place, on the shores of Lake Weir, is on the market.

The 2,016-square-foot, two-story home has four bedrooms and two bathrooms. Spread across 9½ acres, the estate includes 340 feet of waterfront on Lake Weir. Aside from updates to the kitchen, the home and its furnishings are unchanged [since] 1935. (Source: WSJ Online.)

It may not look like all that much. And that lack of updating since 1935 (January 16, 1935 to be precise) will certainly give pause to anyone who watches HGN regularly. (What, no en suite? No open floor plan?) As will, no doubt, the $1M minimum asking price.

But that’s a lot of acreage that could be developed, if and when central Florida real estate creeps back.

And, after all, you’re buying history here.

Because this cottage was the site of the 1935 shootout between Ma Barker and the remnants of her gang, and J. Edgar Hoover’s G-Men.

Ma Barker lost.

The house wasn’t Barker Gang property. It was a vacation rental by owner, the owner being Carson Bradford, who’d built the place in 1930. It’s been in the family all these years, but none of his descendants are interested in keeping/using the place. (The thought of vintage bathrooms – chain pull flush on the toilets, perhaps – and shrinky-dink little double beds with leaden mattresses on squeaky springs: ugh!)

Sotheby’s is handling the sale:

"There's unbelievable interest around the world in crime memorabilia. People have never seen a property where everything is intact from the time of the event," said Roger Soderstrom, a broker for Stirling Sotheby's. "We think the buyer could be someone who has a passion for crime memorabilia and who wants to build their own house (on the property) and keep this as a collector's house. It could be a bed-and-breakfast. You could have weddings there.'' (Source: UPI.)

Apparently, while the blood was cleaned up, there are still bullet scars. (Such fun!) So who wouldn’t want to stay at a B&B where a couple of America’s Most Wanted were taken down by G-Men with Tommy guns? (Didn’t they have tear gas in those days?)

And as for a wedding location…

Think of the fun themes: Men in 1930’s garb (including fedoras). Mini Tommy guns as favors. The mother of the bride could go as Ma Barker. Depression glass on the tables.

Maybe you could get all your guests to dress up as their favorite criminals. Bonnie and Clyde, anyone?

Maybe you could really get into the swing of things and register for 1930’s level wedding gifts. None of this Cuisinart nonsense. No $300 place settings. No 600 thread sheets.

You could sign up for an egg-beater. A linen tea-towel. A butter dish.

Or to keep in the Barker spirit – they were, after all, bank robbers – you could request all cash. As long as it was in small denomination, unmarked bills.

There’s actually some controversy about whether Ma Barker was really the tough broad, criminal mastermind that J. Edgar Hoover portrayed her as. Plenty of evidence points to her being just a plain old doting mom who happened to have raised a gang of criminals (all four of her sons were cons), and who liked to travel with her mama’s boys.

Anyway, bids are being accepted through Oct. 5.

Me, even if I actually wanted to have lakefront property in Ocklawaha, Florida, I would be taking a pass on this one.

A bit too eerie for my liking.

And $1M? Top of the world, Ma!

Here’s an honest-to-goodness money-maker.

It wouldn’t occur to me to pay for something that cost, say, $2.39, with anything other than cash (or a Dunkin’ Donuts cash card). But I see “young folks” whipping out there debit cards to buy candy bars and lattes all the time. So I keep thinking that cold, hard cash is going to be yet another thing that goes buggy-whip in my lifetime. (Will panhandlers have to get themselves set up with some sort of card swipe machine in order to stem?)

On the one hand, it’s probably more convenient not to have to worry about having cash on hand. Take it from someone who remembers the pre-ATM era, there were times on weekends when you’d worry about running out. So you’d make a trip to the grocery store – whether you needed to or not – and use your check-cashing privileges to get $50 over the grocery tab. This was, of course, at a time when $50 could actually tide you over for while. (These days, I don’t even bother with $100 transactions at the ATM.)

On the other hand, if you’re spending cash that’s actually in and on hand, you do have a pretty good idea of how your supply is dwindling. Sure, you can always summons up your balance, but I’m thinking that it’s easier to lose track if you’re swiping your debit (or, heaven forbid, credit) card for every little transaction.

Yet there is, blessedly, still a demand for cash, so that us old fogeys can still keep some in our wallets and under our mattresses, even if there are no newspapers, and few books, to spend it on anymore.

A British outfit called De La Rue, “the world’s largest commercial banknote printer”, “involved in the production of one in five of the world’s banknotes“ benefits nicely from this demand.

It was De La Rue that got the new currency contract for Iraq in 2003, when legal tender no longer bore the mustachioed likeness of Saddam Hussein. This was no trivial matter. Iraq needed 1.75 billion new bills, and they needed them within two months. So De La Rue went into overdrive to make the deadline, and

…chartered 27 Boeing 747s to deliver the freshly printed banknotes. (Source: The Economist.)

De La Rue also produced the currency for South Sudan, when it gained its independence last year. (Now that’s probably a country that doesn’t have a lot of debit cards in it.)

And while I may think that demand for cash is down,

Low interest rates have cut the opportunity cost of holding cash. With banks looking wobbly, many prefer to keep their money stuffed in the mattress, creating extra demand for banknotes.

So bad is good for De La Rue.

What would really be good for their business, of course, is the dissolution of the Euro.

However lousy that would be for the rest of the world, all those countries scurrying around to regenerate a national currency.

Wheeeee…….

Greece may need drachma – probably by the boatful if they end up with hyperinflation.

Once Greece is gone, baby, gone from the Euro zone, the Cypriots may need to get their pound back. The Portuguese their escudo. The Spanish their peseta. The Irish their punt.

While the Euro is vastly more convenient, currency was more interesting when each country had their own.

It was always entertaining to see whose mug made it on to the banknotes – and to see whether you’d even heard of them. (Most Europeans probably haven’t heard of Andrew Jackson or Alexander Hamilton, either.)

In truth, I can’t remember anyone depicted on any country’s currency, other than our own. And, of course, The Queen on British currency. (Still there: they never went on the Euro.)

I think that Irish punt may have had W.B. Yeats and/or G.B. Shaw, but I’m not entirely sure. Grace O’Malley? Queen Medb? Maybe. I remember the coins, however: lovely deer, salmon, harps.

While multi-Euro currencies were interesting, it was also a drag to have to convert and reconvert when you moved across borders. We probably average one European trip a year, mostly hitting one country, but sometimes more per trip. Euros are mighty useful for these treks. And, since we’re always planning another overseas trip, we just hang on to Euros from one trip to the next. No need to ask whether we’ll ever get back to Italy again in our lives.

Anyway, although they’re protected by being diversified – they also print passports and create holograms for credit cards - I’m sure that De La Rue is kinda-sorta hoping that the Euro goes down. Bet they’re watching every move Angela Merkel makes, dreaming about cranking out all that new folding green (or red or blue), figuring out how many planes they’ll need to charter to deliver the not so goods to Athens.

Until we go entirely cashless, it must be fun to be an honest to goodness money maker.

Bring out your ashtrays, your finials, your tongs. That is, if you “found” them at the Waldorf-Astoria before 1960.

A few months back, the Waldorf-Astoria initiated an amnesty program in hopes of getting some of the items that light-fingered guests have packed in their valises between 1893 and 1960. Among that goods that have found their way out:

…flatware, plates, bowls, creamers, coffee cups;…monogrammed napkins, towels, bathrobes;  ashtrays, mirrors, wooden hangers, and lampshade finials molded into the shape of the Waldorf’s crest; etched Scotch tumblers, ice buckets, tongs, side-armed coffee-pots; table-top bells that once summoned bell-hops; autographed pictures of Herbert Hoover and Cole Porter and Prince Rainier and Princess Grace of Monaco, of little Anderson Cooper and his mother Gloria Vanderbilt;…silver soup tureens, brass candlesticks, huge copper room keys, glass bottles that once held relish prepared by the Waldorf’s erstwhile maître d'hôtel Oscar Tschirky, progenitor of the Waldorf salad. Etc. (Source: The New Yorker – subscriber content.)

If you’re wondering what a “side-armed coffee-pot” is – as I was – here’s a picture found on eBay of a side-armed Waldorf-Astoria tea-pot that’s for sale on eBay for $149.99. That’s where a lot of Waldorf-Astoria goodies reside (at least temporarily), including plenty of demitasse spoons, serving platters, a decanter, and a set containing 54 pieces of flatware. (Now that valise must have weighed heavy when it left the prem. Not to mention jangled, unless all those forks, knives, and spoons were wrapped in a W-A towel. Why not: hung for a sheep as a lamb…)

Not all the stuff on eBay was necessarily acquired through five-finger discount.  There’s one very cool Waldorf-Astoria patrolmen’s badge for sale for $100. How cool is that: a hotel had enough cops to issue numbered badges that ran into the 600’s. (Too bad it wasn’t Badge 714…)

Matt Zolbe, the Waldorf’s marketing director, sees all sorts of Waldorfian stuff for sale on eBay all the time, but doesn’t want to start paying folks off for things that are rightly the Waldorf’s to begin with. (Sort of like dealing with terrorists and kidnappers.)

While plenty of the purloined items that the Waldorf hopes to retrieve were in plentiful supply – like hangers, ashtrays, and demitasse spoons - some of the things that went missing are one-offs.

I’m assuming that the picture of Anderson and Gloria is on that one-off list, but there’s also “a mural of an Asian emperor addressing his subjects” which someone cut out of its frame in a public dining room and walked off with; and a two-foot tall bespoke silver trimmed crystal vase commissioned for the hotel’s 20th anniversary in 1913. The “owner” had it appraised for $30K and is willing to sell it back to the Waldorf…

I’ve stayed at the Waldorf a number of times, but never before 1960. (I don’t think I was in any hotel before 1960.) For the times I did stay there, I have nothing to show for it.

Other than an occasional wooden hanger I might have ripped off, back in the day before so many hotels started using the kind that you can’t make off with unless you dismantle the entire closet, I’ve never actually taken stuff from hotels. Other than the mini-shampoos and the cute little jam and ketchup jars that come with room service.

Maybe stuff was just cooler – and more monogrammed – in the olden days, but there’s never really been much in a hotel room that I found much worth stealing, even if I were so inclined.

One time, we did come home from a hotel stay in Portland, Maine, with a pillow. We had gone up to L.L. Bean and done a lot of shopping, and had tons of stuff in our room. So we used one of those carts to put all our luggage and shopping bags on. Somehow, a pillow made its way onto the cart. The bellboy packed the trunk, and it wasn’t until we got home and unpacked that we noticed that we had a pillow with us. (You’d think that bellboy would have noticed and said something, but maybe he thought it was ours.) Anyway, the pillow was nothing special, and we didn’t bother to return it: too much trouble, and probably not worth much more than the cost of shipping it back to them. It eventually went the way of all pillows.)

I do remember, years ago, going to a party at a colleague’s house, where she had a very funky, art deco-ish drink cart. At some point during the 1930’s, her parents had drunkenly wheeled off with it from their hotel. But that was, I believe, from the St. Regis, not the Waldorf. (Just checked on eBay: it’s not there.)

Not that I’m so 100% honest that I’ve never taken anything.

When I worked for Durgin-Park (famous old Boston tourist spot), I lifted a crudely and cheaply framed placard that was hanging in the waitress cloak room, that read:

 If you work for a man, in heavens name work for him!If he pays you wages that supply you your bread and butter, work for him speak well of him, think well of him, stand by him and stand by the institution he represents. I think if I worked for a man I would work for him. I would not work for him a part of the time, and the rest of the time work against him. I would give an undivided service or none. If put to the pinch, an ounce of loyalty is worth a pound of cleverness. Elbert Hubbard (Source: QuotationsBook.com)

This bromide was particularly inapt. When I worked at Durgin-Park, the owner was a viciously mean, borderline insane, drunk-as-a-skunk lout who made everyone’s life miserable. No way anyone but the most supreme toady would “speak well of him”.

I may have the placard around somewhere; maybe not. (If I do come across it, I’ll drop it off at Durgin if they’ll let me see whether the waitress cloak room has been updated since 1973. At that point, it hadn’t been touched since 1873…)

I must confess, as well, to having taken a plaque that was a bit more valuable than the words of Elbert Hubbard from the Union Oyster House, another venerable Boston establishment where I waitressed while in college. The plaque was some sort of oil painting with a haute-relief of a sailing ship on it. I can’t remember what my motivation was for lifting it off the wall of the booth one evening. Bad tip night? A near miss stepping on a rat? (When I worked there, the place was crawling with them. Screaming when one ran across your feet was a firing offense.) Parting gift?

Anyway, I passed it on, and I believe it still hangs somewhere. Just not in a booth at Union Oyster House.

But hotel pilfering? Not me.

So I’ve nothing to contribute to the Waldorf amnesty program.

Apparently I’m not the only one.

To date, the amnesty program hasn’t yielded much. A young woman who works in sales at the Waldorf surrendered a sterling salad fork her grandparents had cadged on their honeymoon in 1949. (Ah, romance.)

O, obit. (They ain’t kidding about the high cost of dying.)

There was an article on boston.com the other day on folks who are taking part in the “latest trend in dying: the self-written obituary.”

Having done all they can to dictate exactly how their funerals will go — down to playlists, menus, and off-beat hearses — baby boomers, and some members of the Silent Generation, are now taking control over the story of their lives.

O, obit. Why not?

Who wants a boring old obituary with “just the facts”? And, let’s face it, most of us aren’t born great, haven’t achieved greatness, and will die waiting for greatness to be thrust upon us. Which means that there’s no behind the scenes NY Times obituary writer with a file chock-a-block full of bits about our lives, just waiting for the word so he can truck it out to commemorate us.

But I must say that, while I won’t be granted a free, this is news, death notice, I also don’t want anyone paying to publish my obituary, either. (Talk about the ultimate in vanity press.)

Which is not to say that I don’t want to have a final word or two.

So maybe one of these days I’ll get around to pulling together something or other for someone or other to read at my funeral, errrrr, the celebration of my life. (I believe I’ve already made it clear that a smidge of my ashes should be strewn in St. Joseph’s Cemetery in Leicester, Massachusetts, where I’ll be with four generations of Rogers-Trainors; another smidge tossed in Galway Bay; and a final soupçon left in Fenway Park. (On this final destination for my final destination: if the Red Sox continue their pathetic ways, please spit in the ashes, muddy up a baseball, and hurl it at someone. But please don’t let my brother Rick be the one to do the hurling, as he’s likely to actually hit a player.)

And if I’m still blogging -  if blogging, indeed, still exists – I should leave a final entry, a ghost-post as it were, with instructions on how to publish it. (Hey, it’s free!)

As a writer of sorts, I won’t have any problem pulling together my swan song, but for those looking for a place to start, there’s Susan Soper’s ObitKit, who’s dying to help folks “put the fun in funeral.”

Actually, no one of Irish descent, who grew up poring over the Irish Sports Pages (i.e., the obituaries), needs to be told how to put the fun in funeral. Why, even at the funeral of my well-beloved Aunt Margaret, whose sudden death (okay, she was 85) devastated those of us who loved her, a number of us blew whistles as we got in our cars for the procession from her church in West Newton to her burial in Leicester. (To anyone curious about funeral processions that process for 50 miles, the cars do stay together on the Mass Pike, but they go the speed limit, resuming funeral pace when off the Pike.) You may ask what we were doing with whistles at a funeral. Well, we didn’t ask the funeral parlor where Margaret was waked to have baskets full of glow-in-the-dark whistles (with the funeral parlor’s name and address embossed on them) in the ladies room, did we? I mean, if they didn’t want us to take them, they wouldn’t have been there. And what good’s a whistle if you don’t go and blow on it?

As for owning your own obit:

Statistics on the number of seniors working to meet the ultimate deadline are hard to come by, but obituary-writing courses are being offered on-line and in workshops, and informal obit-writing sessions are popping up at book club meetings and girlfriend reunions.

Why discuss Hillary Mantel’s Bring Up The Bodies, when it’s so much more enjoyable to work with that most scintillating and engrossing of topics: me, myself, and, of course, I.

Auto-obituary writers should not let themselves get too carried away.

The [Boston] Globe charges $10 a line for a death notice, which is about 35-40 characters, plus an $18.50 fee to put the notice on Legacy.com for one year. At the New York Times, a death notice costs $55 per line, which runs about 28 characters, and the paper’s Legacy.com fee is $55.

The Globe is a regular bargain, but when you do the math, even things there can get pretty pricey. A 500 word story-de-moi would translate into 2,000 – 2,500 characters. Let’s go with the lower end of the range here. At 40 characters per line, that’s 50 lines. So your death notice would cost you, well, not you-you, but someone who knew you-you well enough to get your obituary into the paper, would have to fork over $500 – plus extra for that year on Legacy.com. So obituary writers had best make sure that they put aside a few bucks if they want to make sure that they get published. (As opposed to having your grieving relict say, “$500 bucks to get this load of crap in the obituary section? No way. I’ll just mimeo copies and hand them out at the funeral.”)

The Times, as befits the country’s Paper of Record, is far costlier: 5.5 times per line – and that’s for a shorter line.

Even if you got your story down to a tweet, for five 28 character lines (hitting the tweet 140 max), you’d (again, not you-you) would be set back $275. And that’s for a tweet.

With this self-obituary-ing craze, the high cost of dying  seems to have gotten a bit higher.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My sister Trish sent the link to this article to me, so a doff of the shroud to her.

And just to see what you could pack into 140 characters (this is 135),  here’s my death tweet:

Daughter, sister, wife, aunt, cousin, friend, colleague. Worcester girl. Red Sox fan. Loved Ireland. Pretty darned funny. A reader. Should have been a writer.

This is subject to change, of course. If the Red Sox keep going the way they’re going…

Scott Tucker–one of them, anyway–is paying for spam. (Hope he’s getting his money’s worth.)

About one-third of the comments that appear on Pink Slip are spam. Once in a blue moon, if they are especially ridiculous, I let them through, but mostly I mark ‘em as spam and get rid of ‘em.

As I did with this one:

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Does anyone actually own a Snuggie?":

Excellent beat ! I would like to apprentice at the same time as you amend your web site, how can i subscribe for a blog web site?

Well, agreed, Pink Slip does have excellent beat! But I’m not taking on any apprentices at present, even though I really should amend my web site.

The account aided me a appropriate deal. I were a little bit acquainted of this your broadcast provided vivid clear idea scott a. tucker dancing

Well, it didn’t provide me a clear idea. What, pray tell, is Scott A. Tucker dancing?

Then there was this part of the comment which included a couple of links to various Scott Tucker sites. (I have removed the links; don’t want these spammers getting credit for anything.)

http://www.castroledgerankings.com/driver/scott-tucker
scott tucker amg
http://scotttuckermodernart.blogspot.com/
scott tucker kansas city star
My web page - scott tucker

That Castro Oil ranking of auto racer Scott Tucker revealed him to be 133 in the world, by the way. (We’re Number 133! We’re Number 133!) The other was to Scott Tucker, artist and performer. Could this be one and the same guy? If so, what a polymath!

I found Scott Tucker, racing driver, on wikipedia. While he didn’t appear to be the arting and performing Scott Tucker, he had quite a checkered history that went beyond his recent checkered flag exploits.

In 1991 Tucker was convicted of felony mail fraud and making false statements to a bank and imprisoned for a year. Tucker is currently involved with the private-equity firm Westfund as well as the payday loan company AMG Services. In 2006 Tucker began his interest in motorsports, first participating in the Ferrari Challenge series.

On April 2, 2012, the Federal Trade Commission filed charges against AMG Services. The charges revolve around excessive fees and interest charged to borrowers, in addition to loan terms not being fully disclosed at the time loans are initiated. Tucker was specifically charged in addition to the firm itself.

The wiki categories he’s listed under include both “24 Hours of LeMans Drivers” and “American Fraudsters”. No mention of “Artist” or “Performer.”

On closer inspection of the other Scott Tucker, I found that he was much younger than Scott Tucker, American Fraudster and 24 Hours of Le Mans Driver, and was, indeed, a Texas-based artist and performer. (He’s a member of a “neo-psychedelic band.”) He’s also a movie buff, who’s faves include:

La Dolce Vita, The Great Gatsby, Blow Up (sic), Dead Poets Society, Honey and Clover, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, and Casa Blanca (sic)

Which one would not expect on the fave list of Scott Tucker, 24 Hours of Le Mans Driver. (Maybe Steve McQueen’s LeMans…)

And gratuitous note to Scott Tucker, artist and performer. It’s Blowup (or Blow-Up) and Casablanca.  Sheesh…

Minor spelling glitches aside, Scott Tucker, artist and performer, has plenty to say for himself:

James Joyce, and even Rod Sterling have all been figures in his work. Tucker believes Western Society lives in a fantastic sort of material chaos only upheld due to a lack of personal objective consciousness.

I double dog dare you to deconstruct that!

“The world of technology has changed our social and moral landscape onto a zoo. My work combines elements of mass consumption, sex appeal, terror, and nostalgia; all four exist together in an orgy we call pop culture. As an artist, I feel it is my duty to illustrate their sociological effects in my work.” Scott Tucker (Source: a site called theartmenu.com)

Ah, the orgy we call pop culture…

But Scott Tucker, artist, performer, and zoo landscaper, is also Scott Tucker, Jr., who’s son of Scott Tucker, Sr. (no relation to American Fraudster/24 Hours of LeMans Scott Tucker), who’s the founder and jefe of Artworks, which:

…is a world class faux finish and specialty mural company started 30 years ago by artist Scott Tucker Sr.

Which, if you’re in the market, produces stuff like this:

Someone in Boston is, apparently, in the market:

Within the next two weeks we will be flying out to bid a massive project in Boston that will most likely fill our entire fall schedule.

Go for it, Scott Tucker, Jr. and Scott Tucker, Sr.

But, if it’s you and not the American Fraudster paying for someone who’s paying for someone whose command of English ain’t so hot to do your search engine optimization for you, you’re at least somewhat wasting your money. If you waste enough of it, there’s always the other Scott Tucker for a pay day loan.

And if it’s Scott Tucker, Number 133 in the Castro Oil rankings, who’s hired these nincompoops to do SEO, well, I guess it’s not true that it takes a fraudster to catch a fraudster.

It’s a modest psychopathic wine, but it does have some global ambition

A Philadelphia couple came in for a bit of a shock in Italy recently when they stopped into a shop in Garda, Italy, and saw wine with Hitler’s face on it on the shelves. Not something that most decent folks would want to see displayed, but in this case, matters were made worse. The wife of the couple is the daughter of a Holocaust survivor, and had grandparents and an aunt murdered at Auschwitz. (Source: Huffington Post.)

I’m actually not surprised.

When in Rome this past April, we saw a number of souvenir stands selling Il Duce fridge magnets and other Benito Mussolini paraphernalia.

And, in fact, the Lunardelli winery that offers wine with Hitler on the label – in dozens of different versions, including one with the cover of Mein Kampf on it – also sells Mussolini wine. I strolled around the site a bit and also found a combo Adolf-Benito version. As well as one sporting a coy picture of Eva Braun, and others featuring Goering, Himmler, and Hess.

Why let good taste and common decency get in the way of wringing a buck out of someone lacking in good taste and common decency?

It’s axiomatic (or almost) that if someone’s willing to buy it, then someone should be able and willing to sell it. (I say almost axiomatic  because there is, after all, kiddie porn and snuff which, while they do have an audience and represent a “market” of buyers, should really and truly have no sellers.)

So  there shouldn’t be a law against selling Fuehrer wein. And there shouldn’t need to be a law – other than the implicit rules of taste and decency. And apparently there isn’t a law:

Prosecutor Mario Giulio Schinaia spoke with news agency ANSA, saying the "only crime that could be currently attributable to this is that of apologising for fascism ... At this point, though, it would be opportune to invent the crime of human stupidity."

I actually disagree with Schinaia here. This isn’t a “crime of human stupidity.” It’s a crime of being willing to go pretty darned low to make money.

The owner of the supermarket that sold the wine defended its sale, saying it was a part of history, "like Che Guevara."

It is certainly true that both Adolf Hitler and Che Guevara are, indeed, part of history. And both wore facial hair. But beyond that, there really isn’t a whole lot the two had in common. And whether you worshipped at Che Guevara’s altar, or thought he was the devil incarnate, Che did not bear a good portion of the responsibility for World War II, nor was he responsible for the deaths of millions who weren’t collateral damage from the war itself, but were victims of genocide, singled out specifically for their religion, ethnicity, or sexual orientation.

Thus, while lack of decency and taste should never be a surprise, it was still pretty surprising to read that:

Last month, a woman told European gay news site Pink News that she was ejected from a London gay bar when she objected to a bottle of wine adorned with the image of Adolf Hitler.

Have we become such hip, jaded, cool, raised-eye ironists that someone stocking the shelves in a gay bar would think that this was a good thing to do?

Hitler wine, by the way, has been around since the 1990’s. A decade ago, vintner Lunardelli noted that Hitler was his “bestseller, moving more than 30,000 bottles a year.

And it’s not just Hitler wine in Italy.

Sales of wine and schnapps with Adolf Hitler on the label are increasing all over Austria.

An Austrian website was selling bottles with portraits of Hitler and the swastika. The site offered sales of spirits in “nostalgic bottles of former historical greats.”

The man selling the wine and schnapps was identified only as Roland M. Legal officials say he was motivated by profit, not ideology. (Source: Weekly World News.)

Profit, Profit,  Über Ideology.

That makes it better. I think…

Other uses of the Hitler “brand” include a “Nazi-themed” clothing line that was withdrawn last year by a Hong-Kong clothing company.

Asia is apparently a hot-bed when it comes to the use of Nazi imagery, which figures, I guess, since there aren’t a lot of relatives of Holocaust victims floating around to object. According to Abraham Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League:

“They [Asians] don’t really have a concept of Hitler. I’ve seen a lot of really bizarre things [in Asia] — like [advertisements for] ‘German pianos at Jewish prices.’ It’s bizarre. There’s a bar named after Hitler.”

This all raises a lot of questions around when, where and how it’s okay to start commercializing rather than demonizing horror shows like Hitler and Mussolini.

Personally, I think it should wait a few generations, when there are no longer any actual and once- or twice-removed victims to be horrified by a commercial use of their victimizer images. Thus, I’d wait a few more decades before going to town with a line of Hitler anythings.

Meanwhile, it you want to have tasteless wine, that’s probably tasteless in both respects, there’s always Vlad the Impaler and Genghis Kahn to grace your labels. Nobody around to remember those bad boys!

I think it’s absolutely okay to make fun of Hitler and Mussolini. Along with ignominy, it’s exactly what they deserve. (I love The Producers.) But using the name and image to turn a profit by encouraging those with no sense and/or taste, or – how ghastly that would be – those who are genuinely nostalgic for the good old days of fascism. A pox on their vineyards!

Poor little rich kids (tweet, tweet)

All you slobs out there probably think that it’s pretty darned easy being ultra-wealthy.

Well, let me tell you…

Even when you get beyond the fact that so many of the clearly envious great unwashed are clamoring for them to pay their so-called “fair share” of taxes, there’s the day to day problems associated with being a job creator for those faceless, thankless minions in China and India for whom jobs are being created. And the even more pedestrian issue of finding good help-around-the-house(s)  who won’t go yapping (on their blogs, in their tweets, to the National Enquirer, in tell-all books) about you and your private, personal, wealth and job creating lives at the first chance. (You know, one good thing about the illegals. Not only do they work cheap, but a lot of them don’t speak English. I’m telling you, it just gets harder and harder for the rich.)

Then there’s coping with the hangers-on who probably just pretend to like you in hopes that you’ll give them a used tiara, or something.

In truth, being wealthy may remove a teensie-weensie bit of anxiety about whether you’re going to be eating cat food in your old age and/or sleeping over a heating grate. And it may enable you to buy a raft of swell stuff without fumbling around trying to find the price tag without making it obvious to the sales person that you’re fumbling around trying to find the sales tag.

Come on, who wouldn’t want an iPad in every room, in every home? Who wouldn’t want 2,000 thread count sheets? And cashmere dust rags?

But big money can also buy you big trouble. And some of that big trouble’s social-media related. Especially when your poor little kids are using it.

Take the situation that the children of Michael Dell have found themselves in.

Alexa, a recent high school grad, went and posted a picture of her 15 year old brother Zachary on this tremendously interesting and relevant Tumblr site called the Rich Kids of Instagram. (Seriously, as an aside, you should absolutely go and wander through RKOI. You will regret that you ever doubted for a New York minute that it isn’t difficult being the scion of someone who’s well to do enough to allow you to take private helicopter rides around San Tropez. Truly, you will stop channeling your inner Robespierre and start feeling a whole yacht-load of sympathy for those poor rich folks.)

Anyway, the picture of Zachary that Alexa posted on RKOI – now, alas, taken down – was of young Master Dell scarfing down a lush buffet while seated in the family jet, heading for a no-doubt well-earned vacation on Fiji.

Anyone with a bit of curiosity could see that Alexa had posted the picture on Instagram and pointed to it via her Twitter account. On that same Twitter account, Alexa happily detailed her every move, including the exact days she would arrive in, say, New York, and where she was shopping. She also put up such things as her high school graduation dinner invitation that foretold where (time, date, location) Michael Dell and his wife would be in a couple of weeks’ time. (Source: Business Week.)

Which would not be that big a deal – my sister Trish updates her FB when we’re sitting in the bleachers at Fenway Park (this year, given how crapoid the team is, there’s nothing going on on the field that’s all that riveting) - if, unlike my sister Trish, Michael Dell wasn’t spending:

…about $2.7 million a year for the security protection of his family, according to Dell regulatory filings.

Which, I guess, must mean that $2.7 million worth of security is part of his compensation package. But it also means that Dell is paying $50K a week for security. Which seems to translate into quite a few reasonably well paid, round the clock security folks watching out for Dell, his beloved, and his possessions.  $2.7 million a year in security!  Presumably, if you’re paying it, you’re needing it. Now that, my friends, underscores the point that a life of financial ease is not necessarily a life of personal ease.

Given the security outlay,

…you can imagine how pleased [Dell] must have been to see his children’s jaunt to Fiji detailed on a catchy website and his daughter providing an online diary of her life, replete with GPS locations dished out by her cell phone.

Alas, Alexa’s Twitter account has been shuttered. Dell is mum on whether it was because of security concerns, but the speculation is that security’s the reason.

Jason Thorsett, a manager at a bodyguard company, figures that Dell’s security team went bonkers when they saw the Dells’ locations being given away.

“I’m sure they called the dad and shut it down,” he says. “It’s innocent on the kids’ behalf, but social networking has become the bane of our existence. They undo a lot of hard work on Facebook and Twitter.”

All those 140 character bread-crumb trails leading kidnappers to their targets.

“Twitter is the worst because it’s so instantaneous,” Thorsett says. “You get that GPS location of exactly where you are. It’s just insane.”

What did I tell you?

It is SO not easy being ultra-wealthy.

Twenty-years out…

Michael Kinsley had an interesting post over on Bloomberg the other day on predictions about what might change, in terms of moral (and other) perceptions and behaviors, over the next 20 years.

The list of things that Kinsley and his readers came up with pretty predictably included attitudes towards gay marriage, climate change, and eating meat. But readers also suggested a few less sweeping but perhaps more interesting ideas about what might happen a couple of decades out

No more lawns, one came up with.

This is an interesting one, and a two-fer, as it hits at both environmentalism (leeching all that water that could be used more productively elsewhere, and oh, those chemicals leaching into the leeched-out aquifer), plus the scarcity of time to hover around your lawn. (Hey, I have to be inside, online reading about two-headed kittens and missing birth certificates.)

While I realize that they are unnatural, fussy, and water-wasting, I actually like the look of a nice green lawn, and would hate for them to die out entirely.  Lawn care was, more or less, a hobby of my father’s, especially the front lawn, which was mowed by hand mower (power mower for the larger, less pampered back yard) and only by my father.  The front lawn also had a higher-end watering system: flat hoses with tiny holes in them that sprayed a fine mist, vs. the whirling sprinklers out back. I don’t remember ever seeing any crab grass out front, but weeds and dandelions (front and back) were anathema to my father. Watching my father as he went on lawn patrol, I learned that a screw driver could and should be used to rout out dandelions.

As the result of my father’s care, the front lawn was a green velvet carpet. Nothing felt better than barefooting on a summer night in the aftermath of a watering.

So, while I recognize that green lawns are something of an environmental disaster (not to mention a time synch) I have a certain fondness for them.

But, hey, I don’t have a personal dog in this hunt, as I live in a downtown area where personal lawns don’t exist. If you want to see grass, you go to the Public Garden or Boston Common.

Still, I think the best route here would to encourage lawns to fade away in places – like the sandy parts of Cape Cod and most of Arizona – where there isn’t enough water to support a lawn without going to extremes. But maybe we can let them survive in the environs where water is (for now, anyway) in abundant supply. But about those chemicals…

Another Kinsley reader predicted that high-heeled shoes would be a thing of the past, like whale-bone corsets.

Despite the fact that high heeled shoes are hazardous to foot health, I wouldn’t bet on this one.

As long as high heels are considered sexy, sweet young things who want to catch a man’s eye are going to be forcing their feet into them and stumbling around.

Since I am no longer a sweet young thing, high heels are not my worry.

That said, I did slip up recently and order a pair of nearly 3 inch heels to wear to an upcoming wedding. What was I thinking?  I tried them on and, while they looked good when I was standing still, when walking I could do no more than totter around, leaning so far forward to keep my balance that I looked like Groucho Marx.  Zapped them babies back to Zappo’s. I’ll have to go with one or my more sensible alternatives, two of which, thankfully, are not entirely clunky.

One Kinsley respondent forecast that private car ownership might be illegal twenty years out. Given where and how most people live in this country, I would have to characterize this as wishful thinking, even if most people become telecommuters. But I’m certainly a poster child for how to live carless.

The key has always been living in a city with walkable neighborhoods and good public transportation, but the emergence of Zipcar has certainly aided this cause. (Zip is an entirely automated, short term rental car service that garages cars in convenient city locations.) Although my preference is always to take public transpo, if I need a car for a short hop, I do Zip. In the past year, I’ve used Zip to pick up my Christmas tree; get my niece home from her commuting-challenged suburban high school; meet with clients; have dinner with friends; and fetch a coleus, impatiens, and mulch to spruce up our front “garden.” (Too bad the impatiens, which was a bit water logged to begin with, got doused by a major thunder-boomer shortly after I planted them. Should have lasted through October, but sadly all gone…)

Great as Zipcar is, I don’t think I’ll see death to car ownership in my lifetime.

Kinsley also published a comment from a reader that did not quite enter into the spirit of the futurama discussion:

Another says: “It could be that Mr. Kinsley will be completely discredited as a polemicist of any note whose ideas and questions for discussion will be forever ridiculed.” I wish I could predict that in 20 years, rudeness on the Internet will be considered just as impolite as rudeness to someone’s face. But I doubt it.

Which raises an issue that is a complete bugbear to me: nasty, mostly anonymous comments on news sites and blogs.

While I don’t get tons of comments, I have noted over the years that, when I am posting about something that’s in the news and somewhat controversial, I do attract more short-terms readers. And comments. Invariably, the ones that go on the attack tend to be unsigned. I can understand why someone might not want their full name attached to a comment, but to not even come up with a handle?

But the real problem is not the ad hominem attacks I occasionally draw. It’s the level of discourse (if that’s the right word) in the real public idea domain.

It’s, of course, no surprise that the greater the anonymity of the commenters, the far greater propensity of the comment to be negative, scurrilous, and cretinous. What is so surprising is that so many chose this (cowardly) approach.

Most commenters to articles that appear in The New York Times are “signed” with real names and are, thus, more like little (and sometimes not so little) letters to the editor, only with the ability to do point-counterpoint. I’m not saying that these comments are always devoid of negativity, but there is a general level of welcome civility in the tone and word choice, even when people disagree vehemently with the article or one of their fellow commenters. Just thinking about the comments to NYT articles makes me think I really should subscribe online, rather than just keep on cadging the 10 free articles a month I’m allotted.

Comments on boston.com (The Boston Globe online), on the other hand, use pen or, rather, screed names. Some use their real names, but most use a handle. I’d say that, depending on the topic, the comments to articles in the political-social realm are typically at least half (and this is multiple choice): racist, homophobic, anti-feminist, anti-Obama, and willing to characterize the “other side” as lacking in decency, patriotism, intelligence, and moral fiber. (In this universe, everyone’s a wingnut or a moonbat, and I will note that the local commentary seems to attract more wingnuts than moonbats.) Oh, yes, and as often as not off-topic.

So many of them froth on about how Massachusetts is the worst place in the world to live, that I find myself gathering rebuttal points (education, health, wealth, divorce rate, gun deaths…) that I want to just package up and put in a signed comment pointing out that this really is, cost of living aside, a pretty good place to live. (While grinding my teeth and really wanting to write, ‘If it’s so awful here, why don’t you just pack up and move to Mississippi. And don’t let the door hit your arse on the way out, you moron.)

With Kinsley, I have my doubts about whether commenters will become less rude over time.

Maybe it’s good to have the anonymous commenting world out there to drain some of the tension and venom out of “the system.”

Still, I wish that the Boston Globe would put in place a commenting system that was more like that of The New York Times, where, comparatively speaking and absolutely, civility, perspective and intelligence reign. If they wanted to preserve what they have now, boston.com could keep it in place. Just run the signed commentary in parallel. Signed commenters could post on either side, and those who wish or need for whatever reason to remain anonymous could register with their real name, but with the ability to post as pseudonymous commenter on the signed side. This would be like the letters to the editor used to have “name held on request.”

But let the frothing, mean-spirited, crazed and moronic venom spewers go at it in their own space.

I’m sure I’d be tempted to make an occasional foray over into the muck pit – it’s just way too alluring – but the world would be a better place if, when people made their points, they did so knowing that they their name was going to be associated with it.