OMG! Mom is using a cell phone! Everybody panic!!

I just read another article about how the world is coming to the end. This time it is due to, horrors, moms using a cell phone while with their children! Oh no, cell phones are harming children! 10 years ago it was the internet, 30 years ago it was TV, 50 years ago it was rock & roll, 70 years ago it was radio -- I can probably go on to the electric light or the wagon trains to the west. Every time something new comes along, experts "panic" and explain in great detail how these new devices will spell the end of civilization as we know it as bad parents raise monster children. This has been going on for over a century. Yet somehow, most of these children survive to become productive adults.

One expert worries that increased cell phone usage is leading to speech delays in children. Well delays happen no matter what. In the early 1970s, my youngest brother barely spoke until he was 4 -- he was fine, he just had nothing to say. My eldest child was speech delayed, but that was because he had a hearing problem that wasn't evident until he got a little older. Our 3 year old daughter, in comparison, is a chatterbox (at least around us, she can be a little shy around strangers). I would not "blame" any of these instances on our using/not using a cell phone while with the children (especially for my brother as those devices didn't exist back then, at least in the average home) -- it's just the way things were with these individuals.

How is answering a few emails or texting in the evening different then calling a friend or relative on the phone, which is what my parents did in the evening? The article notes that parents are so busy on cell phones in cares they rarely talk to their children. I rarely talk to my children in the car, mostly because I like to concentrate on driving (silly me....). I'm kind of funny about paying attention to the road when I'm driving a several ton weapon at high speeds, does that make me a bad parent? According to the article, it might. Guess what, kids are going to hurt their foot on the slide, for example, whether you are on the phone, talking to another mother or paying complete attention -- it is part of being a child.

I'm tired of being guilted by "experts" for wanting a little me time. Do any of these experts remember what it is like to care for a small child? It is seconds of fun and excitement surrounded by mundane boredom. Watching Dora the Explorer for the umpteenth time is quite painful unless you have something to distract you, be it a book, a cell phone or laptop so I can surf the net or blog (yay for wifi!). It sounds cruel, not devoting every second to your child, but parents need to stay sane. At the moment, both my children are playing by themselves, if not in visual range, at least in earshot, using their imaginations as they play. They don't need me to interrupt them at the moment as they learn things for themselves.

My wife and I are not heavy cell phone users, using them mostly for seeing where the other one is when we need to meet up or to let the other know we'll be home late from work, so I don't know first hand whether the phone usage leads to an 80 percent more likely chance for children to have emotional, social and behavioral problems, including hyperactivity as the article suggests. But children have been hyperactive forever (and they weren't treated for it). If so, how do they explain my younger brother's hyperactivity in the 1970s, decades before cell phone usage became common? Some children are just energizer bunnies, they keep going and going and going and going .... Knowing a few parents with out of control children, I'd guess that it is more likely the cell phone is just a symptom and the parent would've been lax in correcting their child's behavior anyway.

By the way, as a victim of long car trips down to Florida from NYC every summer as a child, I am very much in favor of electronic toys to distract the children. Those trips were incredibly boring, those games like looking at license plates and signs only work so long, and I would have loved to have the toys my children have now. I or my wife may not know every little detail in our children's lives, but I recall my parents not knowing everything going on in the lives of my brothers and sister. But as both my children are generally well behaved, are respectful and listen to my wife and I, I figure we're doing something right. If not paying strict attention to our children at all times like a prison guard makes us bad parents, well, I know plenty of "bad" parents with great children to hang out with.

Great another lightweight

She is 43 years old, has tried marijuana, eats moose burgers and has a husband who works for BP (the oil company). Let's give it up for Sarah Palin! What is it with the GOP and placing unqualified lightweights at the top (or second from the top) of the ticket when there have got to be better choices? Is the GOP trying to say that a first YEAR governor, Sarah Palin (R-Alaska) of a state with 600,000 people in it, is the best Republican available for the vice presidency? Boy, that says a lot about the qualifications, or lack thereof, of every other Republican.

Dan Qualyle, George W Bush (say what you want but the party leaders, and not the people, chose a governor of a state where the legislature doesn't even meet every year, over McCain in '00) and now Palin. In each case the GOP could've chosen more wisely. After the last 8 years, I want qualified people in both the 1 and 2 slots (and yes, though I disagree with him, I think Cheney was qualified to be President).

Regardless of your political view, you have to agree this does take away McCain's inexperience/age argument against Obama. McCain has been saying Obama is too inexperienced and now he picks someone who is even more inexperienced, and with fewer accomplishments than Obama, for his vice-president. Before becoming governor she was a city council member and then the mayor of a community of under 9,000 people from 1992 to 2002 and then served as a statewide commissioner on an Oil and Gas Conservation Commission. That's it? My god, that just described quite a few mayors in New Jersey. I can't understand why the GOP would take an opponent's relative inexperiece and make him look like a senior statesman by picking someone with even more inexperience (aside from going to least damage to the ticket -- other candidates like Romney would've brought baggage).

Maybe Palin is qualified, I don't know much about her, but what I do know bothers me. Alaska is not the rest of the country. She has been governor of a wide spread state with fairly few people for only a year; that is not the same as being a Senator, both state and US, from a populous state. While she may have done much good, and has the potential to do more, she just does not have the experience at this time to run the country. Say what you will about Sen. Biden, he is qualified to lead the country if something were to happen to a President Obama. I don't have the same confidence about a potential President Palin. Add in Obama's relative inexperience and McCain's age and all I see it that the GOP really blew it by picking another pretty face without much gravity.

Just goes to show that the GOP is all about being elected while the Democrats actually care about leading the country. Now they are picking a vice president based not on her qualifications, but because most potential GOP voters do not hate her? I may not agree with the other potential VP candidates but at least I felt they had the experience that is qualified to run the country in case something happened to a President McCain. While raising a family of 5 for the last 2 decades gives great life experience, it does not give governing experience. By picking a half-term governor from one of the smallest, and least populated states in the country, the GOP has made a half-term US senator from one of the more populated states in America look much experienced.

Palin may have excellent judgment and may be a good potential President. However her resume is quite thin at the moment, even thinner than Obama's. Yes she has executive experience, but so did George W. Bush -- and we saw how well that worked out. I have executive experience from my job, I've managed a million dollar budget for over a decade, am a board member of my temple and make decisions that affect many on a regular basis. That does not qualify me to be president.

I'm voting for judgment and by picking someone so inexperienced McCain just showed me his judgment, or at least the GOP's judgment, is thinner than I thought. The Vice President is an under study who could get the staring role at any time. We can't let the GOP place another inexperienced person in position to run the country. The GOP did this to us in 2000 by giving us George Bush over a much more qualified John McCain. We can't let them do this again.

Springtime for Hitler and Germany

I love Mel Brooks' The Producers, in which Broadway producers fail in an attempt to lose money to make money when the complete flop they finance, "Springtime for Hitler," turns out to be a hit, despite the play's trivializing of Nazi Germany. Like Hogan's Heroes, the 1960s TV comedy that took place in a Nazi POW camp, Brooks managed to to mine a horrible historical event into some funny. When done correctly, these type of programs can humor and not offend people. When done incorrectly it can invoke fear and hatred, allowing bigots to exploit their hatred.

Recently, in NYC, a Jewish Parks Department worker was offended when he walked into a break room and saw his co-workers conducting a Nazi skit. The article fails to mention whether the skit was a parody as in The Producers, or something more ignorant, such as the Black to the Future skit in Queens 10 years ago, produced by NYC police and fire department officers, that parodied a then recent dragging death of a black man. Somehow, I suspect it was the later. Interestingly, the police officers, who were initially fired by the Mayor when news of the skit made the news (and this was before the YouTube era), were initially re-instated on First Amendment grounds as they did the parody on their own time in a public place, before being fired once again as a higher court ruled that the city was able to fire them as unfit for duty due to the perception they were violating the public trust with their racist act, despite the First Amendment. Some might be tempted to defend the nazi parks department workers on the same First Amendment grounds and argue that parks department workers should not be held to the same speech standards as emergency responders.

However, this was not about free speech, it is about a hostile workplace. The employee felt threatened by his co-workers' action, making for a hostile workplace and, if the sources quoted in the article are accurate, it appears their employer, the Parks Department, agrees. If you want to dress like a Nazi, do it on your own property and on your own time, not your employer's property. Of course, if your employer is the City of NY, or some other government entity, you may have to worry about a perception of a violation of the public trust, but I suspect that racist parks department workers aren't as much a concern as racist police and fire department workers, whose job it is to protect and not harm the public. Freedom of speech applies to the government, not employers (even if they have happen to be the government). Once offensive speech crosses into the workplace, there is going to be a problem.

As to the other ignorant comments associated with the article: I would hope those posters are just trolling but I suspect not. This type of bigotry is not unique to Staten Island. It happens all over the NYC metropolitan area and not just to Jews (just ask some of your minority associates). I suspect this happens all across the country as well. The one thing they all have in common is a basic xenophobic hatred that the actors attempt to camouflage in freedom of speech. This was not a First Amendment issue; it was a hate issue, it was a bullying issue and, since the victim was forced to be transferred, it is more.

One thing for sure, the parks department workers were pretty stupid to do a Hitler parody in a break room on their employer's property. In this day and age, one would think it would be common sense for employees to know they would do best to keep their personal views to themselves. I don't know the intent of the parks department employees so I can't judge without more evidence of whether they thought they were being funny with a co-worker (for all we know it could've been an ongoing joking insult thing that got out of hand) or something more; though since the Jewish employee felt insulted enough to complain and argument can be made that it was the later (if it walks, swims and quacks like a duck it is usually a duck, even if called a dog). However, at the least, these employees really need to read the section of their employee handbook regarding tolerance.

Days are getting shorter

I got up for work the other morning and noticed something strange -- for the first time in about 4 months light wasn't streaming through the window into our bedroom. As the cool weather last week indicated, summer is coming to a close. In just a few more days the pool will close for another season and the children will be back in school (which means back to a normal rush hour, yuck).

It seems like we wait all year for these 12 short weeks here in NJ and then, before we know it, summer is gone. Already I noticed a few leaves in one of my trees changing colors and, like pumpkins growing on the farm down the road, the Halloween stores will soon be sprouting in shopping centers across town. Soon the jackets and sweaters will be pulled out of storage, I'll be hearing the cries of "I hate homework!" (my cousin's children in Maryland have already started) and I'll be leaving for work, at 6:30, in the dark again.

For now, though, it is still summer, and I get to leave for work with the sun up and somewhat mild temperatures and enjoy the peacefulness of walking to the bus stop on nice, late summer mornings. I can put off thoughts of slipping out of the house in the dark and being chilly for another month or so. For now I can still take late evening walks with my daughter and dog without a flashlight or jackets and enjoy the air. We still have the pool for a few more days. The BBQ has a full tank of gas, it's not dark when I leave for work and I'm still wearing my sunglasses. It is still summer for a few more weeks and I plan to enjoy what is left.

Your imagination is your own worst enemy

I was talking with a guy the other day who spent the day at work all freaked out that he was about to be fired. It seems that early in the morning his boss told him that the boss's boss wants to speak to the guy about performance issues later in the day. Of course the guy freaked out and imagined the worst possible scenario. Turns out it was just a "good job" type of meeting.

About 12 or 13 years ago, a guy I was friends with in my office got fired for cause. One of the reasons was he was working for his own company while working at our office. He was also recruiting our employees to work with him. About a day or two before he was fired he recruited me and I told him no and left it at that. All of the sudden he's fired and, about an hour after the news became known, my boss called me to come to his boss's office for a sudden meeting.

I remember walking there with dread, figuring this was somehow related to my friend's firing (I was aware of some of his other shenanigans and ignored them as they were minor). At the time I was going to graduate school on the company's dime and saving for my upcoming wedding & I kept thinking my friend just totally farked me. I get to the office and my whole team is there. Turns out it was just an impromptu meeting on something else entirely different and my boss wasn't even aware of my friend's firing (different department). The only thing I remember from the meeting was being very relieved.

Moral of the story: Your imagination is your own worst enemy.

Dear diary ...

I just finished reading an historical bibliography where much of the information about the person came from letters or diaries. And it got me thinking about what of ourselves we leave behind. Back in the 1970s and 1980s, when my mother's parents had retired from here in the NYC area to live in Florida and long distance calls were pretty expensive, we used to write letters quite often (both my grandfather and mother were teachers and she wanted us to get used to writing and he wanted us to get used to writing correctly; it was not uncommon for my grandfather to mark my letters up). Most of those letters have been lost to time but, recently, while shifting through some old pictures in a box, a type-written letter from my grandmother (she was a typist) fell to the floor. It was from around 1980, when I was 12. It was definitely a running correspondence as indicated by her and my grandfather's comments. I even remembered some of it. It was a blast from the past of things from my childhood I had forgotten. My grandparents are long gone now and, as happens with time, the memory of them has faded. However, that letter brought them back, much, as I suppose, the letters used in the biography I just completed bought those long dead people back to life.

Well, I haven't written a letter by hand in many years, outside of business correspondence, which is usually quite dry and, while do write emails or IMs, most of them have been lost to the cyber world. I have kept a journal on and off over the years, usually just to write my thoughts of a special occasion or to clarify something that is bothering me (I find writing to be relaxing), it is barely touched these days and even then it only contains sporadic information, nothing on my day to day thoughts. As I looked at the letter and thought of the lack of record of my life, I wondered how much of me will be forgotten by my children. However, what I do do is either write comments on articles on various websites that invite feedback, or I blog.

The blogging and entries on various websites, I do has become my defacto diary. I write about daily events going on in thee world today or, depending on what page I'm on, reminese on the past. An example is Facebook. On Facebook, I've gotten back in touch with many childhood friends I grew up with. Some of these friends have created Facebook groups based on our high school graduating class (we're having a 22nd virtual reunion at the moment) and others have created pages based on our childhood neighborhood. Recently, I responded to a question on the neighborhood page about what I remember from our youth. Talk about memories. Memories that are falling away through time. Fortunately I started keeping a diary around then and while most of it is mundane, such as whether the Mets won or what the weather was, there some interesting tidbits about places and people long lost to my past.

I grew up in Howard Beach, Queens in NYC, Howard Beach is well known for it's pizza, low crime and tolerance of all ethnicities (click on the links and you will see my sarcastic side). I grew up in the 1970s and had a great time. As I typed my response and thought of many childhood, I thought of my own children's childhoods.

I live in the suburbs now and it depresses me my children won't have the same experiences I had. We walked to our elementary school and were let out by ourselves for lunch to wander over to the shopping center across the street from our school for pizza (2 slices and a soda for $1) then head to the candy store for comics or, of course, candy or flip baseball cards in front of a blank wall that was part of the supermarket before headed back to school when lunch ended.

No one thought it was strange for 7, 8, 9 year old children to leave school for lunch. No one worried that something other then a fight might happen. Sane for after school. The bell rang and we were free to go (the teachers walked us to the exits in elementary school). No problems if you went to someone else's house after school at the spur of the moment, you just walked home.

I remember doing all this at age 8. Well my eldest is now that age and some of what we did is impossible for him to do (fewer sidewalks, longer distances, bused everywhere) or would be considered child endangerment (in my town, even children who live just blocks from the elementary school, like I do, are not allowed to walk to/from school by themselves). Children are not allowed out for lunch, not that they could go anywhere. On the plus side, it is nice having grass in the school yard in lieu of asphalt (though asphalt made it easier to play punch ball). I also like having more than a few baseball/soccer fields for the kids. But they are not going to have the joy of hitting a homerun over the main chapel of our temple onto 90th Street.

Other than that, I miss some of the smaller, unique places that no longer exist; places called the Big Bow Wow, Pizza City, Happy's Deli, the bakery where my dad used to get me a sprinkled cookie early in the morning if I accompanied him on my trike while he walked the dog there to get some coffee (and let the dog do her business on sh-- err, poop row), the Kiddie Park on Crossbay Bvld etc but those places are going away no matter where you live. In the area I live now, an old ice cream place that has been around for 50 or 60 years will close soon as the owners are ready to retire and it doesn't make financial sense for someone else to keep the place going, though I suppose my son will remember the place like I remember the places of my youth (our daughter is too young to remember). At least I still have several kosher delis to go to when the mood strikes.

I also miss the Christmas lights from my youth. In Howard Beach many of the families put up incredible, detailed displays, especially for those days. There are plenty in my current neighborhood, but the houses are further apart than in Queens so we don't get that "wow" factor you'd get riding up and down the streets in December from having so many houses so close together with their displays.

Anyway, as I typed all this into the remember page on Facebook, I realized these blog entries are my diary. It is where I write my thoughts on past and present events. So what I decided to start doing is save all these entries to my computer's hard drive and print out a hard copy to store away for the future so that one day my children will have the same joy I had recently when, while unpacking a box, that from letter my grandparents, gone over 20 years, wrote to me over a quarter of century ago floated out and brought me back home to my childhood.

Start thinking about tomorrow

Like many companies in the US today, my company has flattened the corporate structure and, at the same time, outsourced highly skilled work to foreign countries. The jobs flattened were manger jobs where, for the most parts, the managers had advanced degrees. Those folks were basically demoted or let go and their work, for the most part sent down to the contributor level, leaving no layer between the contributors, who manage million dollar budgets, schedule and contract out with independent contractors, and generally keep the day to day business running, and the directors The work being outsourced is not basic data entry work, but knowledge process work in data manipulation that required much training and, in the past, required a college degree.

This has enabled our company to dismiss roughly 10-20% of the workforce in developed countries worldwide and, with the consolidation of office space due to fewer workers, enabled to company to recognize big savings. Of course those of the contributor level have no career advancement opportunities, as there are no mid-level managerial jobs for them to move into, but why is that important when there is money to be made? As one director in my company put it, there is no lock on the exit door, meaning that if a contributor wanted to advance in his or her career, they were free to leave to do so. Many have, but many, for various reasons have not. However this leaves me wondering, who will run the company in the future when today's leaders retire?

This wouldn't bother me if I thought this potential problem was limited to my corporation. However, many highly skilled white collar jobs are also being outsourced. The institutions doing the outsourcing, in the very lucrative finance industry in this case, use various excuses such as cost and how they are just outsourcing basic research jobs consisting of "grueling hours, traditionally done by fresh-faced business school graduates" that could be done for much less money overseas than in the US. Fair enough but, at least in my field, and I imagine in the finance field too, those grueling, mind numbing jobs were where you actually learned how to apply the knowledge you learned in school. If we are not providing those type of jobs to our youth, then how will they pick up the skills to run our corporations in the future?

I earned my doctorate, which was not in business so take everything I say with a grain of salt, almost a decade ago and have forgotten much of what I learned in school (though I can easily look up the information) yet I'm sure I'm a much better employee today than I was then because of the skill set I've earned through my work. Though my education level has remained the same I am much more qualified to lead the organization, or at least take a high level role, than I was a decade ago, but for the lack of the lower level manager position that would propel me up the corporate ladder. Of course, I can take my skills and leave any time as I am still young enough to do so. However, unlike my wife, whose education level is similar to mine, I have a job that has flexible hours and, basically lets me be Mr. Mom in lieu of higher pay, so I stay where I am for now. However this isn't about me, this is about our country's future in general.

Thanks to consolidation and outsourcing there are fewer contributors at my level than there were a decade ago. That means there are fewer people picking up the basic managerial skills necessary to replace the executives who retire. I imagine this going on throughout corporate America and this concerns me. What are we letting slip away to our competitors? What are we doing to our future?

For now, my company is solving that problem by hiring outsiders (which is why some people who wish to advance leave and then come back in a few years -- I'm always amazed that losing those assets for a years is apparently better for the bottom line then retaining those employees and letting them move up the internal corporate ladder) and who don't know much about our industry, meaning they have a sharp learning curve until they get up to speed. Moving back to the finance industry, some predict that the new wave of outsourcing may include "more sophisticated jobs like the creation of derivative products, quantitative trading models and even sales jobs from the trading floors," jobs that traditionally pay a very high salary and, due to having all the jobs in one place for a critical mass, has allowed Wall Street to remain the financial capital of the world for over a half of century.

As we outsource these type of jobs to "cheaper locales like India, the Philippines and Eastern Europe," I worry that we are also outsourcing our nation's wealth and independence (already done through our oil addiction) tomorrow for a quick buck today. What will happen to America's economy when the only ones qualified to lead our corporations and nation are foreign nationals? What will happen to our independence? What will happen to our wealth? Will we be the nation that this next generation of wealthy, educated executives export the grunt work too? How will this affect our nation's policies? Will we be able to control are destiny or be so poor that we are required to follow what other nations want? Will our children have to leave America to earn a living in the same manner that immigrants come to the US today to earn a living?

I suppose some of this is inevitable in a global economy; talent follows the money in the capitalist world. London was the world financial capital before Wall Street was. It is inevitable that sooner or later another city will take that crown. This has happened before and will happen again and may even be good for the economy in the short term. I just don't see why we are in such a rush to give up our competitive edge, not just in finance but in many highly skilled white collar industries that we have dominated over the last 50 or 60 years.

Maybe I'm wrong, and this is a good thing that will let us innovate further as we retrain these former financial wizards into engineers and doctors who need to be local. Maybe we'll get over our xenophobia and start insourcing skilled labor again. However, if there is one thing that has become evident in our society in the recent past is that money is power and I'd say tomorrow's leaders will be the ones beholden to those who show them the money, which we basically are sending overseas.

It is better to look good, than to do good

What is it with the politicians we elect here in New Jersey that feel it is better to propose feel good legislation to suck up to the population then to actually do good and make people face the results of their decisions? Do they really think we are that stupid? Actually, that is a stupid question since we're the ones who elected these mental midgets in the first place. Two cases in point from this past week: one involves raising revenue in lieu forcing some to face their actions and the other involves looking for complicated ways to make it harder for businesspersons to sell their wares.

First the revenue. Earlier this year, NJ's Governor announced to small, rural towns that use the State Police for their police needs as they don't have their own police departments that they will have to either hire their own police department, like many towns in this state have already done, pay for the State Police to continue their patrols or, since they have little crime anyway, forgo police protection. As expected the rural towns, 89 of about 500 or so state wide, freaked out over the idea they may have to pay for a service they currently get for free. As expected a politician figured out a way to get others to pay for their police service, in a sort of Abbot School district policy for the rich. Instead of making those rural taxpayers pay for their police services like the rest of the state, or to consolidate with other towns for economical efficiency, this mental midget wants to let the rest of the state, anybody else who happens to get a ticket for their car, pay for their waste through a ticket surcharge for such dastardly deeds as speeding or, maybe, failing to pay attention to conditions when your car skids on black ice this winter. Yeah!! Raise taxes, because that is what this is, in lieu of reducing spending for a selected few! Woo hoo!!!!

Umm, sorry, no! If these folks want to live in small rural towns then let them pay for the joy of doing so. No welfare for you. If you want certain services you can pay for it. We all have to budget and decide what luxuries are unimportant when expenses exceed income. Many of us pay a lot in municipal taxes to fund a police department in our towns. There is no reason the rural communities can't do the same, on a smaller scale.

If they want to live independent they are going to have to realize that independence comes at a cost due to lack of efficiency. If we can pay taxes to fund our towns' police departments they can do it. If they find they can't afford the police then I suggest they look elsewhere to see what services they can cut. Raise taxes, opt out or merge with other towns and get the money that way. If they decide if they can't afford it, then it is time to start merging these little towns into bigger towns. Of course, that would mean some people would lose power, as you can't have two mayors etc, which is what I suspect is really behind this idea.But, of course, it is much easier to pick on the speeder, who after all is breaking the law, then it is to force the 89 rural municipallities to do what the rest of the state is doing an paying for their own police protection.

The next feel good, do nothing idea comes from the town of Red Bank, which is the latest to jump on the ban plastic bags because they cause litter and use oil. Sigh. Another "feel good" but really accomplishing nothing proposal. I won't deny the use of oil to make plastic bags, but the town needs to look at the big picture. Plastic bags cost less to produce and transport. They also pollute less, through lower transportation costs. Additionally, they can be reused or recycled. Of the bags I get from the supermarket and various stores each week, roughly 60 - 70% are brought back to my supermarket for recycling. The market has been doing this for years, long before the idea of recycling plastic bags became popular so I assume they do this for their own purposes. The rest of my bags are reused several times before falling apart or are given away.

On the other hand, while paper bags come from a renewable resource, my town hasn't recycled paper bags for over 5 years as the recycling company found it uneconomical so this bags end up in the garbage, taking up even more space in whatever garbage dump my trash ends up in. For those who say use reusable bags, those don't last forever and don't do much for spur of the moment purchases. Of course you can leave the reusable bags in your car, but that isn't feasible for those living in urban areas, such as Red Bank, where they are walking to stores a great distance from wherever their cars may be (assuming they have one).

As to the litter plastic bags make, enforce the littering laws. People throw trash all over the place. A litterer is a litterer. No need to pick on one subject, plastic bags,when you can pick on all. But no, like picking on the speeder, it is much easier to pick on the plastic bag in lieu of doing something easier like, oh I don't know, encourage people to recycle their plastic bags.

Getting older, not bolder

I'm at an age now where most of my friends are married, or at least have been married. So it was with gusto that, when one of my oldest friends (from childhood) said he wanted his bachelor party in Atlantic City, that I and a few others of our old group, leaped at the chance. Woo hoo! Party!! Well not quite. It seems somewhere along the way, as we all enter the end of our third decade, that we quieted down quite a bit.

Long story short, the bachelor party consisted of just 6 people, 5 of whom grew up within a block or two of each other in NYC. We're equally divided now between the Long Island and New Jersey suburbs and don't see each other often. The groom was given several options for his party: Foxwoods, Manhattan, Atlantic City or something else. As the groom likes to gamble, Atlantic City was chosen, so off we went for a night of debauchery.

Once we got through all the Saturday night traffic to get to Atlantic City, worse for the Long Island folk who had the joy of driving through Queens, Brooklyn and Staten Island and all that traffic. I and my brother-in-law, who was coming from Long Island to my house, roughly the half way point from his home and Atlantic City, so we could carpool, were the last to arrive. Basically that meant we went to the groom's room and knocked out a case of beer (well, not quite, there were a lot of half empty beer bottles that got poured down the drain) before headed to the restaurant we had reservations for for dinner.

Unfortunately, due to a lack of proper planning, the hotel we were staying at was on one side of the boardwalk and the restaurant we were eating at was at the other hand. We thought we had plenty of time for a leisurely 35 min ute walk down the boardwalk for dinner. The walk turned into a trot as 1) we realized the restaurant was further than we realized and 2) we forgot what a wise man once said "you don't buy beer, you rent it."

We arrived for dinner a little late and quite famished after our trot. The restaurant we ate at was one of a small chain from Manhattan that we'd eaten in before, if not at Atlantic City than in Manhattan, so we knew what we wanted. While waiting for our food we noticed we were seated with several bachlorette parties and wondered how the restaurant knew we were a bachelor party - I mean just because we were 6 guys, 5 of whom were wearing wedding rings, shouldn't be an indication, should it? While waiting we made the usual ball and chain jokes married guys make with single guys, sighing because some of it was true, and joked about some married friends who weren't allowed to come and that the groom's father chose not to come as bachelor parties are only for young men. Oh if they only knew how tame our night was going to turn out to be.

The food was excellent and, with a little more liquid courage under our belts, but not a lot as we really can't drink like we used to, we headed to a bar in the hotel for the groom to sing karaoke. The bar was definitely for the younger set and, as we noticed the bouncers carefully looking at IDs, grumbled as we dug out our wallets and pulled out our IDs. As we entered the club and flashed our IDs to the the bouncers ... they just waved us in. Ouch.

It was in that bar that our night of debauchery hit it's peak. First we interacted with some completely drunk young 20 something who wanted us to sing with her friends. At least we think she did, she was a little too drunk to understand. Also in the bar was a private party room with large windows with the curtains down. There was a bachelorette party in there drinking and dancing to their own tune. At one point the curtains came down and we could see the young women. They were pretty trashed too and were dancing suggestively. Finally, as a joke, someone held a dollar up to the window. He probably got more action out of that dollar than if we had gone to a strip girl. One woman started dancing seductively at the window while another showed us, and anyone else looking her way, that she wasn't wearing underwear. Yeah, that's a bachelor party! Woo hoo, ready to party!!

Of course, since we're all married or engaged, and have been settled down quite a bit, we didn't do anything more than stare at the women, and thank them for the show as we went on our way for the next great thing: the $10 card table. Finding a $10 card table around midnight on a Saturday night in Atlantic City is about as easy as finding a seat on the NYC subway during rush hour, could happen, but not likely. I think we went into every casino on the boardwalk on our way back. No dice, at least for $10. At one point, we sat down at the nickel slots at one casino and started playing just so we could rest and get a drink. Long story short, I made $3 for killing a half hour and having a jack and coke. Woo hoo, I was winning!

It was around then we started noticing the way some of the ladies were dressed, or not dressed as the case was with one woman wearing a very, very short dress and nothing underneath we saw leaving a casino and walking down the street and stopping traffic. We weren't sure if she was a working girl or just someone dressed to impress (it seemed to be a tie at one point). I thought she might've had her underwear hiked up as I only saw a little of a rear body part I sometimes see at the pool, but I was assured from one of my friends, who saw her turn around, that she had definitely misplaced some underwear too. Little did we know was that that show marked the end of our debauchery.

Finally, at 2AM, we found the elusive $10 table. By then the groom and his brother, both of whom didn't even gamble, were already in bed and another two of us were ready for bed. My brother-in-law and I, who were sharing a room and were pretty beat, left the two gamblers and headed back to our hotel, which, at that point, was the next one anyway. It was as we walked back to the hotel we realized that we drove a long distance for basically dinner, a drink at a bar with some drunks and a walk on a lovely summer's evening -- something we could've done in Manhattan, a shorter distance and mass transit commutable to our own beds. Unlike other parties in the past, no one got crazy drunk, we saw no naked women dancing (aside from the drunk flasher) and we went to bed before 3 not because we were done partying but because we were too tired to continue. Woo hoo, party zzzzzzzzzz.

So much hate, so little time

I just finished reading an article about a New Jersey town scheduling a vote on the school budget for the first day of the the Jewish new year. At first I thought that the town made a simple mistake, as the holiday moves around the standard calendar since the Jewish calendar is based on cycles of the moon, as, unlike much of the country, the NYC area and its suburbs have a substantial Jewish population, and school and government entities are usually aware of the Jewish holidays since a significant percentage of the population is affected by the holiday. Similarly, NYC has become more aware of Muslim holidays as that community has grown, demonstrated by suspending alternate side of the street parking -- though I think schools are still open so equity has not yet been reached. However, as I read the article, and the comments by readers defending the town's actions I began to wonder if this is 2008 or 1908?

I can't believe some of the offensive comments I read. As noted in the article, Rosh Hashana is one of the holiest days on the Jewish calendar. Even non-Orthodox Jews. including "cardiac" Jews, usually go to temple that day. To all those who are whining that the Jews could mail in absentee ballots, how would you feel if a town like Lakewood held a similar vote on Christmas Day?

Some argued that the Orthodox don't even send their children to the town's schools so they shouldn't complain about not voting. What does that have to do with anything? They're taxpayers and have the same rights as other taxpayers. Senior citizens don't send children to school, neither do other childless couples or those who send their children to parochial schools. Why are their rights to approve or disapprove a school budget superior to that of the Jews? Why is it ok to make the Jews mail in their proxies in lieu of going to the polling place and voting like the other citizens? What next, make them wear arm bands? Think I'm exaggerating? Read the comment in the article linked above.

There are about 20 other weekdays in September that the vote could be held, or if going by the statute that the school board is hiding behind, three other days in the calendar year a budget vote can be held. However, the town is holding firm to the September date. How offensive.

Despite everyone's denial that there is no anti-Semitism, if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and swims like a duck, it is a duck, even if you call it a cat. I'm glad I don't live in Edison, I would hate to send my children to a school system that is condoning hate and intolerance. I'm just amazed of the arrogance or ignorance of the board that this type of intolerance sees the light of day in such a multi-cultural state as NJ in the early 21st century.

Sometimes everything goes right

I work from home most days. This allows me to do errands and schedule appointments that I would have to take a day off from work otherwise as my office is a good 35 miles from my home (unlike my wife who works 4 miles from our house). This past Sunday evening, I looked at my list of chores for Monday, take dog to groomers, stop at supermarket to get bread as our son is having a growth spurt, get my driver's license renewed and, courtesy of a vomiting cat who likes to sit on top of the cable box, go to the Cablevision office and exchange the cable box, and decided I would have to use up some of my comp time (I can't remember the last time I only worked 35 hours in a week, outside of weeks I took a day off or there was a holiday) and dutifully emailed my director. My wife was envious I'd have some child free time off from work (very rare these days) on a beautiful summer day, even though I'd be running errands. Turns out she didn't have to be envious.

I split my errands into two parts as I had a mid day meeting to call into. The first part was groomer, supermarket and cable store. The after lunch part was going to be the local MVC office. The dog, my mother-in-law's, was first on the list. Now, though I live in the suburbs, I live in walking distance of mass transit and almost all shopping (though we learned long ago not to walk to the stores because, even though there are crosswalks and pedestrian lights, drivers, even during rush hour when buses are dropping passengers off regularly, forget to look for pedestrians), so it was only 5 minutes to the pet store where the grooming would be done. Within 10 minutes of dropping off my mother-in-law's ewok (a cocker-spaniel long past the time for her haircut), I was in the adjacent supermarket paying for the bread and some salad for my lunch. I was tempted to buy some perishables, but not knowing how long I would be at the cable store up the road, decided against it. Stupid me.

In less than 5 minutes I was at the cable store. As I pulled up I saw two people enter the office and figured I'd be there for a while. It turns out they were the only people in the office and, within 15 minutes I was home again attaching my new cable box to my TV (note to cable people: could you make a cable wire something other than the standard black, it would make life easier when reattaching cables) and ready to go back to work. All in all it took 30 minutes. Well, I figured, this good karma will get me when I head to the MVC after lunch.

Now when I dropped off the dog, the groomer told me she would be ready at 2. Knowing that, I left for the MVC, a 10 minute drive from my home a little before one. Currently, our local MVC office is a few miles from the inspection station, in a small shopping center that surrounds a pond and small park. Very peaceful, hardly the place you expect to find a stress factory like the MVC. I'm going to miss this office next time I renew my license as the office will have moved to the inspection station by then, but it is awfully small and it probably makes sense. Anyway, I digress.

I entered the office, all stressed out, hoping that I had the right documents (many of my bills are electronic these days and I had trouble finding a hard copy of anything with our address until I spotted our property tax bill) and before I could even think, the woman at the reception desk was asking if she could help me. Within moments, she directed me to the correct line, 3 deep. Long story short, the MVC is much more efficient these days. Much to my surprise, I was out of there in about 20 minutes with my new license in hand. If I had come in just a few minutes later, I would've gotten out even faster as there was no one on line behind me. I sure hope this office stays quiet once it merges locations with the inspection station.

I got out so fast, that I actually had time to kill before picking up the dog. I did a quick drive by of the inspection station, as my wife's car needs an inspection this month and I wanted to see how the site was doing with the construction (note to self: bring a book for that one) and then headed to the electronics store in the same shopping center as the pet store to browse while I waited.

Those type of stores can be very dangerous for me. However, miracles of miracles, I did not spend any money there and was soon picking up the dog and headed for home. By 2:10 or so I was back at work amazed that nothing went wrong. Then, as I was going through the emails that piled up in my absence, and planned to attend another boring meeting I originally declined, I realized that karma was about to catch up. Instead of spending a beautiful summer, child free day away from my home office, I was back at work, answering emails that could wait and staring at my laptop's screen. Whoops.

Digital reading

Since you're reading this here online (unless you printed out a copy for posterity) you, like many of us these days, are a digital reader. Apparently you, like me, are part of a passionate debate about what it means to read in the digital age. As I work in publishing, this is pertinent to my interests.

While I do not read novels online, yet, I have long been reading newspapers online, even after purchasing the offline, hard copy versions (sometimes paper is best, but online can't be beat when you want the West Coast baseball scores). Digital reading lets me read and investigate many more news sources than I would if I were limited to print. In the publishing company I work for (editing and writing treatises for professionals), the print version of our materials still does very well, however their online cousins can link out to other related items, allowing users to check cross references and to see if the print material is still accurate.

Apparently, according to some, all this online reading means I am not reading at all (I wish someone would tell that to my eye doctor). Part of the "problem" is that fewer of us are reading for fun or sitting down and reading longer stories in lieu of zig zagging off to another place --- still there? I promise I won't be much longer as I need to hop onto ESPN to check out the scores from last night before zipping onto another news site, that is after I hit my Facebook page to see if there are any good messages, which I'll get to after I read my e-mails.... Hmm, where was I? Oh yeah! Reading is fundamental!

Anyway, the issue appears to be a lack of linear reading, as the net chips away at ... uh ... the ability to .... oh, sorry, just reading a funny comment on fark ... anyway, the net is limiting the ability of us to concentrate on one thing for a long period of time, according to whoever was quoted in the story I linked to above (sigh ... [alt][tab] ... this dude), arguing that though our children know more bits of information on various topics they don't know anything because they are not reading novels and thinking about what was written.

I suppose that is a fair opinion but, as I recall my childhood, and, in the days before video games and hundreds of the cable channels, my various reading appetite (lived in the city and had little money as my mother was a laid off school teacher), I don't recall really ruminating about a novel until I was a late teenager, and even then, it was just for school. I didn't read classics like Catcher in the Rye or Grapes of Wrath (I linked to the Cliff Notes if you want to take 5) until I was well into my 20s and 30s. Of course, it helped I had, and still do, a long commute on mass transit and needed something to do aside from sleeping or staring into the abyss.

Although I read more and more online these days, I read novels because I want to. Perhaps some of this is due to the reading habits I acquired as a child or my long commute. But I think part of it is that I, like many others, still like to get lost in a novel. I've noticed that those my age who like to read do so because they enjoy a good book and those who don't read often, preferring to surf the net, probably wouldn't be reading novels anyway. As to the argument that reading novels has helped me to evaluate information, reading various opinions on various topics, as I try to weed out whose opinion is most trustworthy, does the same.

However, I wonder what those online readers would be doing if not for reading online. I know my online searching and what not has replaced much more TV relax time over reading a novel relax time. While my children are still too young to be reading novels (or in the case of the youngest, too young to read), I want to make sure they are learning skills that will help them in life. Watching TV probably won't, doing research on the internet probably will. So they may not learn how to think for themselves, such as contemplating what the author really meant in a passage and how those words apply to life, the same way I did as their evaluation will come from comparing various sources. As long as my children are reading something worthwhile, and expanding their knowledge, be it online or off, in lieu of watching some idiotic cartoon on TV, I will be satisfied.