- Riot Watch! Riot Watch! Let’s take to the streets in Honduras, where thousands of public employees and followers of former President Manuel Zelaya marched on Wednesday to protest against a low salary raise. That’s right, these people received a raise and they were still pissed - awesome. Most workers are thrilled if The Man chips them off even a small wage increase, but perhaps it’s that attitude of complacency and unwillingness to hold out for more than so ails the world’s economy right now. The current minimum salary in Honduras is $289 per month, with that figure increased by between 3 percent and 7 percent, with teachers excluded. Those figures didn’t sit well with Unitary Workers Confederation General Secretary Israel Salinas, who labeled the increase was "a mock" and called on other organizations to join the protests. He was backed up by the confederation’s assistant secretary, Jose Luis Baquedano, who said the group will challenge the government's decision at the court. Another target of the protest was the Temporary Job Law, which aimed to expedite and streamline the employment of young and elder citizens in the labor market. Protestors argued that the law is against the basic rights of the workers, trampling on rights such as their yearly bonus, medical insurance, retirement and free right to association with trade unions. Now, I’m no labor attorney and I don’t have a complete understanding of the Honduran economy, but the great thing about riots and protests is that you don’t need to know the issues or be on either side of the issue to enjoy them. So riot on, angry Honduran workers, riot on………
- Score one for the women of the cloth. The life of nuns can’t be all that interesting of fraught with excitement, but when someone bequeaths you a rare Honus Wagner baseball card worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, selling it is something that even the most devoted sister at the local convent can enjoy. So big ups to the Baltimore-based School Sisters of Notre Dame, who put the card up for auction after inheriting it from the brother of a deceased nun. The order of Roman Catholic nuns put the card on the auction block expecting to receive significantly less than the $262,000 the card eventually sold for when collector and card shop owner Doug Walton of Knoxville, Tenn., bought it. From that total, the nuns will receive $220,000 after a 19.5 percent buyer's premium is deducted. The auction took place at Dallas-based Heritage Auction Galleries and the sale price surprised even the gallery’s auctioneers. Sister Virginia Muller, who was entrusted with the card, explained that the proceeds from the card’s sale will be split among the order's ministries in more than 30 countries around the world. Honus Wagner cards have always been included in the discussion when it comes to rare, valuable baseball cards because only 60 of the T206 Honus Wagner cards, produced between 1909 and 1911, are known to exist. In the world of card collecting, that makes them freaking gold and it just so happened that in this case, the School Sisters of Notre Dame inherited that gold……..
- As Oprah Winfrey winds down her run with “The Oprah Winfrey” show and begins the process of launching and programming her own network, she’s doing her best to continue one of the activities that has been a hallmark of her career over the years - giving back. She may not be able to (well, she could probably afford to) give a car to every person who attends one of her remaining shows, but she can still give out things that certain segments of our population would consider to be even more valuable than a car. For example. on Thursday’s "Teen Idol Extravaganza" episode, Oprah made dreams come true for hundreds of pre-teen and ten girls when she performed the minor miracle of reuniting all five members of the man band Backstreet Boys for an appearance and - gasp - a life performance.
The performance was the first time all five members of the man band have performed together since Kevin Richardson left the group in 2006. The power of Oprah was enough to compel him to return (along with promoting the group’s upcoming tour with fellow man-banders New Kids on the Block) and all five Backstreet Men sang one of their best-known songs, "I Want It That Way." Released at the height of the man band era, the song spent 31 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 -- the band's second longest run after "Quit Playing Games With My Heart," which lasted 43 weeks. One member of Oprah’s audience received an extra special treat after being contacted by the show and flown to Chicago under the guise of competing for the title of biggest Backstreet Men fan. When her plane landed on the tarmac, the girl was met by all five man banders and they serenaded her as she walked off the jet bridge. Seeing the audience, many of whom were far too young to listen to the Backstreet Men in their heyday, sing along to the song as if it had been released yesterday was eerie, disturbing and disheartening. Oprah clearly has the power to shape opinions and influence tastes, so why is she negatively influencing America’s youth by trying to revive one of the single worst eras in the history of music? C’mon Oprah, you’re better than that…..or at least I thought you were……..
- Wanna own some premium animal poo from the Topeka Zoo? If so, zookeepers at the zoo have special something for you. With the elephants at the zoo churning out plenty of solid waste on a daily basis, the zoo could use it as fertilizer or perhaps spend a lot of money finding a way to convert the excrement into power…..or they could package it, process it and turn it into a gift item for the holidays? I’ll allow zookeeper Kim Doman to explain. “They (the elephants) have looked at us a little funny when we've been up there picking up and scavenging. They're not really sure what we're up to," Doman said. How does the process work? The waste is dried and decorated because as volunteer Karen Taylor says, "After it's dried. Because when it's fresh, it has a terrible odor as you can imagine." Taylor and other zoo volunteers decorate the waste, painting it and placing other accents on what would otherwise be a giant pile of elephant feces. Speaking about one of the zoo’s female elephants, Taylor states, "Hers come out a lot more compact with a bit of a glaze on them. So, they don't fall apart and they dry really well. They're all in different types of shapes, from Hershey kisses to frisbees." What a lovely image that is. The zoo is hoping that animal lovers will be enraptured by the idea of giving and receiving animal waste for Christmas this year and put decorated elephant droppings on their list. The bedazzled biowaste even has a name - My Pet Poo. Made mostly of hay, My Pet Poo is in great supply because as you might expect, the elephants produce a lot of it. The zoo will be selling My Pet Poo at its Arts and Crafts fair this Sunday and prices start at 10 dollars. So start saving now and you just might be able to put that dollop of dung under that special someone’s tree on Christmas Day……..
- Being in the minority on an issue never bothers me, so I’m cool with going against the grain in evaluating a large German bank that is being excoriated for creating psychological profiles of more than a million of its customers and using those profiles in efforts to persuade each personality type to invest in financial products. Customers of Haspa, a division of Sparkasse, were broken down into categories such as "adventurers," "conservationists" or "hedonists" based on interactions with bank personnel and the bank then processed those psychological evaluations and based future sales pitches on those evaluations. For example, “adventurers” were to be presented with arguments that were “strongly emotional, to trigger their sense of impulsive decision making," capitalizing on their propensity to be "motivated by risk, conquest and struggle.” The bank’s financial advisors were trained based on the personality profiles of their customers and for some odd reason, the practice is upsetting to a lot of people. "Hamburger Sparkasse are doing the opposite of helping their customers make responsible choices, by getting into their heads to manipulate them into make choices that are not really in their interest," consumer advocate Edda Castello fumed. Why, because they’re learning from their everyday interactions with people and structuring their business upon those observations? It sounds like good business to me. Seriously, just because a company uses psychological tools to enhance its operations doesn’t mean they’re brainwashing or manipulating people. Customers still have a working mind and free will and people tend to be very careful with their money, meaning they typically aren’t going to be talked into something they don’t need or want just because of a slick sales pitch (idiots who fall victim to Ponzi schemes excluded). Besides, if the bank I use calculated a personality profile based on their interactions with me, they would learn that I am an “angry misanthrope” who hates dealing with them, gets pissed at their slow speed of service and wants as little interaction with bank personnel as possible……….
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