OK, there’s a lot of stuff I want to mention, but I don’t really have time to get into any of it in any detail right now, so I’m just going to leave it with you like a baby on your doorstep, and let you do with it as you please… I can’t remember how I came across it, but this was my favorite quote in the past few weeks. I wrote it down on my arm so that I wouldn’t forget it. “Then came a sandwich of spoiled sardines, carpet tacks, and metal shavings.” It’s beautiful and poetic, don’t you think?… Another Michigan company has beached itself. This time it’s Dow Chemical. They announced today they’d be laying off 5,000, or 11% of their global workforce. No word as of yet as to how many of those jobs will be in Michigan, but I imagine it’s a significant number. It wasn’t a good news day for Michigan. It was also announced that average household income in the state was plummeting… Assuming the cannibal holocaust doesn’t come before I get a chance to make it to the theater, there are a few new films that I’d like to see. They are, in no particular order, Slumdog Millionaire, The Wrestler, Synecdocheny, New York, and The Soloist. The last one looks as hokey as hell, but I’ve seen the trailer for it twice now and it made me tear-up both times. It’s definitely a contrived tear-jerker, but my tear ducts need to have their cobwebs washed out… And I’ve been wanting to mention this weird Concentrate piece on my friend Murph. They literally have photos of him posing at five different places around Ypsi. He says it wasn’t his idea, but I know that it was. I knew when he took the City Planner job here that he just saw it as a stepping stone to male modeling… In spite of driving the company into the ground, the CEO of Merril Lynch wants a $10 million bonus. If you can believe it, he says things would have been even worse had he not been at the helm. I can’t even conceive of having balls half that big… CNN is covering the tiny house movement, the New York Times says the Big Three with get some money, and a tight leash, and, according to the Christian Science Monitor, Pakistan’s military says they have the mastermind behind the Mumbai attacks… OK, I’m going to watch Tropic Thunder now. I’ll be back tomorrow, unless it’s so great that I can’t stop watching it… And I read somewhere that they outlawed bottled water in Toronto.
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3 of my immediate co-workers (19 total in the department) lost their jobs today at U-M Hospital.
“Then came a sandwich of spoiled sardines, carpet tacks, and metal shavings.”
“Crap Sandwich” seems a somewhat more appropriate title for this blog.
I hope this generation doesn’t allow itself to wallow in pity for too long.
Take example from your grandparents or great grandparents and get off the pot and DO something! There’s LOTS to do besides whine about tacks in your sardine sandwich.
I have balls as big as Merril’s CEO, and believe me, it’s more trouble than it’s worth. I haven’t been able to sit down since I was eight.
Seriously though, I agree with Ed. Maybe it’s time to cash in on the medical marijuana prop with a bit of local flair. We shall call it Growing Dope. Or the other proposition that passed this year and needs to be tapped: Growing Zygote.
The $15 billion deal with the automakers could come as early as tonight or tomorrow:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28108346/
Sean Penn also looks great in ‘Milk’.
Andy: Which department? My girlfriend is in Materiel Services and I’m in Environmental. We’ve been awaiting the layoffs for some time now.
For some reason I always assumed this “Murph” person was about 55 years old.
Looking at Murph is like looking at a rorschach test. People see what they want to see. He’s magic. Like an imp.
Tom: “Which department?”
Computer dept.
I like Toronto. The way the city streets all slope, unimpeded, to the lake is great. All the small trash streams down each time it rains and cuts to the chase- out of the city, into the environment, no fussing with trucks and such.
How can a non-profit, making millions each year, need to lay off people?
And the Snooze, last I read, said only 80 non-public-health people would lose positions.
If you knew about 20, then only 60 more to go.
Non profit is a “pay no tax status” reserved for certain types of businesses, mostly religious and/or charitable, but also associations and others. They DO make money … check out the Cistine Chapel sometime.
cmadler:
Follow the link and you’ll find the answer–which is, “pretty damn drunk.”