Free . . . but

This is the time of the year when we our mailboxes are stuffed with gift catalogs, special sales, buy-one-get-one offers, and buy-now-pay-later deals. And how about those telemarketing calls, regardless of whether you are on the do-not-call list, or not? They all look good on the surface, but when you check closer, you find many are really sticking it to you.

Yesterday, I picked up a call from a telemarketer. Because we do get a couple of Skype and MagicJack calls that we don't want to miss, we are not able to screen all calls with caller ID. I wasn't near a computer, so I could not check the caller's website while I was on the phone. The caller was offering a free month of Internet priority advertising in hope of securing our business on a fee paid basis after that. When I Googled the company, later, I found a host of complaints about their business tactics and ethics. It was a "freebut" offer." You know the kind, free now but,"We're going to stick it to you," on your next telephone bill.

I called the company to cancel the "freebut" service, as I was well within my 72-hour cancellation window. I got some names and promises, but overall minimal satisfaction.

I called the phone company and humbly explained the great "freebut" offer and asked how could I stop the billing. She graciously said, "easy," and immediately put a block on any third party billing to our account. It's something new that phone companies are now allowed to do because of so many "freebut" entrepreneurs that are popping up, especially at this time of the year. (I tried to block AT&T's bill, but she politely refused.)

We always told our kids, "If it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is." Where were they when I needed them to repeat it back to me?

Reflections

This past week, I was asked to speak to a breakfast group for three minutes regarding our past ten years in Connecticut. As I began to prepare my remarks, my mind bounced all over the place from tragedy to victory. Thursday, I decided to write down various milestones as they came to mind, hoping it would help me focus. It took most of the day, and yet I had barely scratched the surface. Finally, I boiled it down to a two page outline, focusing on the major high and low points. Even that required ten minutes to get through at speaking speed.

Like the picture, there were some fuzzy areas. There were some ripples, some rough spots, when things weren't very clear to us. We lost both of my parents during that time, represented by the reflection of the two dead tree trunks in the water, and yes, there were many clear blue sky areas, too, including the birth of all five of our grandchildren.

While I go through phases of keeping and not keeping a journal, this was different. I found the reflection exercise therapeutic. So many things weren't clear to me when they were happening, but as I reflected on them, I realize in hindsight how blessed we really were.

Try it sometime. Reflect. Just pick a time frame or a key milestone in your life, find a quiet place, and start writing. Count your blessings as you go. At some point, someone will want to know your story, and you will be ready.

Fall in New England

Every October, we cruise the bi-ways and back-ways in New England chasing the autumn colors. While Columbus Day is the traditional peak for colors, the trees seem to have a mind of their own and will peak whenever they please. Our TV weather personalities show shaded maps every night with areas marked for early color, peak color and past peak. They change earliest in the north and slowly move south toward the coast over the course of a month.

I think this is our week to shoot. The yellows and reds are in and most of the green is out. Perfect! Now, if we can just hold off the rain, we will add a thousand or so images to our fall collection.

Is summer really over?

Which sounds better, the end of summer or the beginning of fall? It's not an abrupt end as many people mark the end of summer with Labor Day, others, September 21 and still others, when the leaves change. If you're like us, you remember the beginning of summer, but where did the rest of it go?

As you who follow our blog may remember, we marked the beginning of summer this year with lobster rolls at Jimmies of Savin Rock. Yesterday, we returned to mark the end of summer with more lobster rolls, beer, and a hot fudge sundae chaser. Jimmies has become our favorite warm weather place to eat when we want to mark a milestone in time, no matter how minor.

I'm not sure how much longer they keep the patio overlooking Long Island Sound open for lunch, but Labor Day is gone, we are into October, and the leaves are beginning to change. The temperatures were in the 80s yesterday, and it was sunny, but we are now supposed to have three days of rain and daytime temperatures in the 50s. I think the Labor Day/color-change segway is over, and fall has arrived.

Let's talk

Pick a seat and talk to me, but not just any seat. Pick the seat of your political persuasion, left or right, then, let’s talk.

The way I see it, we have a two party system and a one party, one term (by his own claim), left wing President. He is at the beck and call of the House minority leader and the Senate majority leader, both of his own party not all of whom support him either.

He made a lot of promises during his first presidential campaign, including openness, total transparency, and changing the way Washington works, along with fixing all the major mistakes of the Administration before him. Now well into his next presidential campaign, we are hearing the same stuff but a little more centrist in order to coddle the independent voters, who ultimately control which way the majority swings.

To be fair, I’m not sure what would have happened if John McCain had won the last election. As a Republican, he would have had to satisfy a Democratic majority in Congress before anything could get done, but then so did President Obama. The left would have been openly critical of anything McCain wanted to do just as the right was openly critical of anything President Obama proposed.

In 2009 a group called the Tea Party Patriots began protesting big government and an ineffective Congress. The grass roots movement was originally split evenly among Democrats and Republicans and now represents the ideals of the right including reduction of big government, less regulation, and more free enterprise.

Most recently we have seen the beginning of the Occupy Wall Street movement, another grass roots protest effort, but this time from the left. Essentially, this group is opposed to big business, wants the rich to pay more taxes, and favors more government control and subsidies to close the gap between rich and poor. It has quickly gone from a grass roots organization to one that the Democrats are claiming ownership.

So pick a chair and talk to me. We have a dysfunctional Congress, an ineffective President, two political parties that are so wrapped up in their own ideologies that they have forgotten the interests of their constituents, and two well organized grass roots movements that are diametrically opposed to each other. Where do we go from here?

Oh, before you sit down, think about which chair you’re choosing. If you pick the chair on the left, who is right? If you pick the one on the right, who is left?

Teamsters

One event that I always look for at a state, or county fair is the horse pull. It's basically a equestrian strength competition that pits teams of work horses against each other to see who can pull a weighted sled fifteen feet. After each pull, a fork lift adds a thousand pounds of solid concrete to the sled and those who made the last cut, pull again until all but one team is eliminated. It's sort of like watching the World's Strongest Man events on TV as men harness themselves to a Boeing 747 and pull it down the runway.

As I watched the horses and their handlers, I was fascinated by their size, their strength, and their focus. They had a mutual respect for each other, and when it was time to perform, everyone knew what to do. Each team of horses would strut to the sled at the command of the handler while a second person would quickly hook the harness to the sled. Instantly the horses would lunge ahead in unison to drag the sled the required fifteen feet. At the end of each round, they would return to their holding area and patiently wait for the next round. Their combined weight was over 3000 pounds, yet the winner dragged 17,000 pounds of concrete across the finish line.

Handlers, trainers, teams, owners and even the audience, were totally focused on the event in the arena. When it came to the pull, everyone was as silent as the gallery at a golf tournament. They were totally focused on the team and the job it had to do. No one moved. No one spoke, or made a noise. No one whistled, cheered, or jeered. They just watched. Once the job was done, everyone applauded.

There is so much for us to learn from these "teamster" workhorses as long as we don't act like the wrong end and think we can do everything ourselves. Then we become that 17,000 ton sled that everyone else on the team has to drag behind them.