New article at American Thinker: My six months at Amazon

The days after Thanksgiving once signaled training season for Christmas caroling. Recent years have instead heralded the shrieks of entire choruses of Maynard G. Krebs: “Work?!?”

The past few weeks have been no different and once again the squalls of disdain have almost invariably diffused from those tan arcologies of Internet commerce: the Amazon Fulfillment Centers.

Well, for a good chunk of the past year I was an associate in one of those very centers.  I am not employed or affiliated with Amazon at present and don't foresee that changing anytime soon.  Nobody from the company is paying me or giving me some kind of perk (and I'd refuse free Amazon Prime on general principles if Mr. Bezos himself extended the offer).  I’m not trying to curry favor and I don’t cotton to anyone.

But I would have done this anyway: provide a perspective that may differ wildly from what a lot of people have remarked about working in one of Amazon's distribution warehouses.

So all that being said, my first published article in over a year is up at American Thinker today.  "Six Months at an Amazon Fulfillment Center" says what it means and means what it says.  Half of a year on the floor, and I ended up being involved in everything from stowing merchandise to loading outbound trucks.  It also meant being there throughout the entire "Peak Season": Black Friday through Christmas Eve.

A snippet from the article:

My primary mission was stowing. It means pushing a cart of merchandise around the warehouse, finding bin space that a product can fit in, using a laser scanner on the bar codes and then physically moving the item into the bin. The facility’s inventory system was at all times tracking the associate’s rate of work as well as accuracy. Several times during the night the rates were posted so that each employee could see how he or she was faring. And as many who have written about working at Amazon have already noted, the managers are looking hard at those rates… 

My stowing during those first few weeks? Abysmal. In fact, I was the very worst of the lot from our orientation group. Getting fired would be a decision born within the circuitry of the Amazon master computer somewhere in Seattle, not any human judgment. My career came a few steps too close to ending during that first month or so.

What happened next? Did the rates rise? Or did your friend and humble narrator get a pink slip from the Amazon cluster-processoring mainframe thingy?!  Mash down here and find out!

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On the passing of H. Ross Perot

Hearing the news that Ross Perot had died earlier today was like feeling a punch to the gut of that persistent eighteen-year old in my personal nature.  Maybe it had to do with the memory of working the local Perot campaign headquarters in those heady days of fall 1992.  Located in rented space on a small shopping strip in Eden, North Carolina, at first glance it wasn't what I was expecting.  There was a shabbiness to the place.  But whatever it lacked in looks, it more than made up for it in frenetic energy.  There was a sense of unstoppable enthusiasm among all those good and wacky characters, and I must have worked at least forty hours there making phone calls on Perot's behalf, assembling yard signs, picking up bumper stickers to hand out...

I forget how much of a percentage Rockingham County went for Perot, but it was a fair amount.  It had less to do with our own efforts, I think, than the character and charisma of Ross Perot himself.  "Now there's a choice!" read campaign signs and many in the county took that to heart.  I certainly did, when I registered to vote the day after turning eighteen some months before.  I knew even then: Perot was going to be the one I cast a ballot for.

Maybe that's part of why to this day I'm proud that no one I've voted for President has won.  Each one of those victors in his own way made a mess of America.  And that "giant sucking sound" that Perot warned us would be jobs in these United States going south to Mexico?  He was right.  He was 1000% right.  NAFTA would never have wrecked its havoc on Perot's watch.  And for that alone, history has proven that he was more than correct.  For there was no doubting the patriotism and concern behind his warnings about it.

And I will also dare say that Donald Trump's win in the 2016 election had a great deal with the lingering sentiment from 1992.  Voters have longer memories than they get credit for, especially after a quarter century of two major parties bringing economic ruin to America.  Trump played a smart game: running as an independent candidate while using the Republican Party's infrastructure to mount his campaign from.  That was the one major deviation from Perot's approach.  But Perot did it first, and he broke the ground for what came later.

Did I agree with everything Perot stood for?  No, I did not.  My differences with him about abortion and gun control are as strong as ever.  Maybe stronger, even.  But no candidate is going to be someone any of us should hold to their positions with equal fervor.  The candidates who try to appeal to everyone are the worst of candidates.  At least Perot was honest about his convictions.  And even as a kid I wouldn't believe Perot could pull off anything about those issues.  His agenda was about something else, and many of us saw the handwriting on the wall: America was headed toward economic disaster and we needed someone of Perot's caliber to avoid it.

Did Perot cause Bill Clinton to be elected in 1992?  I've never seen that.  When the popular vote is worked out and compared with the electoral votes, Clinton was still going to win over George H.W. Bush... who still would have had the majority of the popular vote.  Perot drew voters from each of the two major party candidates, no doubt.  But with 19% of those votes spread out as they were, Perot proved to be at most a large element to not ignore, but not large enough to make that big a difference in the outcome.

There was no doubting Perot's commitment to America and her people.  A commitment that was demonstrated with two incidents in particular.  There was his compelling the North Vietnamese to provide better treatment of American POWs during that conflict.  And then there came the 1979 rescue mission of two employees of Perot's Electronic Data Systems (EDS) from an Iranian prison.  Perot hired legendary Green Beret vet Arthur "Bull" Simons to lead a team recruited from within EDS to plan and execute the mission.  It involved inserting team members into Tehran as the Iranian Revolution was nearing its climax.  The rescue worked, none of the team were lost in the mission.  It was chronicled about a few years later in Ken Follett's book On Wings of Eagles.

Not long after that rescue, the revolutionaries took over Iran completely.  They also stormed the American embassy and took its occupants hostage.  Their 555 days of capture was punctuated by a disastrous rescue attempt sanctioned by President Jimmy Carter that ended in the deserts of Iran.  One can only wonder what might have been had Ross Perot been called in to consult with.

 EDS already made Perot a very wealthy man and he became ridiculously more wealthy when he sold the company some years later.  A billionaire multiple times over, he went on to found Perot Systems.  And then came that night in March of 1992 when Larry King asked Perot on nationwide television if he would run for President.  Perot said he would, provided he qualified for the ballot in all fifty states.  A few short months later he had met all qualifications.  And though we could debate all day about the wisdom (or lack thereof) of his early departure from the campaign, none can question that when he came back months later promising "a world class campaign"... and he delivered on that promise.

Of course, that campaign cannot be mentioned without bringing to mind those informercials - which ran simultaneously every time on all the major networks - that Perot made.  In each one he laid out with nothing more than a pointer and a series of charts the situation in America and what would be needed to fix it.  From one of those came a personal catchphrase of mine: "It will be tough, but it will be fun."

It would be tempting to post a clip of myself doing my Ross Perot impersonation.  But not now.  I will however post a pic of the two campaign buttons I proudly wore that season.  One of which was made during a craft fair during lunch one day at my high school:

There isn't much else that one could say about H. Ross Perot.  Except that he may not have won in 1992 and then again in 1996 when he ran again.  But he left an indelible mark upon American presidential politics.  And that mark may have come back to haunt the Clintons more than two decades later after all.  Not a few times  have I heard in recent years "Ross was right".

Whatever one may think of the guy, it has to be said: he lived an enviable life and abided by his principles.  And we are each the better for that kind of example.

Godspeed, Mr. Perot.  And thank you.

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The titular dilemma of new Star Wars movies (and what can be done about it)

Right now, somewhere as you read this, pre-production is well underway for Star Wars Episode VII.  The script is being written and re-written, conceptual artists are creating new visions of a galaxy far far away, and there is already a casting call for major roles in the next movie.  Barely eight months ago we could have never imagined a new Star Wars trilogy would be happening (in fact, I still find myself hardly believing it).  And now under Disney's management, we are being promised not just a new trilogy (perhaps even two) but a Star Wars movie every year from 2015 until the end of time.

And therein rests a problem which hopefully is being discussed somewhere at the Mouse House and at Lucasfilm:

With all of these new Star Wars movies... how are they going to be titled?  And what does it mean for the Star Wars films we have already?

Until now it's been easy enough: "Episode I: The Phantom Menace", "Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back" and so forth.  Those were individual chapters of one story in an epic fantasy setting.  And it suffices for that one multi-generational epic on film.

Except now, there is the intent to produce several stories in that same setting.  And they aren't necessarily going to pertain to the tale of the Skywalker family from Anakin to Luke to whoever it will be in the next trilogy.

There are already plans for Star Wars "one-shot" films, focusing on individual characters like Yoda and Boba Fett.  Once that big beautiful Star Wars logo blares loud on the screen and the scroll unspools, it's easy to envision it saying "Yoda: Making of a Master" or somesuch.

But those will be self-contained stories.  What of the story that started it all, when it is now to be but one piece of an entire tapestry of tales?  How is the epic at the heart-meat of the entire franchise going to be set apart from what is yet to come?

And there exists the possibility of future Star Wars trilogies: multi-film stories which aren't focused on the Skywalkers or any of the classic characters at all.  Perhaps not even the familiar era of the rise and fall of the Galactic Empire.  The nomenclature of those potential future trilogies must be taken into account.  The sooner the better.

There is a very simple solution: amend the style of the opening crawls of the Star Wars films we already know and love.

There is precedent for it.  When the very first movie came out it was simply "Star Wars".  Only when The Empire Strikes Back was released three years later did the original get retroactively subtitled "Episode IV: A New Hope".  That's been the titling protocol since.

There hasn't been a need to revise that protocol.  There will be soon.  And if accommodation was made before, it can be again.

Here is the proposal: retroactively amend the titles of the existing Star Wars movies so that they will stand apart from the films which will be produced in the years to come.  Let there be no confusing that Episodes I through IX are a singular epic, standing apart as George Lucas' vision of one movie.  Have the core story of the Skywalker family be branded as something unto itself, yet a major component of the larger Star Wars universe which Disney is now creating.

Call it "The Skywalker Saga", or "The Skywalker Cycle" (a Wagner-ish notion in keeping with the operatic motifs at work through the trilogies).  So for example, the scroll for Episode IV could look like this:

That's all that needs to happen.  Just expand the titling format.  It's an elegant and non-invasive alteration that will set the classic films and their sequels apart, and can accommodate any movies still to come.  Including full-bore trilogies set in new times and with characters all their own.

From a literary perspective, it makes a lot of sense.  From a corporate viewpoint, it also might prove to be quite lucrative.  It certainly lends itself well to marketing and merchandising possibilities.

And wouldn't it be grand to someday have a set of Blu-rays on the shelf: "Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga", alongside such classics as A Tale of Two Cities, Moby-Dick and The Lord of the Rings trilogy.  A truly timeless work of literature, standing on its own merit.

That is what the story of Anakin Skywalker, his son Luke and the next generation of their family deserves.  It's what every story in the Star Wars galaxy deserves in its own right.  And hopefully the good folks at Disney and Lucasfilm will take that into consideration.

(Speaking of Star Wars, hearty congratulations are in order to George Lucas on his recent marriage to the very lovely Mellody Hobson.  May they have a long and happy life together!)

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The latest from the wonderful world of 3D printing

This is easily the technology that I'm keenly following more than any other right now.  And for plenty of good reasons...

3D printing is now capable of producing replacement bones using living cells.

Desktop-produced firearms continues to be developed and refined, beyond the control of any government.

Laser-guided 3D printing can now produce metal objects with high precision.  You will soon be taking your car into a garage and have a new custom part created in-house.

High-capacity lithium-ion batteries smaller than the size of a grain of sand have been created in the laboratory and it's thought that they could eventually be used to power ridiculously tiny gadgets, including next-generation medical devices like pacemakers.

And then there's this: 4D printing!  Objects which are manufactured in 3D "folded-up", then are allowed to self-assemble themselves.  One possible use mentioned is being able to buy furniture packed-flat from a store, bring it home and then take it out of the box and watch it put itself together.  More serious applications could be for building construction in hazardous situations.

No doubt parents across the country will be happy to know about 4D printing.  It will potentially bring an end to those most dreaded of words found on just about every toy or game box: "some assembly required"!

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Is greed killing NASCAR?

Not long ago, stock car racing was the most-watched, most profitable professional sport in America and one of the biggest in the world (surpassed internationally only by soccer... or "football" or "futbol" or whatever).  Which isn't bad at all for a spectator sport which has humble beginnings in the manufacture and transport of illegal moonshine throughout the southeastern United States.  And that is where NASCAR's most faithful and stalwart fans have always been found, along with its most celebrated and capable drivers.

Lately however, NASCAR seems to have forgot "who brung them to the dance": those same longtime fans, most of whom have decades of loyalty notched on their belts.  Speedway Motorsports' owner and CEO Bruton Smith had this to say last week when it was announced that NASCAR was moving one of Charlotte's races to Las Vegas: "When the game is over, it'll be money, money, money... Money will move it."

NASCAR's big wigs are poised to lose it all if they keep going at this pace, so writes friend and colleague Doug Smith.  The owners and executives are selling out stock car racing's core fans by having events all over the map, taking them away from longstanding venues such as Rockingham and Darlington.  In other words: the pursuit of a higher profit is destroying what made NASCAR profitable to begin with...

I've written for several years that I wouldn't be surprised to see Nascar fold by 2020-2025. Or at the very least, there would be races that weren't televised live any more, if at all. Regrettably, there are enough sheep out there to keep the sport alive but I see no reason to change my prediction about Nascar on television because any sport depends on its traditional fanbase to support it in hard times. Nascar's attendance and ratings have been down for years and it can be traced right back to the unholy trinity's concentrated efforts to run off the traditional fans. MLB, NBA, NFL, NHL, Soccer, Tennis, Golf, other auto racing bodies such as Indy and F1, and nearly every other sport I can think of tries at least to innovate but still remaining loyal to their core fanbase. In the case of MLB, I think they try too hard sometimes to do this since it hinders progress that could actually make the game better, but they are at least trying to keep their core fans.

Nascar on the other hand doesn't subscribe to this theory. They think that the fairweather fans are the group they need to go after. I'm not saying they shouldn't try to lure in new fans but I am saying that perhaps if they didn't mess with things that worked to draw in fans for over 50 years previously, perhaps they might actually draw in some new fans without running off millions of fans that Bill France Sr and Jr worked for a combined 55 years to draw in.

Crash here for more of Doug's thoughts.  It's well worth reading and pondering, whether you are a fan of NASCAR or are a student of corporate decision-making (if there really is such a thing...)

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Xbox done

Here's the Xbox One...

There is no backward compatibility: you can't play anything from your already-existing library of Xbox 360 games on it.  You can't play your original Xbox games on it either.  Ditto for any games from Xbox Live Arcade.  It has no power button (it stays on all the time) and it needs an Internet connection to really function optimally.  It has a hard drive, but it's non-removable.  To play your games you must install from the disc.  If there is no more room on the hard drive you'll have to wipe some games off (then re-install if you want to play them again later on).  It won't work at all without the Kinect sensor (something which unless you have ample enough space, could be a problem).  Once you play a new game it's tied into that Xbox One unit and you can't easily take it anywhere else or let a friend borrow it or be allowed to sell it... okay well you can but the next player using it will have to pay a fee to Microsoft.

But at least it will tie all your incoming cable TV, satellite TV, Internet, Blu-ray and whatever else into it so that you only need one remote control.  I guess that's something worth five hundred bucks, huh?

The big "reveal" yesterday spent way more time raving about the Xbox One's television and home entertainment capabilities than it did about actual video gaming.  Seems to kinda defeat the point of pouring the entire budget of a typical developing country into the design of something for... you know... playing video games.

The lack of backward compatibility alone turns me off completely from wanting an Xbox One.  But then Microsoft had to add insult to injury more ways than I care to count...

I'm gonna be way, way content with my Xbox 360 for a long time to come.  Based on commentary I've seen since yesterday's reveal, I won't be the only one apparently.  Heck, lots of people and private businesses are still using Windows XP nearly twelve years after it was released.  I'm expecting the Xbox 360 to enjoy similar longevity.  Along with anticipating Microsoft's entry into the next-gen console wars to slip to a hard second after the PlayStation 4, and perhaps even lagging significantly behind the Wii U.

And one last thing about the Xbox One: it's ugly too.  It's like the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey as envisioned by George Orwell: a big black solid slab of freedom is slavery.

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End of an era: Disney closes LucasArts

LucasArts is no more.

Disney laid off the entire staff and shuttered the studio this morning.  There had been speculation that LucasArts might be liquidated after Disney acquired Lucasfilm and the other companies beneath its umbrella five months ago.  The video game studio had been flailing in recent years despite moderate successes like LEGO Star Wars.  On the other hand there were turkeys like Kinect Star Wars.  It had been hoped that games like the upcoming Star Wars: 1313 would have increased its fortunes.

But now it's official: LucasArts has been closed down.  Disney has stated that future games will be licensed to other studios for development.  Some like Star Wars: 1313 may never get released at all.  The "LucasArts" name will continue to exist but the firm itself and its development staff has been disbanded.

I can see that as an appropriate measure.  The Star Wars: The Old Republic massive-multiplayer online game was practically developed entirely by BioWare anyway.  This is the way the wind had been blowing for some time...

Even so, a little bit of my youth died today.  Star Wars: X-Wing was the very first computer game that I bought, way back in winter of 1994.  The sequel TIE Fighter consumed most of my summer a few months later.  When I played Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis (still one of THE BEST computer role-playing games ever) I obsessively went through all three of the "paths" that Indy could take.  To say nothing of the creatively offbeat games like Full Throttle and Sam and Max Hit the Road.

(I would be remiss if I didn't mention also Rescue on Fractalus: a game that some swear remains one of the most terrifying and fright-inducing more than a quarter century after its release.)

Well, the studio may be gone.  But the memories it evoked will ever burn bright.

Farewell, LucasArts.  And thank you for all the good times you gave us...

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Towns Without Pity: Modder proves EA is LYING about SIMCITY always-online!

So... that whole thing about Electronic Arts' new SimCity requiring a constant Internet connection to play?  EA told us that it was needed because most of the game's processing takes place on EA's own servers.  In other words: the official company line is that it is not possible at all to play SimCity locally on your PC or laptop.  And despite the horde of connection problems that players were made to endure throughout the past week, EA has insisted that they can't remove the always-online obligation and that doing so would require coding up a whole new game.

Lies!  Lies!  All damnable lies!!

Electronic Arts, you got some 'splainin' to do.

The video gaming realm is reeling tonight after word surfaced that a hacker/modder calling himself "UKAzzer" has made SimCity completely playable in the total absence of Internet, for however long you want!

UKAzzer was able to enter the game's demo mode and from there he turned off the disconnection timer.  A few tiny changes of code and the game kept going, and going, and going... and going.  Not only that but he's also discovered that cities can be made much larger than the limits "officially" imposed by the game.

And he's proven it too.  Look!  YouTube clip!



So it looks like the "always-online" component was only slapped-on for digital rights management.  One anonymous developer at Maxis (now owned by EA and the studio that created the first SimCity game nearly 25 years ago) has come out and said as much, adding that it was very easy to make the new SimCity a single-player experience without needing to be online at all.

This situation is really quite unprecedented so far as the video/computer game industry goes. EA practically made it a litany about always-online being needed and how SimCity absolutely, positively could not be made to function without it.  That assertion is now, without any uncertainty, a false one.

I'll wager an RC Cola and a Moon Pie that the next few days at Electronic Arts are going to be a PR nightmare.  But since they've been caught, they should go ahead and do the right thing and rip out the always-online DRM from SimCity.  Doing so would go a LONG way toward re-establishing good relations with its customers and player-base.  Ever since word (and those horrid reviews on Amazon.com) hit the street about how crap-tacular SimCity is because of the DRM, would-be players have been avoiding this game like the plague.  EA needs to come clean and fix this, STAT!

(And if Blizzard is wise, that company will do the same with Diablo III.  If the upcoming PlayStation 3 port of that game won't need always-online, there is no reason whatsoever why the original PC version would require it either.)

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Dear Amazon: I don't care about gay marriage, just gimme my damn books

I believe that homosexuality and bisexuality is just as wrong as heterosexual extramarital intercourse, rape and polygamy and for the same reasons.

Do I have gay and lesbian friends?  Yup, sure do.  Plenty of them in fact.  They already know that I cannot approve with a sincere heart the behavior they engage in.  They also already know that though I must judge as wrong that behavior, I cannot judge them wrong as people.  Certainly not as the friends who I am thankful to have.

I don't believe that "homosexual marriage" is wrong.  I know that it is.  The notion itself is a contradiction against logic and human culture.  "Marriage" entails the uniting of two unique characteristics into one, so that the the sum is greater than the equal of its constituent parts.  That is something among human society that can only be found in the uniting of one man and one woman.  We've had six thousand years of recorded history without "gay marriage" up 'til now, and many thousands of years of human culture just as absent of it before that.  Sure there were aberrations and deviations once in awhile, but by and large gay marriage is a mutation that has never survived social Darwinism.

Those who advocate "gay marriage" are ignorant of something else.  Namely, that true marriage is not focused at all on sexuality.  That is a defining aspect of marriage... but it's only one aspect of it.  If a marriage is based primarily on sex, then it's not going to be a marriage that tends to survive and endure the trials and tribulations of a couple's lifetime together.  That goes for any couple, be they gay or straight.

So why are we seeing homosexual marriage hoisted high and in our faces lately?  There are two reasons, I have observed.  The first is that legalizing "gay marriage" is perceived by its proponents as being official endorsement for that behavior.

The second is that many if not most of those demanding "gay marriage" believe that doing so demonstrates how "progressive", how "forward-thinking", how "wise and tolerant" they really are.  They won't admit or acknowledge it in the slightest but to them, they are assuming that they "know better" than the rest of us and that we have to be "educated" and made to conform to their own demands and expectations.

Case in point: Amazon's new commercial for its Kindle Paperwhite e-book reader.  I first saw it last night.  It opens with a man and a woman laying on the beach.  The guy is squinting at his tablet in the harsh sunlight while the lady is obviously enjoying reading without straining her eyes.  Convinced, the man immediately orders a Kindle Paperwhite and tells the girl they should go out and celebrate.

Trying to shut him down, she tells him "My husband is bringing me a drink right now."

"So is mine," the man tells her.  Cut to the bar behind them and their husbands(?) waving back at them.

No doubt that Amazon deems this to be a groundbreaking and culturally revolutionary ad.  That it's a game-changer for marketing.  The climax of the commercial practically screams out "WE'RE DIFFERENT AND PRO-GAY DAMMIT!"

Fine.  Amazon is pro-homosexual "marriage".  I couldn't care less what Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos believes on the matter.  He's as entitled to his beliefs and spending money on them as much as anybody is.

But this kind of marketing is a terrible, terrible model for a business.  In fact, it's proven to be downright disastrous.

And I'm not talking about for taking pro-gay stances either.  Anytime a company's leadership decides to use that company as a platform for a social or political agenda, the profits drop.  Ever heard of Hechinger?  It used to be a pretty major name in the hardware and home improvement business, right up there with Lowe's and Home Depot.  And then its head executives chose to make Hechinger as a company pro-gun control.

People stopped shopping at Hechinger as a result.  They wanted lumber and bathroom fixtures, not a political statement.  That was twenty years ago and very few people now remember the company existed at all.

Want more proof?  J.C. Penney's profits dropped 32% in the past quarter.  The situation there is so dire that the company is apparently deferring payments to its suppliers.  Many are blaming J.C. Penney's pro-homosexual marketing: a blunder bad enough to warrant many to demand the banishment of Ron Johnson, the current CEO.

Look, it's not the particulars and peculiarities of the personas involved that is the present problem.  I've come to enjoy the products I buy from Apple.  My iPad goes with me everywhere.  It's become an indispensable part of my life.  I also know that Apple's CEO Tim Cook is widely reported to be gay.  But not for a moment have I considered not buying stuff from Apple because of it.  I buy Apple's gadgets because they work and because the company trusts its products enough to sell themselves.  I do not now, nor will I ever buy something because it's being sold as "pro-straight".  I would however very seriously consider not buying a product if the officials running the company selling it decide to get "in yo' face" about an issue that I disagree with.

And based on history, I don't doubt that there are many others who would refuse to support such a company either, on those same grounds.

Amazon: seriously?  A pro-gay e-book reader?  Why should I care?  Why should anybody care?

Jeff Bezos, keep your pro-gay stance to yourself.  Just be a responsible CEO and shut up and sell books.

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Mellow Mushroom goes the extra mile for U.S. soldier's family

There is a Mellow Mushroom that opened up not long ago in nearby Burlington. I've yet to eat at that one but now I'm feeling led to. For one thing the pizza is insanely delicious. For another, after reading this next story y'all will agree: this company rocks!

The tale begins with Army National Guard Major Shawn Fulker, who lives in Jacksonville, Florida. At the moment Fulker is deployed thousands of miles from home in Afghanistan. His wife's birthday was coming up and in spite of the distance he wanted to do something nice for her. Josephine Fulker really loves the pizza at Mellow Mushroom, so Shawn e-mailed the company's corporate office and asked if one of their Jacksonville restaurants could deliver a pizza and a $50 gift card to his wife. Shawn let them know that he would gladly call the store and pay for it by credit card.

Good story so far, aye? But wait: it gets better...

Mellow Mushroom's headquarters forwarded the e-mail to the company's Fleming Island location, which went above and beyond the call of duty. First they made a special heart-shaped crust for the pizza.

Then the store manager and another employee drove out with it, stopped at a supermarket to buy balloons and a vase of flowers, and proceeded on to the Fulker home.

They delivered it all - including the $50 gift card - to Josephine.

And the store didn't charge Shawn Fulker a thing! From the story at ABC News...

John Valentino, the Mellow Mushroom franchisee who owns that location and others in Jacksonville, said his store was happy to have made the day special for the couple.

"Of course we weren't going to charge him for anything," Valentino told ABC. "Him being a serviceman and his wife being home. … Hopefully in her husband's absence we were able to help her have a great birthday while he's over in Afghanistan serving our country."

Josephine Fulker had just finished Skyping with her husband when the doorbell rang and she saw the two Mellow Mushroom employees at her door on Thursday.

"I don't know their names exactly, but they had a pizza and a big butterfly balloon and a vase of flowers with a gift card for $50 and they told me that it was from my husband. I said 'Oh my goodness.' I was surprised and excited and overwhelmed and all of that. It was so nice," she said.

It was especially nice because Shawn Fulker had already sent his wife flowers and candy earlier that day. Since he hadn't been able to check his email for a while, he had no idea that Mellow Mushroom had been working on his initial request.

The Facebook page for Mellow Mushroom at Fleming Island has gone bonkers with gratitude about their efforts for the Fulkers. Which was a very, very cool thing to have done.

And hey, Fulker and his unit also showed their thanks, all the way from Afghanistan!

It's stuff like this that renews my faith in humanity. Way to go Mellow Mushroom :-)

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No more Twinkies: Labor union destroys Hostess

I hope the idiots in the photo on the right are happy.  Those are some of the members of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union who went on strike against their employer: Hostess Brands, Inc.

The union has about 5,000 people working at Hostess. As of this morning, their months-long strike has put themselves and thirteen thousand others out of work.

The big news at the time of this writing is Hostess going out of business and liquidating its assets. The company could no longer afford to be in business as a result of the strike. More than 18,500 people are now unemployed.

What a colossal committing of ass-hattery.

But hey, at least the employees responsible can rely on the union bosses to back them up. Not to mention getting government unemployment checks. All out of spite for a measly 2% decrease in pension that Hostess put on the bargaining table. Yeah, win the fight for a tiny amount of pension but put nearly 20,000 people out of work and destroy a favorite snack food for everyone.

Like they say on the basketball court: "Smooth move Ex-lax!"

Labor unions are worse than useless. If this doesn't demonstrate that, I don't know what possibly could.

Better stock up on your favorite Hostess-brand goodies, folks...

 

...'cuz they're about to be gone. Forever.

(I can't imagine any other company right now wanting to buy out Hostess and putting their goodies back into production: it'd cost too much to relocate factories to right-to-work states, and would anyone in their right mind in this economic environment want to go through the hassle anyway?)

It is the end of an era, my friends. A darn shame too, seeing as how Hostess snacks helped to end the reign of terror of so many supervillains back in the day.

Twinkies, Ding Dongs, Ho-Hos, Fruit Pies, Wonder Bread: get 'em now, friends and neighbors. Their value will be greater than gold as barter items on the underground market when the sh-t hits the fan. Probably sooner than later.

But if I were the CEO of Hostess, I wouldn't have put out a press release or called a news conference about what has been done to his company.

This is how I would have delivered the message...

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Harry Potter movies aparating away on December 29th

This has got to be the stoopidest marketing maneuver in the history of anything...

The folks at Warner Bros. are planning to remove all the Harry Potter movies from store shelves come December 29th. After that date, your only chance of getting Harry Potter on the shelves of your personal library (legally 'course) is to buy it secondary market a'la eBay.

Apparently Warners thinks that Disney's "Vault" model is the way to go with a film series that has already generated $12.1 billion. That should be enough money for anyone, right?

I haven't watched a Harry Potter movie since the fifth one, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, came out in theaters. Guess I could be honest and say that I've just been... waiting for the right time to revisit that film franchise (for a number of reasons). If that time comes in the near future, looks like I'm gonna have to buy the Blu-rays now and put 'em in the trunk for later. Not something I particularly care to do (also for a number of reasons).

Dumb, dumb, dumb business move. The one rationale that I've heard for Disney's treatment of the home market is that it allows for its movies to take advantage of whatever is the dominant technology at the time (VHS, then DVD, now Blu-ray etc.) I can't see how that possibly figures into Warner's strategy here. The only reason I can think of why the company is doing this, is to compel people to rush out and buy the Harry Potter movies as soon as they can for this holiday season.

Guess it'll be several more years before I or my children (Lord willing that I have any) will get to enjoy the Harry Potter series in the comfort of our own home...

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Atlas is shrugging: Alabama mine owner goes Galt

Back in late February through early March I wound up reading Atlas Shrugged for the first time in my life. That revelation shocked many of those closest to me, who had assumed that bibliojunkie that I've always been, that I would have long ago devoured Ayn Rand's classic novel.

Can't help but wonder what my life would have developed into had I read the book when I was in high school or college. Atlas Shrugged didn't add much substantially "new" to my belief system, but it did clarify and crystallize it as nothing else had before. I'm thinking of re-reading it again sometime soon (but I've re-read the part about Kip Chalmers' train at least forty times since winter and laughed every time it goes into the tunnel: yes, I'm perverse that way :-P)

So now in a page right out of Atlas Shrugged, a coal mine owner in Alabama has metaphorically taken the Ellis Wyatt route: abandoning his business and leaving the sign saying "I'm leaving it as I found it. Take over. It's yours."

Here is Ronnie Bryant's statement that he made at a public hearing in Birmingham, as being reported on David McElroy's website...

"My name’s Ronnie Bryant, and I’m a mine operator…. I’ve been issued a [state] permit in the recent past for [waste water] discharge, and after standing in this room today listening to the comments being made by the people…. [pause] Nearly every day without fail — I have a different perspective — men stream to these [mining] operations looking for work in Walker County. They can’t pay their mortgage. They can’t pay their car note. They can’t feed their families. They don’t have health insurance. And as I stand here today, I just … you know … what’s the use? I got a permit to open up an underground coal mine that would employ probably 125 people. They’d be paid wages from $50,000 to $150,000 a year. We would consume probably $50 million to $60 million in consumables a year, putting more men to work. And my only idea today is to go home. What’s the use? I don’t know. I mean, I see these guys — I see them with tears in their eyes — looking for work. And if there’s so much opposition to these guys making a living, I feel like there’s no need in me putting out the effort to provide work for them. So as I stood against the wall here today, basically what I’ve decided is not to open the mine. I’m just quitting. Thank you."

Well, I can't say that I blame him. Earlier today I learned that a dear friend in California was having to apply for a business license just to tutor kids after school. When I read that, I was like "What the...?!?"

Business owners, and especially small business owners, are the source of all industry and productivity in this country. Hell, in any country. They do not need or deserve to be overly burdened with ridiculous amounts of government oversight, legislation and regulation. When I read the story of Ronnie Bryant, and how he has given up out of frustration... it pisses me off!! This was a man who created and maintained jobs that people need and want.

Much more of this, and there won't be a United States as we have come to know it.

Sometimes, I wonder if that's the conscientious purpose of too many in our government.

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New area business: Two Girls & A Truck Landscaping

Lately quite a number of good people that I know have decided to start up their own businesses. Here's another one and as always, this blogger is more than happy to direct y'all's attention to it :-)

Based out of nearby Oak Ridge, Two Girls & A Truck Landscaping is a landscaping and lawn servicing company owned by Tammy Marcum Buck, Linda Marcum and Oscar Marcum. Don't have time to mow your lawn? Let the Two Girls do it for you! They can help you wherever you're at in the vicinity of Greensboro, Oak Ridge, Summerfield, Madison and Mayodan etc. And right now they're offering a special: $35 of cutting, weed-eating, trimming and blowing for up to half an acre. They're also offering a 10% discount for elderly and disabled. Two Girls & A Truck Landscaping will give you a free estimate on your landscaping needs and annual contracts are available.

So if your lawn is looking more and more like a bloodthirsty jungle, check out Two Girls & A Truck and hire them to tame it!

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A good friend just started a franchise biz!

Nicholette Haynes is a very dear and sweet friend. And earlier today she announced that she had begun a PartyLite home business. PartyLite is an outfit that sells things like candles (especially scented ones), home decor and sweet-smelling stuff for bath and such. There's some great stuff that Nicholette is selling as a PartyLite consultant and you can find them all on her new website! Give it a looksee and give Nicholette some business :-)

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It's just me... and my Smart Cover

So after doing my best to find an iPad 2 at one of the many local stores purporting to carry it, to no avail, I bit the debit card and proceeded to Apple's website and ordered one. And I went all out!! Got a 64-gigabyte model in black, with Wi-Fi and 3G (the AT&T version). Looking forward to it arriving in a few weeks. Hey, then I can be blogging from anywhere! Like at iCoffee in Summerfield, f'rinstance. I guess then I could have Tebow sitting next to me whilst I write. Heh-heh, "Blogging with Tebow": sounds like a winner :-)

Well anyhoo, I just checked the status of my order and the iPad 2 is still due to arrive in mid-April. However, the Smart Cover that I ordered along with it is already en route and due to be delivered here on Tuesday!

That's a bit bass-ackwards. It's like priority shipping a pooper-scooper ahead of a puppy. Apple coulda saved wads of money if it had shipped them together, but I didn't see an option for that when I placed my order. Pretty lousy business sense, in my opinion.

But anyhoo, I'll soon have an iPad 2 Smart Cover, but no iPad 2. Guess I'll just have to use my imagination for the next four weeks. Sorta like a Calvin 'n Hobbes thing when you think about it.

Maybe I could put the Smart Cover on an Etch-A-Sketch and pretend that I have an iPad 2? :-P

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The Knight Shift welcomes a new sponsor: The Detailed Decorator!

This is a momentous day for The Knight Shift! Yours Truly is proud to announce the very first business to contact this blog for advertising.

So without further ado, it is my great honor to direct your attention to The Detailed Decorator LLC, based in Atlanta, Georgia!

Owned and operated by Jaime Casstevens, The Detailed Decorator specializes in finding unique interior decor custom-tailored for each customer. In her own words, Jaime says that...

The Detailed Decorator was created with YOU in mind. Do you not know what accessory to buy for your home? Do you not have the time to go shopping? Let The Detailed Decorator do it for you.

From shopping in exclusive stores to just looking for something you couldn't find anywhere else, we are here to help. We specialize in personalized shopping to meet all of your home decorating needs.

The customer is our #1 priority. It's our goal to help you make your house a home.

Don't know how to get started, check out our online store and blog you just might find something you're looking for.......

We sale and ship to all of North America!

You can click here to visit The Detailed Decorator website and if you are on Facebook you can visit The Detailed Decorator's page there and see much, much more!

So here's a hearty welcome to The Detailed Decorator! And if you have a business (or some other legitimate operation) and want to advertise on a blog that serves up bunches of unique hits per day to a worldwide audience, contact me at theknightshift@gmail.com and we'll work something out!

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Darn you Steve Jobs!

My plans have been thrown afoul... because now I'll have to be here next Friday afternoon to place my order for the iPad 2 on Apple's website.

(Mash here for one of Engadget's myriad of articles about the product's unveiling today.)

I didn't get an iPad last year, but I fell in love enough with the simplicity of the design that... I knew this was on my short-list of "things I never knew I needed" and ought to have. For more than a decade people have given me funny looks when I have to tell them that I've never had a laptop computer. I just don't like how they're made: too much that can get broken easily. The iPad is different. And iPad 2 has enough bells and whistles on it to have me break down to get one now.

'Course, word on the street is that iPad 3 might be coming out around September. Not feeling terribly obligated to wait to see what it may (or may not) have on it. I just care about what can help me be productive now... and since I'm looking at a fair bit of traveling coming soon, the iPad is gonna make a fine tool to that end.

Besides, if iPad 3 is lustworthy enough, I can just give my iPad 2 to my sister :-)

On another note, Steve Jobs looks great!! Glad to see that his health is apparently improving well :-)

EDIT 8:50 p.m. EST: So my sister has since told me "I don't see what's so great about them!" and that she doesn't care to have an iPad at all.

Well, phooey on her!! I'll tell you what I might do, gang: come September or October, if there is an iPad 3 out and I wind up getting that, we may just have a contest on this blog and give away the iPad 2.

Or I could get two iPad 2s soon and run a contest and give one of those away, brand-new.

Hey, you never know what is going to happen on this blog :-P

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Awesome news: Monsterpocalypse to ditch collectible format (MUCH easier to get into the game)

I've been so busy with community theatre and other projects that it's been months since I've had time to get in a game of Monsterpocalypse: Privateer Press's terrific game of giant monsters and metropolitan destruction (or defense, depending on which faction you wanna side with). But that hasn't stopped my love for this sweet lil' game (which I wrote of my love for over a year ago). I now own sizable armies of each faction and every Mega figure except for Mega Vorgax (one just sold for $197 on eBay: I love the Planet Eaters but not that much :-P). And I've come to develop a pretty good metagame-thinkin' style so far as strategy goes.

Monsterpocalypse is one of the most fun games that I've ever played. But there's been one complaint about it: that its been a collectible miniatures game. Meaning, you had to buy booster boxes without being able to see firsthand what you were getting. So a typical box might have 1 building, and 5 units of differing factions... and they might not necessarily be a faction you want to collect. This has led to a significant trading element to the game (not to mention a secondary market on eBay and other sites) but horribly frustrating for most people.

But things are about to change for the better. Last week Privateer Press announced that Monsterpocalypse would soon be going to a non-collectible format. Beginning this summer there will be boxes clearly marked with each faction and those are the figures you can expect to get. So if you like to play G.U.A.R.D. and need more of that faction, you can buy that box and not have to worry about a single Lords of Cthul creeping out (though as a player who loves the Lords of Cthul perhaps too much, I for one wouldn't have a problem with that :-P). A lot more people are about to start playing this game, who wanted to get into it earlier but were turned off by the collectible marketing. Which can only be a good thing :-)

By the way, if you're in the Greensboro/Burlington area, we play Monsterpocalypse most Thursday nights at HyperMind: a very neat game store in Burlington, not far from Elon University's campus. And if you wanna know even more about this great game and also order Monsterpocalypse figures and accessories (including some super-kewl dice just for Monsterpocalypse) click on over to the Team Covenant website: those guys live and breathe Monsterpocalypse. I'm even considering attending the second MonCon convention in Tulsa, Oklahoma in a few months that these good folks organize.

And 'course, it goes without saying that I have to mention the video I made for HyperMind's entry in that Monsterpocalypse contest a year and a half ago...

According to my calculations, I used Defender X and Terra Khan to demolish all of downtown Burlington, North Carolina. But hey, it coulda been worse: I could very well have unleashed Yasheth :-P

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Song's over: Activision cancels Guitar Hero series

The big news coming out of the video game industry today is Activision shutting down the Guitar Hero series: once one of the most insanely popular set of video games in recent history. The company cited declining sales as being the biggest factor in the decision to bring the "music 'n rhythm" series to a halt.

This reminds me a lot... a whole lot even... of the "video game crash" that took place between 1983 and 1985. This might come as a shock to the younger readers of this blog (ooh-boy am I dating myself here :-P) but once upon a time, video games were not "hip" at all. Ya see, in 1982 the Atari 2600 was the king of home video gaming. It seemed nigh-invulnerable. But within a year or two the home video game industry hit rock-bottom hard.

What happened? Mostly it was a market way over-saturated with games that were, well... crap. Turkeys like E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial (a title now infamous for how Atari paid the mob to bury millions of unsold E.T. cartridges in a New Mexico landfill) and Pac-Man (HOW did Atari mess that one up?!) did plenty enough damage, but so too did M*A*S*H and Porky's and Custer's Revenge (I refuse to even begin to describe what that game was like, it's so unbelievably... wrong).

Same thing has happened to the music game genre. Between Guitar Hero and Rock Band and seemingly "new" titles for those series every few months - not to mention the over-abundance of the gaming peripherals - there is simply too much music video gaming on the market right now.

I don't think the genre is ever going to disappear completely. But today's announcement from Activision is certainly gonna obligate the studios to re-assess where music gaming goes from here. Personally, I think it'll prove to be a good thing. It has mandated an obligation to be innovative. I've little doubt that music games will not only continue to be produced, but will also become better in the long run.

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