ChuckDoherty.com

Last week on a flight from Atlanta to Providence, I was seated next to a 30-something woman who was the picture of the modern young executive.  Busy, busy, busy – every moment of the flight.  When she wasn’t feverishly working on her laptop, she was surreptitiously text-messaging on both her Blackberry and her cell phone despite instructions from the flight crew to the contrary.  In fact, even as the plane was making its approach into Providence she was still texting away, dual-fisted, behind a makeshift barrier she set up using her handbag so that the bright screen of the Blackberry didn’t attract the flight crew’s attention in the darkened cabin.  Her messages were going to get through, damn it!

Now, I can understand that there are times when an emergency would require communications even when phones are supposed to be shut off, and for all I knew, this young woman could have been some Jack Bower-type who needed to reach her headquarters in time to head off a nuclear attack.  This could be truly vital stuff she was dealing with, so who was I (or anyone on the flight crew) to say otherwise?  I figured that if the degree of determination she displayed was any indication of the importance of her business, her mission must be nothing short of life-and-death.   

Or so I thought until I happened to glance at the PowerPoint presentation she was working on.  This particular slide show was a sales plan for a product she was responsible for bringing to the world; an item she apparently considered so important that even its marketing effort should take precedence over aircraft navigation and safety concerns. 

What could it be, you may ask. The cure for cancer? Anti-aging sandwich spread?   A giant, radio-controlled robot that can deliver mail at 200MPH?  

No, nothing so trivial.

She was marketing domed plastic lids for Slurpee cups.   

Sleep tight, America

In case anyone ever need to know, Thrifty is the the most half-assed car rental company on Earth. In Atlanta, their rental facility is miles away from the airport and you are transported there via a “courtesy bus” that must have started its life as a short school bus here in the states, then sent to Nigeria to live out its retirement years. After it was deemed too unsafe for even the roads of Lagos, it was purchased by Thrifty and shipped back to the states once again where it now shuttles the unfortunate back and forth to the airport in a death-cab Hell-ride that you need to experience to even believe possible.

Once at the facility – which is modeled after the architecture of a prison work-gang camp – the chase is on to find which car is yours.  Once that mystery is solved, you move on to the checkout process which is as involved as applying for a building permit in Tokyo. 

Bringing the car back is not quite as time consuming, but during the wait for the return bus, as you stand around among the other losers who forgot to reserve a car from another company in time, the sense of collective shame is palatable.  Getting stuck renting from Thrifty is the travel equivalent of waiting until the day of the prom to ask someone if they will go with you.  

I have to say that I was quite moved by the way that the Amish community in rural Pennsylvania responded to the horrendous shooting that took place at an Amish school yesterday.  No cries for vengeance, no demands for protection, no knee-jerk, reactionary plans to post guards or change their way of life. Just a measured and compassionate response to an unbelievably horrific event, and in keeping with the principles they try to live by every day.  Despite the constant barrage of intrusive reporters and politicians looking to spin this for their own ends, the people in the area remained true to their principles.

Even those who were directly affected by this crime went so far as to do what they could to help the family of the shooter, realizing that they too suffered by this madman’s actions.  Really – my hat is off to this entire community for dealing with an indescribable tragedy with nothing but kindness and love. 

For the second time in a week I was presented with the lifeless body of a mouse in the middle of my dining room.  This last hunting expedition took place while I was in my cellar working on the computer. I heard all sorts of commotion above me, and by the time I got up there the poor little mouse had been thoroughly (and thankfully, neatly) dispatched and the cat was standing nearby as if waiting for me to pin a medal on her.  I wish I could put up tiny warning signs around the house telling mice that this not the best place to seek comfort from the cold, but a cat’s gotta do what a cat’s gotta do and the rest is just a matter of caveat rondentia.