A number of years ago, I was at a conference in Dallas. Since I didn’t like the food that was being served at the conference, I left the banquet hall and headed for the W House which was a restaurant at my hotel.

As I was listening to the daily specials, I couldn’t help but notice that my waitress had a heavy southern accent. When it came time to order, she asked me if I wanted a salad or a vegetable. I asked her what the vegetable was and she said “Bains”. “Bains” wasn’t registering with me and knowing that people in the south sometimes eats unusual vegetables I asked if “bains” were anything like okra.  She put her hands on her hips and said “grain bains”. Oh, green beans. I opted for the salad.

As I was unwrapping my silverware, I accidentally dropped some on the floor. Reaching down, I picked them up and wiped them off with my napkin.

When my food arrived, the waitress set the food down on the table. Looking me in the eyes she said “Do you need another fock?” “excuse me?” I said. She repeated “A fock. Do you need another fock?”

Now, this is the kind of conversation that I would have expected in Nevada but not in Texas. I told her that she must be confusing me with someone else. Somewhat frustrated she said “A fock. Do you need a clean fock?” Reaching down she picked up my fork and said “Do you need another one?” Oh a fork. At this point in time I was too embarrassed to ask for anything and told her that my fork was just fine.

Lansing likes to clump similar stores together. For example, in one block they have a Burger King, a McDonalds and an Arby’s with a Rally Burger and an A&W across the street. So, if you are hungry and want fast food, you head for this area. You can decide what you want once you get there.

This clumping seems to also hold true for auto parts stores. There are two auto parts store right next to each other and a third across the street. Talk about competition.

Now I can understand this closeness with fast food places. You have a choice between a Whooper, a Big Mac or a roast beef but not so with auto parts.  Delco, Champion, AC, all of the stores are going to carry them.  And if they are going to be competitive, they are all going to be about the same price.  I can’t see a shopper saying “5.95?  I think Ill check next door.”

Furthermore, they are all going to carry a similar inventory.  Oil filters for late model cars? No problem.    However, a water pump for a 68 Buick might be a little harder to find.  And, if they haven’t got the part that you need, they are going to order it for you.  None of them  are going to say “Sorry, we don’t have that part in stock.  Why don’t you try next door.”  Of course, chances are slim that the store next door will have the part that you need so you might as well just order the part and be done with it.

So, why are there so many auto parts stores so close to each other?  Location, location, location.  Since these stores are all fairly new and since they are all in an old industrial neighborhood, I am going to guess that land was cheap and zoned right.  But, I’ll bet that when they were looking at the land, they didn’t know that two other auto parts stores were also looking at that area.   And I doubt that the owner of the land pointed that fact out to them.

Unless there is a real run on auto parts, I am going to guess that one if not all of the stores, will close in the next 6 months.  Sad.  More unemployment for an already poor economy.

A few months back, I noticed a man sitting in our waiting area at the entrance to the directors office. He was reading a magazine so I assumed that he was waiting to meet with the director. The director wasn’t in at the time but I figured that he would be returning soon.

A half hour later, I noticed that the man was still sitting there reading the magazines. Thinking that perhaps the director was detain elsewhere, I asked if he was waiting to meet with the director. He said no, that he just needed to get out of the office for a while and we had a good selection of magazines.

What’s next? Is he going to help himself to the coffee too?

I pointed this matter out to the office secretary and she asked the man to kindly leave. We no longer have magazines in our waiting area.

I was at the local Ford dealership this week. They have an Enterprise car rental office there and I needed to rent a car for a few days as mine needed to go into the body shop. I noticed that they had 2 brand new 2006 Shelby Cobras sitting on the lot.

Just in case you have never heard of a Shelby Cobra, the Shelby Cobra is a Ford Mustang that has been re-engineered by automotive legend Carrol Shelby. It is a limited addition Mustang and the 2006 is the latest release.

Since it is a limited addition Mustang and since there are some gearheads who would pay anything to own one, the dealership is selling the 2 that they have for $20,000 ABOVE list.

The car boasts of a 455 hp 427 cu in turbocharged V8. They don’t mention what the gas mileage is but I guessing that if you can afford to shell out $70,000 to buy one of these, gas mileage is not a concern.

I had thought about asking for a test drive but I am betting that they will take one look at my Honda Accord and say no.

Usually late Saturday afternoons, I go to the local video store and pick up a couple of videos for the weekend. With my video review guide in hand, I move through the movies alphabetically.

Several month ago when I looking for a couple of videos, a blond skinny 30 something store worker came rushing up to me, introduced herself and asked if she could help me. I thanked her for asking and told her that I was just fine. But, she continued to “hang” with me making small talk about videos.

Overly friendly women, whom I don’t know, make me nervous as I am never sure of their intent. I found her giddy demeanor to be unsettling and when I checked her left hand, I noticed the absence of a wedding ring.

Now, I realize that the absence of a wedding ring doesn’t mean she isn’t married. But, the presence of one is a pretty good indicator that she is married or at least not interested in finding a man.

The other day, I had to drop off a couple of videos. As I pulled into the parking lot, I noticed her standing outside the building smoking. Now, I haven’t seen this woman since my first encounter several months ago so I was surprised when she said “Hi Ned!” and waved frantically as she came running towards me. Her face was radiant as if she were meeting her lover. We engaged in some small talk as I dropped the videos in the return slot. Then I hopped back in the car and left.

Bad vibes. I never told her my name during the first meeting so she must have looked it up on my video account. More to the point, she remembered it after all these months. Fortunately, I don’t see her regularly in the store so I don’t think she will be a problem. I have no idea what her name is.

We were visiting our future church last Sunday and were very moved by the acts of benevolence that they demonstrated.

It seems that one of the families that attends that church was in a desperate situation with their house. The foundation had given way and the house was literally breaking up. Plus, they had a special needs child.

The church had been working with the family for several months to try to resolve their housing problems. Finally, they concluded that the best thing to do was to abandon the existing house and build the family a new house.

Someone from the church made a $40,000 donation towards the project. The church in turn asked members of the congregation to donate $10. Since there were about 4,000 members, they easily raised another $40,000. Plus, they asked for volunteer laborers to work on the house when it came time to build. All and all, it was a very moving event.

Then I look at the church that I presently attend. It would be easier to get blood out of a turnip than a dollar out of the decons. They seem to have an aversion towards helping anyone. While I realize that they can’t give money to everyone, I also know that if the congregation were aware of these needs, they would be willing to help. Unfortunately, the decons do not make any of these needs known. Instead, they focus on accounting procedures and practices.

A few years back, one of the families in the church that I presently attend had a major set back. Dad, who was their only source of income, abandoned his wife and 4 preteen daughters.

The family applied for and were receiving welfare, but there was no child support as dad had fled the country. In short, their financial needs exceeded their income. Soon, bills started piling up and utilities were being shut off.

The house that they lived in was old and at the lower end of the housing market in the area so finding a different house was not really an option.

Since the decons were not bring the needs of this family to the congregation, I was concerned that nothing was being done and that they were going to loose their house. I expressed my concerns to the minister and he just smiled and said not to worry, the decons would never let the family loose their house. Well guess what, the family lost their house.

A few months later, the church, under the guide lines of the decons, started a fund drive to renovate the church. Pews were recovered, carpet was replaced and a small fortune was spent on oak lumber.

Now, don’t get me wrong, the church did need to be renovated and the church does look nice, but they went to extremes with the oak lumber. To make matters worse, they used the churches cash surplus to pay off the low interest renovation loan 5 years early.

So, what can I say? The decons managed to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars to renovate the church but couldn’t float a $50,000 loan to save the house of a family.

Every time that I look at all the quarter sawn  oak, I think of the family that lost their house. Sad.

Ministers come and ministers go but it is the people who make up the church.

I was watching one of those nature shows on TV the other night. The topic was the Grand Canyon. The commentator stated that it took the slow moving river millions of years to wear away at the rocks and create the canyon as we see it today.

I thought “millions of years”. He must be from the old earth school.

Later in the program, they showed a 10 minute rain storm in the canyon. The commentator stated that a single 10 minute rain storm could age the canyon by a thousand years.

Now wait a minute, you can’t have it both ways. If you are telling me that a 10 minute rain storm can age the canyon by a thousand years, then I am not willing to believe that it took millions of years to create the canyon. While rain storms are not a common event out there, they do occur several times a year. And if you have a 10 minute rain storm once a year for the next 1000 years, the canyon would have aged a million years in only a thousand years.

And what other natural events could occur which would accelerate the aging of the canyon? Hail? Sand storms? Tornado’s? It seems to me that there are more variables to the aging of the canyon than just water flowing through it.

Do you think that the commentator actually understands his contradictions? Probably not. He is just another pretty face with a good voice.

Every time that I have been in the cafeteria this week, I have noticed that the new grill cook is missing.  I suspect that he either quit or was dismissed.  He only lasted 2 weeks.  In his place is the woman who was his self appointed supervisor.

I feel sorry for any one who has to work with this woman.  She is a total control freak.   I gather that she used to be the grill cook but that she got promoted.  Maybe she will come to the realization that unless she wants to be the grill cook forever, she needs to lighten up.  I suspect this is why she has never been married.

Working in a geek environment at the state, I encounter a lot of very strange people.  Some are very shy and avoid eye contact at any cost.  One guy, whom I have nicknamed “the crab man”  walks sideways with his face to the wall.  I tried walking like that once and started experiencing motion sickness after only a few feet.

Some are outwardly aggressive, “in your face” type of individuals and interesting enough, they all are women.  They go out of their way to defy any sort of  rules or social norms.  They are the ones who will take the last cup of coffee and not make another pot proclaiming that some one else can make the next pot of coffee.  Of course, they are also the ones who can be heard cussing a blue streak because no one made any coffee.

But for the most part, the rest of the geeks opt for passive aggressive behavior.  One of their favorite tactics is to select “reply to all” when they respond to any email regardless of the content.  And in doing so, they not only reply to the sender but also to everyone else who may have received the email.  This, of course, creates more email for the staff to deal with.

For some reason, these people seem to take great pleasure in annoying their co-workers.  But, I guess it is better than going postal.

One advantage of being a philosophy major is that I can confound the easily confused, namely, the management. The whole time change thing is a classic example of management at its best.

For some reason, the management thought that since daylight savings time kicked in at 2AM, we should change the clocks on the telephone systems at 2AM. They had this perception that there were actually people working at 2Am who were going to be lost if the time on their telephone wasn’t change at 2AM.

In reality, anyone who is working at 2AM on a Sunday morning isn’t going to care that the time on their phone is off because either they have bigger problems to deal with or they are too low on the food chain to have a telephone with a display. Therefore, it would be OK to wait until morning to do the time change. Besides, it will be at least a week before the clocks on the walls get changed.

But, management being management, they insist that 2AM is the magic time to change the time. In protest, I point out that since we are springing ahead one hour, 2AM would never exist. Instead, we jump from 1:59:59 to 3:00:00 thus springing ahead one hour. There is no 2AM.

If 2Am doesn’t exist, how can the clocks be changed at 2AM? Judging by the expressions on their faces, I have just short circuited their brains. This is just like in the sci-fi movies where the killer robots are shut down by just such a question.

In a state of total confusion, the management starts mumbling incoherently, their body movements become erratic and take on a spastic disposition. “That does not compute”.

With Gantt charts in a total state of disarray, the management mumbles that 9AM would be fine. Defeated, they head back to their service pod.

I can’t wait until we “fall back”. I will then tell them that while there is a 2AM, there are also 2 one AMs! Dilbert would be proud.