Failing Down on the Job: Blogging this summer

I’ve pretty busy trying to figure out my long term plan in life. It’s complicated – not so much in what I perceive is the needed path to follow – but in trying to fit my close relatives into that picture. To be totally frank, it does not look good for them.

(We) just got a 20% pay cut on the delivery routes we’ve done for 4 years, this time. (All together over a decade of service to that cause.)

The company, Lee Enterprises, somehow thinks it is a good practice to leave completely out of the picture those most affected by their bottom-line alterations. Lacking the class, or business sense, to at least bring in the carriers that will remain behind to craft a better operation and working relationship. I understand how hard the print media has been hit – but it seems they never learn how to run a more effective and efficient operation.

Meanwhile, my family refuses logic or long-term thinking. They still sit in foreclosure status. My aunt refuses to file for bankruptcy. Too many pets (14) and not enough assets. And I’ve made every possible attempt; and now, I must somehow get my own ideas moving forward without money or assistance from anyone of import. (So far.)

I continue to work on my baseball tome – with a completion date of November 15th of 2009. It will be (to me, anyways) a lasting work – which is why it has taken 4 years plus to research, read, write, edit, analyze, gather images, work out charts and diagrams. But I am tired of the project – in some ways. That means I need to move on to something fresh, inviting and stirring of those intellectual juices in a pot of potential. (Title: Bringin’ Gas & Dialin’ 9: A Seven Score Addiction to the National Pastime (1869-2009))

 

 

Fiction writing and a new business of some sort. I do have a fledgling idea: an online to print-on-demand press for starters, but with a twist or two.

In today’s world, your own business is the only way to keep from being at the mercy of mercinary management types that do not care as much or as often about their employees. It is fine and well established that customers are your revenues – but your employees are your potentials for innovations and future revenues. They work to put food on a table – but you must give them some security.

The Globalization of commerce put everyone in a too competitive framework – which I do know drives innovation – but it incumbent on employers to cut down the ruthlessness (and rapidity of workforce turnover) that some engage in for the sake of too oblivious wealthy stockholders.

Meanwhile, employees, you must engage in enrichment of your mind and keep your body able to roll with these punches. No free lunches. No slacking or exploiting the bosses good graces. You have to be a “mini-boss” while being flexible and likeable enough to stay a sound and savvy employee.

After that diatribe, I can say my problems have not changed significantly – but I have attempted a new attitude. I am looking for opportunities; utilizing what others toss away; taking in the best I find from people I meet, and discarding the rest (hopefully, not the person too.)

So, my blogging is way down, as I work on a book, trying to read and think up a new business plan, where I might have to live, and the adventure and pleasure of meeting new ideas and people behind them. My blogging energy to worry about Health Care, Erin Andrews of ESPN, the Cubs, the darfur genocide ,or a myriad of other world concerns is taxed. I can write about it – but does it really matter???

¾ Pole: The Cubs Have the Horses to Win

I recently found myself stuck with a bad car. The brakes went out shortly after the purchase of the beaten fillie. The power windows don’t work right. The engine has a lifter problem. For $500, you get this sort of vehicle. One without the horses to get you home at night.

 

The Chicago Cubs are not any of that. They are a sleek thoroughbred, a Genuine Risk, that can bring it home in the derby.

 

Surprisingly, they are a team with more ways to beat you than just the usual bang-it-over-the-fence mashers they implemented from 1998-2005.

 

They employ on-base expertise in actually racking up walks and long pitch counts. They can string together hits, get the merry-go-round of 1^st and 3^rd going steady while keeping pitchers in the stretch and managers harried and annoyed. The top 3 pitchers of Zambrano, Dempster and Harden, can turn in a gem, or fight for 6-7 innings while allowing 3 or less tallies. The bullpen of Samardzija, Marmol and Wood are The New Nasty Boys of Lou’s Crew. Even centerfield, with Jim Edmonds and Reed Johnson platooning, has become a strength, unlike years of plodding by disappointing colts and overused sires.

 

This all came at a significant price tag – as the Cubs spent freely $350 million on the cusp of the ball team’s billion dollar sale – but it spent wisely, and acquired well. GM Jim Hendry, know best for fleecing the 2003 Pirates and the frustrating lack of moves in 2004-2006 seasons, has either become wiser or just leveraged the cash spent to put a quality product and team on the field. Hendry’s horses have finally turned in times worthy of Triple Crown contention.

 

But at the ¾ pole, teams are faced with either pulling away while others bite the dust, or fading down the stretch, to finish 2^nd, or out of the money.

 

Realistically, no one could blame a fan for doubt. 100 years of yearning and learning that the Cubs have their own curses of black cats, drunk goats and grabby Bartmans teaches you frustration that only a Cub fan has the history buttressing his/her point of view.

 

But this team has the horses.

 

The Secretariats, the Bold Rulers, the Affirms and the Citations of the horseracing world are the benchmarks of success.

 

 

This 2008 Chicago Cubs team has ample talent to be the frontrunner in the post season. In a race of eight teams, they may be the ones that set the pace, drives the turn and shows superior instincts in the final leg of the season and post-season.

 

 

A World Series takes these horses to new heights in Cubs lore. A win to the pinnacle of the franchise’s history.

 

It’s early still, but this observer staked these fillies to a Spectacular Bid.

 

Go Cubs Go!

 

 

Blog Post Screw Ups: So this is the makeup???

Getting Drunk on Wall Street??? Find me a hooker(while your at it), will ya?

I had a wonderful post going on the Drunkiness on Wall Street with Prez Bush quoted as saying to his political cronies, “Wall Street got Drunk.” I talked about Anheuser-Busch being bought by InBev, with 2 beer companies now owning more than 50% of the drunk market. (SABMiller is the other big one…case you didn’t drink them in.) The fact another Bushite, Republican FCC commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate, casted the deciding vote on the merger of XM and Sirius, thus eliminating competition, what little there is, in the digital radio market. And my Chicago Cubs eliminated a part-owner of the BREW CREW from contending for the ownership of those Cubs.

So it went. I had snappy lines and wit and charm. Leo…through and through. Yet, I refused or ignorately allowed myself to forget to save the post as I worked. As a result, one cut-and-paste later, my post disappeared before my eyes. Stupid blog-ger!!!

So I have this video addition:

The Duke Spirit performing The Step And The Walk. Sorta reminds me of Jefferson Airplane’s Somebody to Love. (This Song Clip from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas)

So that’s it. The next post will be more lucid and likely have a point….