Author Archive: Paul Epps
Ask for Help
Asking in time of trouble means you waited too long to ask for help. Ask for help when you are doing well. — Jim and Michele McCarthy Read more →
The Funniest Thing I Saw All Day . . .
. . . was a company web page that said if you call their customer service line, you should “be prepared to give your customer number, first and last name . . .” OK, thanks for the heads-up on the customer number but how much preparation do I need in order to be able to provide my first and last name? Read more →
Wisconsin’s Smoking Gun
If you cut the pay of an overpaid worker, he’ll generally scream bloody murder. After all, overpaid workers like to stay overpaid. But if you cut the pay of a non-overpaid worker, you haven’t really damaged him. He just quietly leaves and gets a job elsewhere. After all, the ability to find a comparable job elsewhere is pretty much the definition of not being overpaid. Now how are the Wisconsin public workers reacting to projected pay and/or benefit cuts? As if the rug’s been pulled out from under them, that’s how. Every time a worker says “These cuts will cause me severe pain,” that worker is saying, in effect, “I can’t get anyone else to pay me at the level I’m accustomed to,” or, in briefer words, “I am overpaid!” So yes, they’re overpaid. And the louder they get, the surer you can be. — Steven Landsburg Read more →
What Everyone Says in a Book
It is my ambition to say in ten sentences what everyone else says in a book — what everyone else does not say in a book. — Friedrich Nietzsche Read more →
Mass Electrocutions : Another Reason I Prefer to Just Stay Home
At least 17 people have died in a small Brazilian town after a live power cable broke and fell into a crowd of people enjoying a pre-Carnival street party. — BBC News Fiesta! Read more →
Orwell in Wisconsin
On Saturday, February 26th, Americans in all 50 states rallied to show solidarity with the people of Wisconsin, and to save the American Dream. — MoveOn.Org Ha ha — George Orwell couldn’t have said it better! MoveOn.org doesn’t stand with the people of Wisconsin, they stand with the people trying to rip off the people of Wisconsin. Union-elected legislators provide sweet contracts for public-sector unions, who in turn kick back a share of the money to the legislators. Government employees take both sides of the action and the tax-paying fools who pay for everything are not represented at all. That’s the American Dream? Read more →
Be Yourself!
The human being who does not wish to belong to the mass must merely cease being comfortable with himself; let him follow his conscience which shouts at him: “Be yourself! What you are at present doing, opining, and desiring, that is not really you.” . . . — Friedrich Nietzsche Read more →
Slinging the Bull
The verb — to sling — is key. You do not offer bullshit. You do not put it forth. You sling it. Keep in mind that slinging, as an action, requires a loose arm and a relaxed attitude. It’s a careless action, and should be fun for both you and the recipient, although probably more fun for you if they’re not expecting it and are forced to receive it with their guard down. — Stanley Bing, What Would Machiavelli Do? Read more →
The Last Freedom
We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one’s own attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way. — Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning Read more →
New Jersey is the Worst Place to Die
The worst place to die is New Jersey with a combined effective estate and inheritance tax rate of 54.1%. Congrats to the Garden State! In second place is Maryland at 50.9%. Good try! — Yahoo! Finance Read more →
East Coker
Shall I say it again? In order to arrive there, To arrive where you are, to get from where you are not, You must go by a way wherein there is no ecstasy. In order to arrive at what you do not know You must go by a way which is the way of ignorance. In order to possess what you do not possess You must go by the way of dispossession. In order to arrive at what you are not You must go through the way in which you are not. And what you do not know is the only thing you know And what you own is what you do not own And where you are is where you are not. — T.S. Eliot, “East Coker” Read more →
Union Sundown
Wisconsin public schools are among the lowest performing in the country. So it makes sense to me that this is one of the first teacher’s unions to get dissolved. And, this is a great example of how a union has outlasted its usefulness to the community. — Penelope Trunk Read more →
Life Slipping Away
Some of the really savvy new media efforts like Flipboard are exciting, but after the initial “wow” factor wears off, these apps mainly serve to remind me that there’s already too much good stuff to read out there, and that my life is slipping away from me in an infinite stream of interesting bits about smart animals, dumb criminals, outrageous celebs, shiny objects, funny memes, scientific discoveries, economic developments, etc.. — Jon Stokes, “Why I don’t care very much about tablets anymore” Read more →
You Don’t Count, You’re Not on TV
There’s this primary America of freeways and jet flights and TV and movie spectaculars. And people caught up in this primary America seem to go through huge portions of their lives without much consciousness of what’s immediately around them. The media have convinced them that what’s right around them is unimportant. And that’s why they’re lonely. You see it in their faces. First the little flicker of searching, and then when they look at you, you’re just a kind of an object. You don’t count. You’re not what they’re looking for. You’re not on TV. — Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance Read more →
The Serenity at the Center of It All
So the thing to do when working on a motorcycle, as in any other task, is to cultivate the peace of mind which does not separate one’s self from one’s surroundings. When that is done successfully then everything else follows naturally. Peace of mind produces right values, right values produce right thoughts. Right thoughts produce right actions and right actions produce work which will be a material reflection for others to see of the serenity at the center of it all. — Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance Read more →
This Instant Right Now
The past cannot remember the past. The future can’t generate the future. The cutting edge of this instant right here and now is always nothing less than the totality of everything there is. — Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance Read more →
Bird by Bird
Thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report on birds written that he’d had three months to write. It was due the next day. He was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead. Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother’s shoulder, and said, “Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.” — Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life Read more →
More People I’m Sick Unto Death Of: Blue Man Group
Hey fellas — mime died out with Red Skelton. It doesn’t become entertaining again because you paint your head blue. I say to my kid, “You know what I would do if I owned the Blue Man Group concept is have multiple shows all over the world so I can make more money.” “You can’t do that,” he says. (It turns out they actually do do this, BTW.) “Why not? It’s not like going to see the Beatles, where people actually care who’s in the group. It’s more like going to see Lion King. Why would there be only one Lion King show?” “If you’re making more money, then I’d want you to pay me more money.” “Well, that’s the beauty of my idea, Clem Kadiddlehopper, because as I said, nobody cares about you. You want more money, you can take a hike. I’ll get another guy in here and… Read more →
We Who Are Your Closest Friends
We who are your closest friends feel the time has come to tell you that every Thursday we have been meeting, as a group, to devise ways to keep you in perpetual uncertainty frustration discontent and torture by neither loving you as much as you want nor cutting you adrift. Your analyst is in on it, plus your boyfriend and your ex-husband; and we have pledged to disappoint you as long as you need us. In announcing our association we realize we have placed in your hands a possible antidote against uncertainty indeed against ourselves. But since our Thursday nights have brought us to a community of purpose rare in itself with you as the natural center, we feel hopeful you will continue to make unreasonable demands for affection if not as a consequence of your disastrous personality then for the good of the collective. — Phillip Lopate Read more →