1286 A Nil

Once again, the World Cup has come and gone, at least for the USA. It’s interesting to note that for a brief while, while we had a team in contention, there was some interest this year. Maybe Major League Soccer in the US helped.
Or all those soccer moms are finally having an effect.
Still, soccer is a much more defensive game than most Americans are used to. And that’s not good. Long periods of activity without any tangible result remind the average American of the drudgery of his or her workplace. Who needs to follow a sport that reeks of that?
Back and forth, back and forth, “red cards” and “midfields” and “advancing on goal” blah blah blah. Who needs it? Just rush to the end of the field with eleven men and force your way across.
And how about the way our sports broadcasters adapted to the lingo? They changed the word zero because of the World Cup. Like tennis folks favor “love,” so soccer folks love to use the word “nil” when referring to zero. Games are “one/nil” or possibly “two/nil.”
It may be because using the word nil makes it sound like more than zero. Zero sounds as if the team did nothing. But no, instead of laying a big fat goose egg, they were actually scoring nil points as they fiercely held their opponent to one.
But really, if the American sportscasters wanted to be consistent, they’d have to call the game what everyone else in the world calls it, football.
Of course they can’t, that word is taken in the American vocabulary. By a democratic game where everyone marches down the field, and each time the make a goal, they score not one point, but a whole six-pack.
America, ya gotta love it.

1285 Working Dog

A new “day” is being foisted on the business world. Tired of the normal distractions, they’re proposing a “take-your-dog-to-work-day.”
Now, I love dogs. I love them so much I don’t have one, because it’d be too cruel with me never home. But is the already productivity-impaired American workplace really prepared for another day of disruption?
Casual Friday was bad enough. Study after study has shown people work less professionally when they look less professional. Then it was “take-your-daughter-to-work-day,” a praiseworthy attempt to expose females to the glass-ceilinged workplace. Then the backlash, “take-your-son-to-work-day.” Pretty soon the workplace was looking like a daycare center.
The “take-your-dog-to-work-day” folks are asking businesses to consider programs permitting employees to bring dogs in the workplace. They say, “Business should understand how beneficial such programs can be to employees and their canine companions, as well as the company bottom line. Studies have shown that employees who bring their dogs to work tend to be more efficient, happier and healthier in the workplace.”
No word on how customers feel.
Because they tend to be miffed.
Do I want to go to a restaurant where Fido’s nipping at my table scraps? Trip over Bowser while I’m shopping for boxers at the clothes store? Have Fifi growling at me when I’m talking to the undertaker?
And if we start with dogs what’s next? Bring your snake to work day? Soon the workplace is a daycare center and a menagerie.
That’s what I came to work to get away from at home!
I say no. The workplace is not home. They need to be separate. I don’t car how much happier my air traffic controller feels, I don’t want his Shih Tzu jumping out of his lap and crashing my plane.
America, ya gotta love it.

1284 Where There’s Smoke

I guess I’m getting cranky in my old age.
Like the other night. I’ve peacefully drifted off to sleep. I had my bedroom window open, catching the gentle summer night’s breeze. I’m doing my best to reduce my carbon footprint and not use air conditioning. And on summer nights, it’s nice to have the fresh air wafting through the house.
Since I get up early I go to bed early too. Anyhow, I’m stirred out of my slumber by a strange smell. It’s smoke.
About the time my subconscious registers that fact and starts to turn on the alarm chemicals in my body, I hear voices. My panicky and yet still partially dream-addled brain interprets the voices as fearful.
I wake fully up in complete sphincter-clenched adrenalin-energized crisis mode. The smoke smell is intense, and appears to be coming from my window. I run over, look out and ...my neighbors are sitting around their new portable fire pit. Laughing and drinking, smoke billowing into the fresh summer air.
That’s when the cranky part kicked in. Because this neighbor of mine is a liberal in good standing. He’s all against global warming. He doesn’t like carbon dioxide emissions and greenhouse gasses generally.
Yet here he is burning big chunks of wood, and smoke-polluting my fresh summer breeze. Not to mention infusing my bedroom with the odor of charred alder.
We all have our blind spots I guess. Just because there’s a burn ban on, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t fire up the chiminea on the back patio.
It’s bad enough his loud party woke me. That’s what you get when you live in a neighborhood.
It’s filling my house with the lingering stench of burnt wood that really got me fired up.
America, ya gotta love it.