Matthew Dicks's Blog, page 494

Charity sucks. At least in this instance.

There was once a device marketed to housewives  that would charge anyone who wanted to ring the doorbell 10 cents as a mean of reducing the number of traveling salesmen knocking on their doors.

In order to ring the doorbell, a visitor had to deposit a dime in a slot right next to the bell. This would trigger the bell to ring. If the guest was a friend, the dime was returned upon entrance. However, if the visitor was a stranger, the money was retained by the device and was given to charity.

Obviously the ability for a person to knock on a door rather than ringing the bell mitigates the effectiveness of this device, but my real problem with it is the idea that the money collected was given to charity.

While I am not opposed to charitable giving, it seems to me that if you are forced to endure an unsolicited solicitation from a sleazy salesman, you should be able to profit from the time lost.  

I encounter a similar issue when students in my class win writing contests and are awarded cash prizes. Oftentimes the parents of these fledgling wordsmiths want their child to donate their winnings to charity or to some school-related cause.

I’m always appalled at this notion.

I explain to parents that this is the worst possible thing to ask a child to do. In almost every case, it’s the first time in the child’s life that he or she has received monetary compensation for mental exertion and creative output.

Reinforce this incredible feeling by allowing your child to revel in the joy of cold, hard cash.

Better yet, expand upon the experience. Enhance the reinforcement.  

Take your child to the most decadent candy store on the planet and allow him or her to spend every dime on jujubes and lollipops.

Allow your child to purchase the book that you thought was inappropriate for his or her age level.

Permit your child to purchase his or her first rated R movie ticket.

There will be plenty of opportunities in a child’s life to help those in need, and a charitable spirit is a quality that is well worth fostering in young people.

Just not immediately after a child has been paid for something he made up in his head. Don’t ruin the moment by forcing your child to give this money away to starving children. Not this time.  

It’s no surprise that it took me three years to complete my first novel but less than a year to complete my subsequent books.

Once you get paid for your efforts, you want to be paid again and again.

Black and gross

My daughter told me that she was asked to try “gross food” at school today.

“Gross food, Daddy. Black food. Black, gross food. Black and gross.”

I was admittedly concerned at first, unable to conjure the image of what might constitute a black and gross food.

After some questioning, it turns out that she was served olives.

I agree with her opinion wholeheartedly.

It also places her in good standing after my son’s recent traitorous stand on peas. 

My useless super power

In addition to my fairly useful super powers is one that is no less extraordinary but useless.

Whenever I wake up in the middle of the night, for whatever reason, I can accurately state the time within fifteen minutes of the actual time, and oftentimes much more accurately than that.

Every time, without exception. 

How I manage this is a mystery to me.

But an even bigger mystery:

How am I ever going to use this super power to defeat evil?

Woodstock’s quandary

Is Woodstock a figure of adoration or a bird in a hell of a lot of trouble?

My daughter refused to explain.

   

Food Nazis

In the post recent post on our brother-sister blog, 107 Federal Street, Kelli Elizabeth writes about living under the culinary version of the Third Reich.

Fat employees receive fewer benefits at Whole Foods

There are a lot of problems with Whole Foods’ policy of awarding larger discounts to employees with lower blood pressure, cholesterol and BMI.

There is the issue of privacy, of course. In order to determine what level of discount has been earned, an employee is required to subject him or herself to a physical examination and surrender private medical information to his or her employer. 

There are also genetic conditions and illnesses that prevent individuals from achieving the blood pressure, cholesterol and BMI levels that Whole Foods requires for the highest discount possible. While Whole Foods has attempted to mitigate these concerns by offering specialized consideration for legitimate medical issues, this would require employees to disclose even more medical information to their employer.

Once again, privacy concerns abound.

There is also an apparent disregard to the connection between a healthy diet and the amount of money a person can spend for food.

The research is clear:

The more a person can spend on food, the more likely his or her food choices will be healthy ones. Offering larger discounts to employees who are already exhibiting healthy eating habits only serves to perpetuate the chasm between those who can afford healthy food and those who cannot.

But all of these concerns pales in comparison to the real problem with Whole Foods policy:

It sounds like an incentive policy created by a bunch of condescending, judgmental jerk faces.

The title to this blog post is “Fat employees receive fewer benefits at Whole Foods.” While this sentence was admittedly chosen for its inflammatory nature, it’s factually accurate. It contains no exaggeration.

Fat employees, or employees with elevated blood pressures and levels of cholesterol are granted fewer benefits as a result of their physical condition.

Not good.

Even if an incentive plan is logical and based upon irrefutable scientific research, it can still appear mean-spirited and elitist.

This one does. 

Whole Foods needs to ask itself:

Is rating our employees based upon specific physical attributes and then assigning them levels (designated by a gold, silver or bronze label) sound like a nice thing to do?

No, it doesn’t.

Furthermore, there are so many other ways for Whole Foods management to incentivize their employees to lead healthier lives that don’t involve weighing them, sticking them with needles and dividing them into metallically-labeled levels of achievement.

Rather than a 20% discount on everything in the store, Whole Foods could offer a 40% discount on fruits and vegetables only.

They could offer free consultations with nutritionists and trainers or discounted memberships to local gyms.

They could subsidize the co-pay on an employee’s annual physical.

But categorizing employees by weight and blood pressure for the purposes of offering varying discounts on food purchases?

Even if it works to improve the overall health of the workforce, it’s just not nice, and it doesn’t project the right image for a company that is all about image.

Charlie Brown’s close encounter

My three-year old daughter is playing in the other room. I just heard her say, “Charlie Brown, take me to your leader.”

Snoopy? Lucy?

Charles Schultz? 

Strangest Christmas behavior ever. Right?

It’s 9:00 AM on Christmas morning. Things are not going as expected.

After opening a few presents, including three books that I had to read aloud before we could continue, my daughter has told us that she is tired of opening presents and wants to practice her numbers on my computer.

 

So now she is sitting at the table, typing the numbers 1-10 and asking how to make 14, 19, 22 and so on.

There is still a pile of presents under the tree, including her best gift, but she wants nothing to do with them.

“When I’m done with my numbers, let’s eat breakfast,” she says. “I’m hungry.”

“Do you want to open presents first?” I ask.

“No!” she says. “No more presents!”

At this rate, these presents may never get opened.

Honestly, in the history of the mankind, has something like this ever happened? I adore nonconformity, and her lack of materialism warms my soul, but this is ridiculous.

First peas

I do not like peas.

As a child, I despised them. Before being introduced to broccoli, peas were my least favorite food. My mother used to require me to eat as many peas as I was old, and even that was difficult.

My son tried peas for the first time yesterday and seems to feel decidedly different about them.

Is it wrong to think that he has betrayed me?

 

A tree is dead. A little girl whispers to the survivors. A family rejoices with chocolate.

Our annual Christmas tree hunt was a huge success.

One dead evergreen and an afternoon of fun.

We began our adventure by ensuring that Charlie was dressed for a possible Antarctic blizzard, despite the 40 degree temperatures and clear skies.

Upon arriving at the Christmas tree farm, Clara became intensely interested in the tiny trees, referring to them as “little baby trees” and having short but intense chats with each one, often ending with, “See you next year.”

Little kids are so weird.

Once I killed our tree and strapped its carcass to the car, we stopped for some hot chocolate and eggnog.

Great fun was had by all.

 

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