TubaOrNotTuba

On the TV screen, the station just presented one of those annoying branding ads, pointing out that the potential win for tomorrow night’s lottery drawing. I don’t do lottery; the mathematical odds keep me alert to any scam run at the government level. For the sake of perspective, this time around the windfall would be fourteen million. That’s 14 plus 6 zeros: enough money to fulfill a few dreams in the time I have left. No need for pension fund worries.

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Maybe I can distract myself for another few minutes. Enough time to let the eBay “opportunity of a lifetime” pass me by. You see, there’s the main problem with online sales (from my point of view). You can remain an impulse buyer for days, rather than the few minutes most of us spend at the local mall.

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My favourite personal computer manufacturer (rhymes with Bell) is a large corporation. The company no longer works out of a warehouse in the wilds of Texas, it now has a larger “footprint”, and it relies on the marvels of VOIP to keep its many offshore workers in the loop. Therein lies the difficulty.

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In high school physics, there were demonstrations of Newtonian physics. In part, an attempt to explain why a rocket might actually climb up, or move in space, but the base of the argument was that pushing something in one direction would cause that object to move, in a direct relation with the force applied. There were formulae and everything; science. Canadian economics is not a science.

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It’s easy to mock the rich when you aren’t. It’s easier to mock the stupid rich. The rich that gamble their excess, in the hope of having even more. That might be a definition of greed, come to think of it… not the mocking; the gambling. There are those that believe gambling to be a sin, or a sickness. When it’s done at the organized level, it means far too much coverage in the media. Did you ever count those pages of numbers in the “financial section” where there are columns and columns of numbers that purport to show a pattern for those who invest.

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My sympathies are extended to any employee in retail that lives with a soundtrack. Background music, not of their choosing. My sons are unable to handle some of the local FM radio stations after spending part of their waking hours each day listening, over and over again, to the same insipid choice of songs that seems to beat one’s soul into pablum. And I’ve just returned from grocery shopping, where I ended up singing along to a cover of a Roger Whittaker song.

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If the actions of the local banking industry are an indication, the cashless society model is alive and well. This evening, I had some cash to deposit, so I headed up to the building where we’ve done our cashier-free transactions for the last two decades. The machines were gone. No forwarding address, no explanation, no screen waiting to watch me (they do watch me; I saw that in a movie once, so I believe it).

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And what if she actually touched a teddy bear? Is it now worth more to the buyer? Those are the questions that follow a recent visit to a local toy store by the world famous Celine and her son and spouse. Don’t get me wrong, I think being a fan is a wonderful hobby, but I also understand that fan is derived from fanatic (thank you, my teachers that were etymologists at heart).

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Some people are unable to avoid being noticed. Take our mayor, with a guitar (please!). Last weekend, the police in a small town north of Montreal wondered why one of the local fire trucks was “wandering” around town, with the siren and power lights on, when they’d heard nothing over the radio. They gave chase (at low speed), and when the big red tanker was finally immobilized, the driver jumped out (hurting himself from the fall) and then ran away with the forces of law and order in pursuit. I didn’t see it, I didn’t hear it, but I can imagine the scene. (Taken from a CP story).

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Since it’s quiet where you are, and you have a few minutes to take care of things that otherwise might not get done, might I suggest taking out your wallet. No, I don’t need anything from you; this is more a wakeup call. If you lost your wallet tomorrow, would there be enough data inside for someone else to cause you great financial worry, or perhaps a small crisis in your identity? Are you sure.

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