I'm purposely not writing a 9/11 two years on post. There are bloggers who write much better than I who will be doing that. I also don't have any tapes of the carnage and I will not be watching any replays on television. I have never seen footage of the event (only still pictures) and I never plan to because it is just too horrible to watch.
That doesn't mean I will never forget it. I hope we hunt down and exterminate all the animals who think killing innocent people is a way to paradise. And I hope that we do not elect a Dimocrat for president, because I'm sure that we would end the war on terror which would only make matters worse. Bin Laden was quoted as saying that when we left Somalia with our tails between our legs, that's when he knew we could be defeated. We don't need a Dimocrat pussy as our president.
I've read how various people and organizations plan to celebrate 9/11 this year. Here is how we plan to do it where I work.
After several attempts to increase the participation in the xxxxxxx cafeteria, we reluctantly announce that the cafeteria will close on Thursday, September 11. Additional vending machines are being installed in the seating area of the cafeteria. Listed below are the locations of the vending services available in the building. 1st Floor 3rd Floor Coke machine Coke machine Snack machine Lobby Coke machine 4th Floor Coffee machine Coke machine Snack machine Servery/Seating Area Coffee machine of Cafeteria (New) Juice machine Coke machine Food machine Snack machine
Yep! That's right. They're gonna shut down our cafeteria.
I did get a big kick out of the note.
After several attempts to increase the participation in the xxxxxxx cafeteria
The attempts to "increase the participation" involved cutting services and increasing prices. Every time they raised prices, less people ate there. As less people ate there, they made less money, which meant they had to lay off staff, thus cutting services. Less services, less people eating there. Less people eating there, more price increases.
For breakfast they had bagels, muffins and coffee. For lunch they went to box lunches and soup. A small soup was $2.14. The box lunches were $4.75.
My buddy Brian and I had been predicting the shutdown for months. It's a shame 'cause when he was in town we used to meet in the cafeteria and spend a productive 45 minutes drinking coffee and goofing off. It just won't be the same with machine coffee. Maybe I should get a little coffee maker for my office.
When I first moved into this building 18 years ago (18 years! I've lived in Atlanta and worked in the same building for 18 years?), we had an incredible cafeteria. We had real plates and real flatware. The food was good and reasonably priced. Back then TCIDNN (The Company I Dare Not Name) subsidized the cafeteria. Even after they dropped the subsidy the cafeteria was still reasonable, but over the years as we changed vendors, quality and service went down and prices went up. Finally, this year it hit rock bottom.
I find it strange that they're closing it down on Thursday rather than Friday. Just their version of 9/11 I guess.
The thing that got me was the use of the word, "participate". Note, you don't buy from, patronize, shop at or spend your money at; you participate. They don't even recognize the idea that selling people food is a business, not some kind of team-building exercise.
Isn't that just fucking nice.
GOC, is it possible that TCYDNN outsourced the cafeteria to the same band of scoundrels who provide concessions for the Maynard Jackson Airport? Sure sounds like the same business model.
Posted by: gwalchmai on September 11, 2003 10:37 AMDenny:
I hate to say this, Denny 'ole buddy, but you have just espoused a Dimocrat arguement. It's the dimocrats and their followers who allow the formation of unions. If access to a cafeteria was in the union contract of workers at TCIDNN (if the unions existed there), you would still have it, and you might even have decent food there. TCDINN would have been forced by the union to continue the subsidy.
But, dimocrats are not running TCDINN, and no unions exist worth the name, n'est ce pas? You have just been fucked by the TCDINN corporate monkey. You are not alone in your feelings of violation, this sort of corporate disregard for the welfare of workers has been going on a long time, pre-dating unions in this nation. When the unions arose and did something about corporations raping their workers, a clock started ticking. That clock has now rung and the corporate world has awakened in a climate where it is ok to rape workers again.
What a great new day for America!
Happy Rememberance Day.
Never forget!
Posted by: Rivrdog on September 11, 2003 11:06 AMRivrdog - Golly, I hope that was sarcasm. If unions existed and forced TCIDNN to subsidize the cafeteria and other worker stuff, TCIDNN would be out of business. I have done very well over the past 30 years without a union. The cafeteria problem was not so much TCIDNN's as the company that ran it. They alienated their customers who quit buying their product. I very seldom eat lunch so I won't miss it. There are places to eat 5 minutes away with better prices and better service. It will just be a minor inconvenience for the TCIDNN workers to leave the building to go to lunch. Many of them bring their lunches and have done so for years.
Posted by: Denny Wilson on September 11, 2003 12:48 PMWay Off Topic: Something's been eating at me lately and I need to see if you (and others) think I'm perhaps way off track with my line of thinking:
In the past months the rhetoric, rancor, and outright disdain thrown at Bush has increased to such a level that presidential candidates--not the usual crowd of Molly Ivins, Maureen Dowd, John Pilger, Paul Krugman, and Frank Rich--use such terms as "liar", "miserable failure", and "gang leader" to describe President Bush. They point to tax cuts, they point to Iraq, others point to Homeland Security, The Patriot Act (could an bill have a more loaded name? I doubt it.), and some point to spending, etc.
There's one problem with all of this: A president is nothing without a willing Congress and House. Presidents don't make laws, they suggest laws. Presidents don't approve budgets, they influence budgets. Presidents don't authorize long-term war action, Congress does. Presidents don't spend, Congress approves the spending--the President is supposed to throw down a veto from time to time to make it clear the federal purse strings are not loose...with this group of politicians, the purse string are non-existant--it's a free for all. Bush did not make The Patriot Act law, Congress and the House did.
Come to think of it, any Democrat who complains of the Administration's economic plan best shut it while they're ahead. Reason being: The Democrats did not even bother to put forth a budget for proposal; they spent their time deriding the Republican budget. The least one could do, before chiding the other guy's plan, is to have a plan of your own.
If people have a problem with Bush's domestic plans or federal spending, they should point fingers towards their Congressional and House representatives, not Bush. I want to pull out my fingernails when I hear the pathetic, tired, and trite rhetoric of "Bush's Tax Cuts", as it is so often hung out like fresh meat for the intellectual Lilliputians of the Left. Perhaps it should be explained very slowly: President Bush did. not. pass. the. tax. cut. Senators and Representatives did. They could have turned down his request in toto, but they did not.
If anyone should be mad at Bush, it should be real conservatives (and this guy). His presidency, domestic-wise, has been a Democrat dream come true.
In all, I'm at a loss to grasp the nucleus of the hate from the Left. I understand they're an emotional lot to whom facts are anathema, but I'll let that go for a moment. How can you hate someone who is perhaps the most ineffective "Republican" in history? Bill Clinton had a more conservative presidential record--by far--than Bush. It is like hating for the pure sake of hating because you are so devoid of legitimate criticism and ideas that of the two available paths:
1. Have some quality time with reality and wonder if perhaps you are wrong.
or
2. Call a man "Hitler" even though, as logic dictates, if he were like Hitler, you would be dead for saying so...
...they always choose #2. It's really odd.
And then there's all the talk of the loss of civil rights, etc., etc. but I've to see someone point to a lost right or even state one example of how there life has changed under the Bush presidency. It is like a great lie that gets repeated over and over and that, in itself, allows the charge to need no basis in reality.
Here comes the obligatory but. After all the aforementioned, the alternatives to Bush, as represented by the Democrat Party, are far, far, far, far, far worse. When Joey Joey Joe Joe Jr. Lieberman is the most appealing of the lot, something is amiss. As someone noted on Little Green Footballs in the comments section, the disquietude and disatisfaction with Bush is only exceeded by the outright disdain for the current Democrat riff-raff. It's not yet safe enough to vote Democrat.
Posted by: addison on September 11, 2003 09:01 PM