Don't you just long for some good old fashioned common sense? I know I do. What happened to common sense? Did we loose it, has the pollution mutated it out of our bodies?

There was a time, that if it made sense and solved the problem, that was the way it was done. If something wasn't broken, you didn't mess with it. Now people and corporations want to think outside the box. 'What happens if.............?' 'Would it work better if we did...............? For instance, downsizing. Whose bright idea was that? Downsizing can be good, if you are cutting the deadwood, eliminating duplication of effort. But what if you just want to move jobs from one area to another, effectively putting some highly qualified individuals out of work and moving jobs to an area where there are not any highly qualified individuals currently employed.

Okay, you say, how about relocating to the new area. Well that might work for some but not for all.

But I digress. There is no common sense about downsizing. Effective April, (maybe May) 2010, I will be downsized. My job will be moved elsewhere. Why? Don't really know. They claim that they can do it faster, better and cheaper in the home office. I wish them luck, they will have do it without me.

Downsizing - Good, Bad & Ugly

You may ask what the difference is between Bad and Ugly and there is no Good in being downsized.
Well, the difference is in how it is done. Most of the downsizing is handled in the Bad to Ugly manner. The worst is showing up and the doors are locked and you have no where to turn and no one to ask questions. Next is they tell you they are going to downsize and they don't give you a timeline. That is what I am going through now. They told us last May that they would be transitioning our jobs to Rochester but didn't know exactly when. Some have bailed already, others are holding pat. I am one of those. Not from some miss guided hope that they will change their minds but because at my age, I don't know if I want to continue to work full time and from the perverse pleasure it gives me in taking every dollar I can from them.

The last time I was downsized was back in 1992. They told us they were going back to their core business strategy and our part of the business wasn't it. Those individuals who fit in other areas were offered jobs fairly quickly. If you weren't one of them, you pretty much knew you were going to be let go. When it came time for our section to be downsized, we were given a date and told what our severance package was going to be. We were even given the opportunity to buy some of our equipment. After all it wasn't going to be used anymore.

I consider that the best of the bad ways to be downsized. They were upfront, provided timelines and kept to them. It was tough but at least it was relatively painless.

This current downsizing will be drawn out, painful and will not make any new friends for the company in Rochester. It has been intimated that we might be offered jobs there but I would never feel comfortable working for a company that had already stabbed me in the back once. Who knows when they might do it again.

I will survive, God will see me through this trial as he did the last one.

Insanity

Have we all lost our collective minds???? Everyone agrees that the current health care system is flawed. We all know that special interest groups are doing everything to keep the status quo. But to resort to wearing guns, screaming matches in which nothing is heard or discussed. Come on. We currently have a federally run medical program, Medicare. My mother is covered under this plan along with retiree medical coverage from my father's place of employment. However, Medicare is her primary coverage. Over the last year she has had surgery to remove a cancerous tumor from her bladder and a visit to the emergency room for 8 stitches in her head when she fell at home. She saw her own physician, was treated at the hospital nearest her home and has received excellent care.

Is Medicare perfect? Of course not. But right now it is better than some of the private insurance plans offered by employers.

Some of the problem is the fact that alot of people without insurance go to the emergency room for routine medical care. Emergency rooms are more expensive to run and therefore the bills are higher because they are to be used for emergencies. In many cases these individuals are seen but cannot pay so the cost is passed on to the paying public through higher fees which are paid by the insurance companies which in turn pass the increase on to the employers or to the taxpayers.

A Medicare -like plan for everyone as an option to those already in existence may be the answer if people would just stop and think for themselves instead of being lead around like so many sheep to slaughter. It would also be used as a last resort when no other insurance can be purchased.

Our enemies will not have to attack us from without; we are destroying ourselves from within.

No doubt we all remember those sayings from our childhood: Look before you Leap, Don't bite off more than you can chew, Stop chewing your cabbage twice, etc. etc. They were meant to teach how to be cautious. Not to take on too much because it would only lead to disaster.

Well apparently our elected officials never got that message. Both at the Federal, State and Local level our elected politicians are trying to fix everything and in the process not only not fixing anything but making matters worse. What is wrong with picking something that can be fixed fairly easily, that is a relative term, fixing it and then moving on to the next item. Is it so wrong to be known for doing something right and as promised rather than doing everything wrong and not living up to any promise?

Right now all of our elected officials are running around like frightened chickens pecking at everything they see without really accomplishing anything. Everytime someone criticizes them for not looking over there, they run over there and peck at it until someone else cries foul and then they run to that problem and peck at that one for a while. Nothing ever gets completed, except maybe now the Dash stadium, and no one is happy, except for Billy Prim.

A lot of our problems are critical. My feeling is you fix the infrastructure first, roads, schools, fire, police. After that you look at what is left. Fixing the roads, building new or refurbishing the old schools will create jobs. Paying our teachers, police and firemen a decent wage will hopefully encourage qualified individuals to apply for positions in those fields.

Perhaps I am coming from a different time when priorities began at home and not elsewhere. You took care of your own and then you helped strangers. Funny but it worked back then. You would think with all the technology and advances that have come about since then, it would work even better now.

Perhaps it's because we have changed. We no longer look after our own but ourselves. We no longer care what happens to our extended families, our neighbors but ourselves. I will get mine first and after that it is everyone for himself.

How sad.

Conspiracy Theories

I have been watching the History Channel and their program on our founding fathers and free masonry.

I cannot believe the number of conspiracy theories that have arisen over the years regarding how the Free Masons have a plot to install a new order in the USA. Hey, if they can reduce spending, raise the morale and morals of our politicians and put us back on the road to being the great nation we really are, I don't care.

The Democrats control the White House and both parts of Congress and still cannot get anything done. The Republicans are too busy with extra-curricular activities and whining about how no one listens to them.

My God is this what we have become?????!!!!! What happened to the Nation of Jefferson, Lincoln, Roosevelt. The Best and the Brightest? Sounds more like a bunch of middle schoolers on the playground.

We are supposed to be adults leading the greatest nation in the world. When will we start acting like it again? We are not children, we know what must be done and we know that it is not going to be easy. Let us stop seeing Commies around every corner and read conspiracy into every secret organization.

Have we finally lost every shred of common sense that ever existed? I sincerely hope not. If we have we are surely doomed.

Spontaneous

Our lives are regimented. We go to work, come home, eat, take care of whatever at home, sleep and start the routine all over again the next day. The weekends are even worse. The truly bad part is we are starting our kids on this even earlier.

When I was young, around the time the earth cooled, kids were kids. The summers were for having fun. We played outside, (video games weren't even thought of). The only time we watched TV was when it was raining and we couldn't go outside. We played from dawn to dusk. We didn't go to camps to learn to do stuff. That was what school was for.

But as adults our lives are structured by work, outside committments and the daily grind of living. We have forgotten how to be spontaneous. To say you will do something without thinking about it just because it sounds like fun. To step outside the everyday and do something without planning it for months in advance.

Granted it could go wrong. But that is part of being spontaneous. You really aren't sure how it is going to pan out but you're going to do it anyway. Now I am not talking about doing anything really dangerous. But saying you'll go to the beach with a friend who really wants to but can't find anyone else to go with. Or taking a class on beading just because you've always wondered what it would be like.

4th of July and Patriotism

Tomorrow is the 4th of July and day to celebrate our freedom from the tyranny of British rule. Yet we are still in the throes of another type of tyranny. We cannot seem to free ourselves from the tyranny of hatred. Hatred for those who look differently, who believe differently. We have not yet freed ourselves from the tyranny of fear. Fear of thought to be unpatriotic. Those to cloak themselves in the flag are not always being patriotic. They just want to make others feel that they are not.

I believe that I am patriotic. I love my country and support the men and women who fight to protect her. But being patriotic is not limited to the 4th of July, Memorial Day, September 11, December 7 and the IMPORTANT days of the year. Being patriotic is supporting our troops everyday of the year as they are fighting for us everyday of the year. It supporting organizations like the USO and the various veterans organizations who provide services for those who have fought and those who are fighting still.

My father fought in WWII and I have friends who have fought in Vietnam and Desert Storm, etc. Thankfully they all returned whole in body but changed in mind and spirit. We need to support them in any way we can. We need to let them know that the ideals they are fighting to establish elsewhere in the world are still strong at home.