I'm pretty steamed about the AIG bonuses. Here's what they should do. If you are a player like those execs, and taking risks, then you should benefit if the risks pan out. But if you are guaranteed to win no matter what, you aren't really taking a risk at all.
If you are up for one of those bonuses, then you should only get the bonus if the company performs well, if the risk YOU took creates profit for the company. If the risk creates a loss, you should lose out, no bonus, and you should suffer some kind of comparable and proportional personal loss as a result. Only then is it a bonus, and only under that kind of circumstance is such a large bonus justified. Risk means you win big if the action pans out but you stand to lose if the action fails.
Beyond that, I do not see how those people can accept $1 million in bonuses when working stiffs like most of us are struggling to make ends meet despite working hard five,six or seven days a week, making sacrifices and hoping we don't get the pink slip each morning.
And get this -- they're now calling the bonuses "retention fees." That is the most bogus thing I ever heard. Where would these people go if they didn't get their "retention fees"?
Worse, these executives are the very ones who created this mess in the first place. How valuable can they be??

It's March 1 and it's snowing in Salisbury. We get no snow all winter, and now it's almost spring, and it's really snowing. Ruined a practice session today, and might ruin rehearsals tomorrow. Robert's in Easton waiting for Chad to get off work because he insisted on taking him to work tonight despite the bad weather, and now it's too awful for him to drive home and then back to pick him up. Todd and I are home. I'm off on furlough Monday, which I suppose is OK.

Those kids who go to school would be all excited to have a day off, but there's one problem. They were already off on Monday (not sure why). Go figure.

I went to SSO rehearsal tonight. Other people didn't. It was a sparse turnout. It was sleeting here when I left, but as soon as I got across the drawbridge, it was just raining. When I left two hours later, it was starting to sleet at SU, but by the time I reached the drawbridge on the way home, it was really snowing. And when I got closer to home, it was obvious it had been snowing for some time because it was accumulating. We have a few inches now, and it's just getting started.

I remember lots of snowstorms around here when I was young. Once we were out of school for two weeks, at least. The roads were covered with ice (I lived in town, a block from the Catholic school) for weeks. Our house was so cold, we had blankets draped across the upstairs landing to save heat, and we all camped out in the living room to keep warm.

And in 1979, we had a blizzard that covered the whole front of the apartment building where I lived and was so deep, cars that were parked outside were nothing more than bumps in the landscape. It was up to my waist. But it was all melted and gone in just a few days, because it was late February when it happened.

In 1987 we had an 18-inch snowfall. Chad was just a toddler. I have a picture of that snowfall, taken from Winder Street when I was dropping Laura off after a prolonged (thanks to the snow) visit.

But it doesn't snow here much anymore.

Check out this photo of me taken in 1970. It's classic 70s look. I found it on facebook, where a high school friend had posted it! That's Wi-Hi in the background, Long Avenue entrance.
Valentine's Day, and I spent it working, rehearsing and playing a concert. Busy day!
I had another birthday. I got an iPod, which is great fun!

I am irate because my son just lost an entire week's pay to bank overdraft fees, thanks to a $2.10 miscalculation that he didn't even know about. I would prefer the banks notify us before paying overdrafts and taking outrageous fees out. Better yet, how about not paying even small overdrafts. If there's not enough money in the account, don't pay. That way, you don't get stuck with all those fees. We've probably lost thousands of dollars we cannot afford to lose over bank fees charged that way. Apparently, you make a tiny error. The bank goes ahead and pays; if you're using your check card, they just pay and don't bother to let you know you're overdrawn. They they take out immediately a $35 fee. That fee triggers another overdraft, which triggers another fee. And so on. They still don't bother to let you know what's going on. Next day a new fee gets taken out, which triggers another overdraft signal and another fee. Something needs to change or there's liable to be a major uprising in this country over that practice.

So now would apparently be a good time to give up peanut butter. Several brands of peanut butter crackers and cookies, as well as institutional packages of peanut butter (sold to cafeterias, nursing homes and the like), are reported to be harboring salmonella and making people who eat them sick. Personally, I can live without peanut butter.
Still, it's scary to have to worry all the time about what might be next to be tagged as contaminated with salmonella. Used to only be dairy and chicken. Then it was salads and produce. Last summer, it was tomatoes (false alarm) and now it's apparently peanut butter.
It would appear our once-safe food supply chain is no longer so secure.

See, I told you I'd do better this year. I'm trying.
Today I read the obituary page of the newspaper where I work and was shocked to see the face and name of one of my parish deacons. I had known, of course, that he's been ill for many years, but still. He was one of the best, a warm and goodhearted man. He was, in fact, my favorite of all the deacons I've ever known. There was just something about him that was so approachable, so sincere.
He presided at my father's memorial service in January 2005 (my father lived to be 95). And it turns out he died on what would have been my father's 99th birthday!
Carl Beers, we'll miss you!

It's been almost three years again. Sorry about that. Since that posting in 2006, a lot has happened, as you might imagine. The sister-in-law's cat had to go. It kept attacking my older son, who is a big cat lover and even though he didn't live here, every time he visited it was awful. And the cat didn't like us much, either. I felt bad, but we kept him a whole year after she left him with us, and he never got any better.
Our black cat who was almost 20 years old had to be put down. He had cancer and was very sick, suffering and all that. We felt bad about that, too, but it was the right thing to do.
My older son has moved back to Baltimore County. He was substitute teaching but not getting much work, only two or three days a week. He comes back periodically to help his dad out and earn some extra cash. He's planning to sign up for a bartending/mixology course at Wor-Wic starting in January. He and one of his roommates will be taking the course and driving back and forth together. I hope they get jobs as a result. That's irony for you -- he gets a degree from a top academic college and it does nothing to help him get employed. He spends $149 and eight weeks learning to make mixed drinks and has better employment prospects from that?
We've had three rounds of layoffs where I work. I've survived them all, so far. But these are not good times for any business. I hope we survive.
My youngest son did not graduate from college. He basically flunked out, did nothing but get into trouble. He did, however, complete the two-year honors program he enrolled in. Weird. He fooled around with various jobs for a couple of years, totaled one car, joined Americorps, completed a year in that program, signed up for a second year but then ended up getting offered a job with the postal service. So now he is working as a mail handler for the U.S. Postal Service. It's the hardest of all the jobs he's had in his life, it's night shift but not regular hours, so it basically means he had to quit everything else he was doing, music, friends and all. But he's now been there almost a year, and he has applied to be shop steward for his union on his shift (and will probably get the job, as not only does no one else want it, they're all encouraging him). He's making good money but still living at home. We never have really lived alone, my husband and I, so far. Never.
Still, we're doing OK for now. And that's something to be thankful for.
I'm going to do better with this and my other blogs this year. That's one of my New Year resolutions. I have four other blogs: Musicology (hosted on www.delmarvanow.com), Shore Voices (also on www.delmarvanow.com), The Anti-Blog (on blogger) and on wordpress, A Spark in the Dark.