How sick are we?

As I was flipping around the channels Monday night, I watched a show called Intervention. Then there was another show called Hoarders. The Intervention show is about drug addicts and alcoholics. The Hoarders show is about mentally ill people who fill their houses with trash and usually have insect and rodent problems.

What I found to be the most disturbing was that the American people are being entertained by the misery of others. The producers of these shows are raking in the dough by exploiting the mentally ill.

Are the truly mentally ill the ones who tune into these shows every week?

Poor Little Sandy Bullock

It is hard to feel sad for someone who walks through a barn full of cattle, barefoot and that is just what Sandra Bullock did. She likes "Bad Boys" just like so many of her American sisters. She marries a guy who can't keep his pants zipped and then is surprised when he can't keep his pants zipped.

Did anyone think that this may just be Sandy's fault. She couldn't keep her man because it appears he doesn't like skin that hasn't been run through an inkjet. Sandy is not a scag and therein lies the problem.

Don't Use Your Cell for Business

30% of American workers are self employed or freelance. It is a wonderful life working when you want and where you want. The downside is that you must constantly keep an eye and an ear open for new opportunities and you can’t shut off your phone Friday at five. The internet doesn’t sleep and many customers don’t believe you should either.

I asked Google for a Voice number. It is the # on all of my business handouts. Actually it is the number I use for everyone except family and friends.

Who gets my email account when I die?

Have you updated your will? I finally got around to it, not that anything major had changed. I’ve known for a long time that I had to specifically include my ‘digital assets” in my last testament. Who did I want reading my emails, my documents, my ideas and the book I started but never finished?

There is no pot of gold in my letters, notes, and emails, but I don’t want there to be a question of whose property they become, and I consider my email and docs personal. I have even thought of letting most of my information die in one of Google’s server farms. I’ve had to think long and hard about my virtual property, Have you?

10 ways you know that your website sucks

1) Your "bounce rate" is 101%.
2) People cook dinner while your site loads.
3) Your copyright says 2007.
4) It only loads in Explorer.
5) Your website was designed by "Flash Jimmy".
6) Your meta description says "I need money"
7) All of your outbound links take customers off-site.
8) Your competitors use your site as a "what not to do".
9) You made your logo from Clipart.
10) Google refuses to put AdWords on your site.

Unprepared for the inevitable

Our world is governed by natural laws. A world without pain would be a world which worked according to special laws, rather than the laws of physics. Good comes out of evil and suffering. Without earthquakes there would be no mountains, without volcanic eruptions there would be no planetary atmospheres.

A good case study is comparing the recent magnitude 8.8 earthquake in Chile, with the magnitude 7.0 quake in Haiti. Because of Haiti's poverty, political struggles, and lack of a building code, the country was brought to its knees. Human fallibility was responsible for much this disaster. Chile on the other hand, spent much more time and money preparing for a quake. The one they endured was 500 times more powerful than the Haiti Earthquake and yet the country came through mostly in one piece.

What is the one common denominator in all disasters?

Unpreparedness for the inevitable.

USA & Britain could have their credit ratings lowered.

The American and UK governments should ask their citizens what happens when your credit rating drops. We could tell them that our loans will cost us substantially more and usually money that we can't afford.

According to Moody’s Investors Service the U.S. and the U.K. have moved “substantially” closer to losing their AAA credit ratings as the cost of servicing their debt rose.

Pierre Cailleteau, managing director of sovereign risk at Moody’s in London, said in a telephone interview that the governments of these two economies must balance bringing down their debt burdens without damaging growth by removing fiscal stimulus too quickly .

Cailleteau said “we expect the situation to further deteriorate in terms of the key ratings metrics before they start stabilizing.” “This story is not going to stop at the end of the year. There is inertia in the deterioration of credit metrics.”

The U.S. could pay about 15 percent of revenue in interest payments. More than the 14 percent limit that would lead to a downgrade to AA.

Public Education is Dead

A teacher asked my niece in a stern voice "Don't you want to know about the clouds?" My niece replied that if she wanted to know about the clouds she would look it up on the Internet. She was right. A good majority of the school children know they can find general knowledge on the net. After learning reading, writing and basic arithmetic, what is the real reason to stay and learn to appreciate literature, or understand why the Founding Fathers felt oppressed?

I was curious for the longest time on why kids were dropping out of school in droves. It was explained to me that they see no value in school after learning the basics. The students who want to go to college of course will stay in school, but sadly the ones who don't will use their smartphone to get through life.

What do you mean you don't use email?

My doctor is great. He takes his time with his patients. My medication for blood pressure needed to be increased. He told me to let him know if I noticed any changes. I told him I would email him if I had a problem. "I don't have email". I know the look on my face was one of awe. "Just give my nurse a call."

So.... I leave a message with the receptionist so she can tell the doctor my message. I have played telephone before and the message was never quite the same as the one I left.

Am I the crazy one thinking an email is more economical and safer?