I'm sure you've heard someone mention the closet syndrome, or have even experienced it yourself. It occurs when you leave something hanging in the closet, or folded in the drawer, unused for an extended period of time, say a year or two, or longer. Clothes change when unused for a long time.

First, you may notice that this really nice garment that was so trendy and sharp-looking when you hung it up appears to have altered in appearance. The fabric looks just slightly out of date, or it may appear faded, or just a tad worn. There may even be "tea" stains on light colors, like an ivory wool jacket. It's the darkness of the closet that affects the fabrics. Sometimes, the buttons, or the trim, or lace, may be a bit worn. Now how could that have happened? It was like new the last time you had it on.

Then you try it on and the most drastic change of all appears. The garment shrank. It's too snug. The buttons pull. The waist may not buckle easily. The belt may not meet. Horrors. You definitely have the shrinking closet syndrome. The closet doesn't shrink; only the clothes inside it shrink. Sometimes, even the shoes shrink.

This syndrome affects all races. all ages. and both sexes. No one is safe from this dreadful phenomenon. However, it does take one more nasty curve for the older person. Clothes may also be longer than they used to be by an inch or two.

No known cure has been developed yet.
 

Finally, TV dealt with a difficult topic, and did it in an entertaining fashion. Topics like this are usually avoided, but The Philanthropist dealt with child slavery in Haiti. The slave trade is still very much alive in vast parts of the world, particularly in Asia and third world countries.

Usually the slaves are young girls and women, but in some places like Haiti, boys are also sold as slaves. Usually the families sell them out of a severe need for money, but as evidenced in this TV show out of greed and cruelty as well. The price is not very high in general. The buyers are people who may have a little more money but need laborers, for their homes and gardens or factories. In many places, they are sold by their families into prostitution. By age 30, they are usually released, if they have not died of disease or mishap, without any real job skills, or family.

Having been robbed of their childhood, they live in adverse conditions, have no rights, may be beaten, and live in squalid conditions. Those who are molested by their owners or put into prostitution are subjected to disease. They do not receive an education. They know nothing but daily fear, hunger, and abuse.

There is a large international market for child sex. Tourists are solicited for such vacations. Although advertising or selling such tours in the US is illegal, Americans can go to another country to make arrangements. Places like the Philippines specialize in child brothels. In Manila, there was such a brothel with a busy trade. All the girls were 12-14. Because the owners feared that they would run away, they were chained to their beds. A can was put in their rooms to use as a toilet. (I have trouble imagining an adult would want to have sex with a young girl who is chained to her bed and may be carrying a dangerous disease. But maybe its the thrill of danger coupled with the feeling of power over a helpless human who cannot escape. These are men who really need to suffer.) When a fire broke out in the house, the girls could not escape or be rescued, but perished in the fire.

Getting the word out is not enough. At the end of The Philanthropist, he asked a question, "What can we do about it? Any ideas?" And that's what we need to do, listen to ideas, asking ourselves what can we do as individuals, as groups, to stop selling children into slavery and offer them a chance to grow, to learn, to work, to have their own families. What will we do for the world's children?


 

I remember the summer my baby brother took summer school. And the second summer as well. The first was for English literature. The second was world history.

I wanted to be sure he at least got through summer school, so I coached him. His big project that summer was Tale of Two Cities. I hadn't read it, so we went to a second hand book store and got a copy for me. We discussed it almost every day. He memorized lines; in fact, he can still quote them now, several decades later. The classroom must have been a little boring during the school year, or he was having too much fun. He did well in summer school and with a little one on one attention. I always tried to respect his opinion and didn't force feed him any ideas. Today, he still loves learning and is deemed to be very smart by most people. I guess school just wasn't his strong suit.

As for world history, I hadn't taken any classes in it, high school or college, so I was about to learn a few things. The short session allowed only the first half of the 20th century. When they got up to the origins of World War II, he began to shine. His political cartoon was clever and original. Our discussions showed he was listening in his classroom. His special project was Mussolini. So we trekked to the library (pre-Web, remember?), and got out a stack of books. At home he learned to use index cards for facts and ideas, and to note the reference on the back of the card. We discussed all the data, so I could be sure he understood it, and planned an outline for his paper. Then he rejected that outline, and created his own. I was a little hurt if I'm honest, but I was proud that he was an independent thinker and not just a robot. He put together the paper and listed his sources in his bibliography. The teacher wasn't accustomed to such quality papers in summer school, but insisted he must have plagiarized one or more of the sources, even though she couldn't prove it. (She was wrong. She could have proved it by quizzing him on the topic, or asking him to give an impromptu oral report. He'd have aced it.)

So what do I recall of Mussolini after all these years? Well, in a nutshell: Italy was in terrible shape and needed rescuing. He did. He was wonderful for Italy. Then after winning the people over, he shafted them. Too blunt? Try this:

By the late 1930's, Italy was way behind much of Europe. Garbage piled up in the streets. Sewage was everywhere. Clean drinking water was hard to come by. Health standards were low, disease was common. The streets and the cities were filthy. Transportation was unimproved despite population increases. The people were poor, hungry, and desperate for a better life. Mussolini came to the rescue. He loved Italy and wanted to make life better for his people. He organized public transportation, built new roads, put modern sewage systems in, laid pipeline for drinking water, and established garbage collection. He supported the arts, preserving antiquities, and improved the health care system. And the people loved him for it. People always love a leader who improves their lives, and they stop looking at the details of his political moves. They will ignore the danger signs of the future for a piece of the pie now.

As he grew in their favor and in political strength, the power went to his head, and he made alliances that were not in the country's best interest. Those same people that adored him began to revile him. They mutilated his body and the body of his mistress in the streets (what did she have to do with his decisions?). The multitudes are easily turned, and that one became vicious and primitive.

History has a way of repeating itself, because people are essentially the same throughout the ages. We should be wary of any leader who offers to solve all our problems quickly. Promises and programs that sound too good to be true probably have a lot of risk involved, There are many troubled places in the world, including Mexico and the USA, that have substandard living and huge economic, hunger, or health problems. The time is ripe for a "rescuer" to step in and solve the problems of the masses. Who will be the next Mussolini?



 

"Doesn't" is not the proper form of the verb for this entry title. (It's a song title.) He's not what he once was, but who is?

I saw him in concert last night. I'm not really a country music fan, but I like everything. Bluegrass, classical, opera, swing, jazz, Beatles, motown, beach music, disco, etc, I'm not too familiar with new wave, grunge, and reggae. I don't like gansta. But country is very mainstream, and my family likes it.

The Jones concert for the whole family was a birthday present for my 81 year old father from one of my brothers. There were 8 of us, counting the six month old, in umbrella chairs under the stars in our downtown mall. Four generations, relaxing to a warm-up by sons of the Statler Brothers, enjoyed a summer evening together and smacked the occasional mosquito. The humidity had let up and the heat wasn't so bad, at least compared to scorching temperatures today, and a good time was had by all. Yes, we watched a lot of people in t-shirts get inebriated. The audience was small. It wasn't even sold out. But there were a lot of loyal fans who let him know they loved him.

The good news is that No Show Jones showed up. These days he has a mop of white hair and a paunch. He can't hit those low notes like in his recordings and doesn't try. He did do some medleys of his songs, and The Jones Boys, his band, featured a lot of instrumentals. And he did shortened versions of his number one hits. George and his band probably were on stage for a little over an hour. His duet partner was Britney Allen, a petite singer with a really big voice. She did great and should go further.

George is slowing down, but at age 77, he showed that he's still not ready for any rocking chair.
 

The hoopla that has risen over Kevin Skinner has caused me some consternation, so I did a little research. And I have come to these conclusions about him and about our society.

Kevin is what you see. A country boy, married, he's part of a close family that works hard and loves music. He and his brothers and sister and father all make music. One brother has a college degree in classical piano. His sister is in a band with him, called Kevin Skinner and Friends. He writes songs, including one about his grandmother who died two years ago. He was very close to her and wrote the song as therapy for himself. When he told the AGT "camera" about mud bogging and sitting on the porch to count the stars, he was serious, and he thought they were good answers, not humorous things. The people in his hometown really do those things. His wife is well-spoken and poised and just an every day person, a solid citizen like Kevin. People back home who knew him are really excited that a "homeboy" is making good. They're excited that someone they've known, gone to school with, or worked with is getting the limelight. He's enjoyed a good reputation and really seems to be a good guy. He's not an actor or a plant in the show like so many have claimed.

He's different from Susan Boyle. I don't like the comparison, first of all because it isn't being very nice to her, treating her like some object of ridicule still. But Kevin is intelligent and so far seems to be able to handle the pressure better. His main crime is that he came from western Kentucky and speaks not only with a Southern accent, but with the particular version that comes from that part of the state. It's unfortunate that he's been unemployed. Prior to that he had an honest job helping to put food on America's table.

When he first encountered those judges and their rudeness and then the laughter of the audience, my heart broke, not just for him, but for all Southerners who've ever been judged as slow or stupid because of slowness of speech and/or a drawl. I prayed, "Oh, God, please, let him be good.". And he didn't disappoint me, and I loved seeing those rude, prejudiced, narrow-minded judges having to do an about face.If his feelings were hurt, he kept it hidden. He remained poised, and calm, and polite. He not only showed us his talent, but his good heart, and deep character.

We saw for ourselves the shallow character of the entertainment industry as represented by the emcee and the judges. But what about the audience?
Why would anyone laugh when a person says he's unemployed at any time, but especially in this economy? What if he had hungry or sick kids at home; would that be funny? And what's wrong with being a chicken catcher? I wouldn't want to do it, but I don't want to be a plumber, or a cable installer, or any number of jobs that have to be done. Honest work is a good thing, not a joke. And who says that being a judge on a talent show is more important than providing chickens for those judges to eat in their expensive restaurants? They not only laughed at Kevin, they laughed at millions of people who have to do dirty jobs for a living. What does that say about that audience or about our culture?

(If I really wanted to do some low blows, I might say that Kevin Skinner has never been filmed by his daughter, drunk eating a sandwich off the floor like"The Hoff", or that he doesn't live with a burnt out drug addict and grown kids who have a ton of problems. So who should be laughing at whom?)

Yes, Kevin has talent. He sings with emotion, and from his heart because that's the way he is. He has an artist's heart. He feels things deeply and expresses them through music. It puts a lump in our throats when we hear him sing a soulful song. Let's hope they don't let the background tracks overwhelm him, which almost happened in the quarter finals. It's always good news to see a deserving person succeed. But the big news here is that we have become a crass, unappreciative, judgmental society, and that the entertainment industry is so unconnected to the real world. We need more people like Kevin who can remind us to get back on track.


 

Usually men design houses. I really haven't seen that many female architects or lead contractors. And it shows. Yet, women outnumber men as the managers of those houses.

First, there are never enough electrical outlets. Or if there are almost enough, they are not in convenient locations. In a bedroom, the outlet may in the middle of the only wall with no windows or doors. Where is the bed going to go? Right against the middle of that wall, making that outlet difficult to reach, if at all. Or heavy dressers or bookcases will cover the outlet. And these days, there are TV's, radios, clocks, and computers in bedrooms, as well as lamps. And with today's small appliances and electronics, kitchens and family rooms need outlets at several spots on each wall and at several heights. In my computer corner, I have one outlet with two plugs for a computer, a lamp, a printer, and a phone! So where do I plug the vacuum? You can never have too many shoes or electrical outlets. Of course, the circuitry has to handle all those extra things, too.

Next, closets. They're never big enough, even when every room has one. Closets aren't just for clothes. They hold all our "stuff". We have to have a place for luggage, sports things, Christmas things, linens, supplies for overnight guests, vacuums, floor polishers, carpet cleaners, crafts, nostalgia, toys and games, visitors' coats,and our hobbies. Some households need a place to keep medical or invalid supplies. And we can't forget a place to hide birthday or Christmas gifts. Now our bedroom closets don't have to be gigantic, as long as there is a second closet somewhere else, you know, for seasonal things. We can trade out summer and winter wardrobes, the active closet being the one in the bedroom. Anything that doesn't get transferred back and forth with the season changes goes in the box for donations to the V.A. charity yard sale. Even big houses just don't seem to come with small pantries or broom closets,

So many shortcuts are taken when building houses. You'll find a house where the outlets are far from the doors, so that when you enter a room at night, you have to rub your arm up and down the wall until you locate the switch. I had a house where one outlet on a blank wall in the dining area was almost too high for me to reach. And I've seen houses where the washer and dryer and water heater were in the closet. So where does that family member hang clothes or get privacy? And in my A-frame, floor vents for heating and cooling were right up against the double set of sliding doors, so that the air went up between the drapes and the glass, and not into the room where we needed warm air.

And that brings me to another gripe. Baseboard heat. These men in a hurry don;t care when they're building that for the next 40 years or more, furniture is going to be right up against those heat units, blocking air flow, and drying out and cracking from the heat. I just know that if women were on the job, things would turn out differently.


 

I took a course in college under Professor Disraeli about the complexity of language. We had two sentences we always came back to review all semester. They were very simple, but made a good point; context is everything.

The first sentence went like this: "The missionary is ready to serve." Now just what does that mean out of contest? Is the missionary ready to serve a round of tennis, as in take a turn? Or volleyball (serve the ball)? Or is he handing out a parking ticket on a day with a traffic cop? (serve a ticket) Is he accompanying someone to "serve" a summons or divorce papers?

Has the missionary taken time off from his calling to serve his country in the military? In a time of war, the missionary might very well be willing and ready to serve in the military. Or might the missionary be serving a dinner, or serving coffee? It could be a statement that he had finished training and learned a language and is ready to go to an assigned field to serve God, or to serve his calling. Maybe he has mustered up his courage and he is ready to serve in some unsavory task, not in the job description, but that he feels is necessary.

Then again maybe, like the movies I watched as a kid-The Three Stooges, or Abbot and Costello, the missionary has been cooked by cannibals and is now tender enough to put on the cannibals' table, as in "the chicken is ready to serve". One usage I did not know about back then, I have since learned from PBS' "Are You Being Served". "The missionary is ready to serve" might mean that he is on duty at his job now and is ready to assist people in a purchase.

The second one is "The lamb is hot." Four words. Here goes:
The lamb is really overheated in his unshorn wool and needs air-conditioning.
The lamb is really sexy, very pretty.
The lamb is very popular right now with all its little lamb friends.
The lamb is angry.
The lamb is feeling the urge to mate.
The lamb upholstery is sexy, popular, best-selling, etc, and not an actual live animal at all. Maybe a toy or Halloween costume. Maybe a vest that's also available in suede.
The lamb is cooked (like the cannibal's missionary) and is hot in temperature, right out of the oven.
The lamb is the butcher's best-selling meat this month.
The lamb, butchered and cooked, is very trendy right now, in a lot of restaurants and stores. Add it to the menu to make money from the trend.
The lamb is very spicy and burns the tongue; cayenne or tobassco, or peppers, or something heat it up.

It's interesting to note than when we eat a cow, we call it beef. When we eat poultry, we still call it chicken or turkey or duck or pheasant. But kill the calf and call it veal; cook a pig and call it pork, or ham or sausages. Fish and shellfish keep their names. Buffalo is still buffalo. Bit I digress.

Context is as important as our vocabulary. And that's why we have so much trouble communicating, and we often misunderstand.


 

Saw Red, White, and Tuna last night. The third play in a trilogy about a small Texas town called Tuna. It's a two man play that makes you roll with laughter.
The first play is Greater Tuna. I say that one in another town a few years ago on a normal stage, played normally. I don't recall much except the two men played all the parts, were speed dressers, and that it was very funny.
The second play in the set is about Christmas in Tuna. Haven't seen it.
This third one is all about Texas attitude, racism, the Bible belt, and changing mores and customs. One guy played all the older women; he was so realistic, I had to keep reminding myself, there was a man with thinning hair under that wig. He moved and spoke like a middle age woman, or an aging woman that you felt he was like so many women you have known, only funnier.
But this production company staged it in a smaller theater, where the stage was ground level, and the rows of seats were raised. I managed a front row seat, so occasionally, the actor was only a few feet away from us. At that range, you see the make-up, the stockings on the men, and what's underneath the silky, nylon night gown the skinny one is wearing as he prances back and forth around the edges of the stage area. You can't help but notice that what you might expect to see is not there. Let's just say things were concealed. I tried not to look after I realized that but it's like driving by a car accident You have to sneak a peak. There were so many great lines, and I can't remember any of them.
All of the plays require that you use your imagination, and it's easy to do. The scenery is simple and adapts quickly. Most of the props are a 50's style table and some matching chairs. Sometimes the chairs are chairs, sometimes a sofa, sometimes cars, sometimes a bed. You have no trouble figuring it out. The stage hands and the dressers are essential elements of these plays. In the final act, they actually make one costume change right in front of the office, only they slow down for this one.
If you want to laugh, go see any of the Tuna plays when you get a chance.


 

Some things should be universal. We consumers love variety and uniqueness, but for some things, we'd like to have standard parts or procedures.

Take cell phones and chargers. If you buy a cell phone today, buy all the accessories, too, because a few months from now, it will be obsolete, and the parts will unavailable. You will spend your time driving all over town, trying to find any retailer who still has that part or accessory in stock. Standardization would allow only two or three type chargers. That way, they'd be interchangeable. With three chargers only, everyone in your family with different phones would be covered should one be lost or replaced. Instead, no charger works for more than one style phone. When the phone goes bad, you can't reuse the charger for another phone. You can't use the car charger for another phone.

Another variety that is more of a pain than a plus are POS machines. You know charge card readers and self-check out registers. There's one kind at the gas/convenience store you use several times a week. A different type at the grocer, and yet another at Wal-Mart. It all depends on the bank, Because they're different everywhere you go, you make mistakes, you hold up the line and get flustered. I've seen so many people apologizing to other customers because they're having trouble. If all banks would standardize these machines for payment, the consumer would learn how to operate them without so much distress at the check out counter.

And the self-help registers seem like they would be fast and easy. As long as you don't mind doing your own bagging as well, this offers a shorter line and you feel in control. Well, almost. If you key the wrong code for produce, heaven help you. Of if the item is too lightweight to register that it went into the bagging area, you have to press or beat the bagging area to make the system go on. Or maybe you have an item that can't be read by the scanner. Or heaven forbid, you buy wine and have to wait for a busy service manager to run over and approve it, so you can finalize your sale. I went with someone recently to Wal-Mart and the lines were so long that we went to the self-check line. We got through relatively easy with most items, then the lightweight t-shirt wouldn't register in the bagging session. Then he tried to pay and bag at the same time. He wasn't fast enough putting his signature on it, so it wouldn't take his credit/debit card, and it tied his card up. He had to go by the bank in person to straighten it out. Then the receipt slot, the change section, the coupon printer all are in different places from store to store. And while you're trying to get out of the next person's way, that person and her kids are all over your, looking at your bank info. There's no privacy. If it was the same type machinery in all stores, the customer could learn how to do this without so much frustration and feeling embarrassed and inept in front of strangers.

I don't want to stifle competition. It makes more cost-effective products, and fosters individuality. But electric workers, and all construction workers, know that their are standards to follow. They go to the store and buy standard parts, standard fuses, standard plumbing parts, standard size boards, etc. They work, yet still allow for individual creativity. Shopping would be so much more peaceful and stress-fee with standardized check-outs.
 

Banks are there to make a profit, usually in the form of interest and bad check fees. But they can be very creative about many ways to make money off the average consumer.

In this state, it's ok to charge up to $50 for a bounced check. Bad checks do require a small amount of labor to process. Considering the low wages paid to people who do that work, it probably runs $6 -$25 per bad check, depending on how difficult it is to collect. Now the rest is not all profit. There are a few checks that will eventually require filing a warrant, etc., and a few rare ones will never be collected. So the expense from those checks makes up another portion of the fee. The average bad check probably breaks even or makes a small profit. However, check writing is dwindling as the debit card use rises.

The fees I object to are over-the-limit fees and late fees. They're meant to be punitive, but these are excessive in practice. If someone has been over the limit two months in a row and you continue to add punitive fees-I've asked around, and it seems most banks charge $39-that customer will always be over the limit. If he can't pay it down in two months, it's not going down any time soon. That's when the bank should cut off use-no new charges-until it's below the credit line. If it's only one month, then it was just a mistake, and he/she paid it down right away. Two months in a row should be the absolute maximum for over-the-limit fees. And it should not go over $25.

Late fees are also around $39, and will accumulate regularly, even if you're making monthly payments. When a person goes through a divorce, loses a job, or goes into the hospital, payments can't be made on time or a month will be missed. If the balance is close to the credit line, and the customer has a disaster and can't pay until the last minute, the payment arrives one day after the billing date, and he gets the extra fees. The minimum payment will never be as much as the two fees plus interest, until the account gets huge with fees.

I ran into this problem when my husband was unemployed for an extended time, right after making some large purchases. A balance of $2100 quickly grew into $3500, even though I cut up the card and made payments every single month. I just couldn't pay as much as they were demanding. So the fees were $78 and the interes was higher. The balance just kept growing, and there was nothing I could do about it. I have never used a credit card since then. My credit was ruined, and I had to sell my furniture and beg from relatives to get it to stop.

Now I have to pay more for car insurance because of my credit record! I haven't had any tickets, my record is good, I haven't made any claims in 15 years. But I'm a rick to the insurance company because of my credit. Now there's another industry as crooked as banks: insurance!