Newsviews

National

Obama is doing such a fine job that it triggered Rudy Gulliani into orchestrating a self destructive ego implosion.

International

Muslim miracle as huge fire fails to collapse one of their tallest skyscrapers.  Is it a sign from Allah or just good engineering?

Crime

That lady who went looking to gun down that neighbor kid for pissing her off ended up getting gunned down herself.  Awkward.

Sports

Some Nascar dude beat on his wife but there’s no elevator footage so he’ll probably be back to spinning around in circles in no time.

Business

Apple is hiring up people and actually paying them what they’re worth which is causing their competitors considerable consternation. Beneficial free market concepts are rarely “trickled down” far enough for the workforce to partake of.  Their former employers are gearing up to spend a fortune enforcing non-compete clauses costing millions that could have otherwise been applied to the workers before they bolted.  Walmart was so spooked they cranked their pay knob all the way up to ten!

Opinion

We should outlaw non-compete clauses.  We’re a competitive society, not some hippie-lettuce toking, tambourine-circle banging commune-ists  (exceptions: Colorado, Washington, Alaska and yours truly).

Enjoy.

Rita’s Last Letter to “Mom”

When Rita found out her chemotherapy at the Hemer Lung Clinic was not as effective as she had hoped, she walked away from the treatments (against doctors advice) and she opted  to take a more ‘natural’ approach to her death than that which the medical profession would have preferred.

Giving Up on Radiation and Chemotherapy

It was at that point that I started working on her rationalist eulogy and she started working on her last letter to her mom.  When she finished writing it, she gave it to me with the following caveat:

“If my mom treats you with dignity and respect upon my death just hand her this letter and walk away.  If she treats you like a criminal and disrespects both my wishes and your dignity, then do whatever you can to make sure that EVERYBODY sees this letter.”

The full letter is available for public viewing at the bottom of this post.  The following is some expository information I have added as ‘bonus’ material.

Best of Dodge

Today’s Top Retailer – Homespun Collection

The Past

It’s been almost forty years since I graduated FDSH (Class of ’76).  In between then and now, I have had an exciting and prosperous life.  The last five years I’ve been in Germany running a business teaching English to eager Germans with my loving and lovely wife Rita.

Sadly, Rita passed away in September of this year after a losing bout with cancer and I found myself a widower in a foreign land.  To be honest, I’m more than a little homesick and a lot heartbroken, so I’ve returned to the land of my youth (and family) to reclaim my spot in the land of milk and honey.  I stepped away from our business and returned to the US with little more than a few suitcases and my faithful dog Bandit to begin life anew once again.

I’m optimistic that my enthusiasm for life, my education, and my broad life experiences will see me thru to another successful chapter in my life.  Many of my former high school classmates have already departed this Earthly plane just as my lovely wife recently did so I’m also keenly aware that it’s likely to be my final chapter.  As tragic a consequence as it is to lose my best friend and business partner of twenty five years, I cannot roll over and give into the grief that would consume me if I stopped moving forward and mired myself in the pain of her loss.  I would not honor her wishes or my future by doing so.

The Present

Fort Dodge seems to be in a state of flux, having lost a huge number of jobs on the closure of the packing industry back in the 80’s. As I view my old stomping grounds with aging, yet fresh eyes, it seems to me that it’s long past time for Fort Dodge to regain the economic viability I remember from my youth. As long as I am part of this community,  I shall attempt to promote those businesses that mirror the high standards of customer service that I have always brought to my clients/customers over the decades.  Even as Sears goes the way of the dinosaurs, I am proud to see that there are still quite a few remaining successful businesses here that hold to those standards.  Each day over the course of the next several days I shall highlight local businesses in my BEST OF DODGE series that showed me the same level of commitment to customer service and merchandising that we brought to our business.  A rising tide raises all ships and as long as I’m anchored here I will do my best to see the tide rise one again.  Today’s endorsement after the jump.

Sunday Morning Services

Good morning to all.  This is the first service from America since returning from my socialist utopia in Europe.  As such, I’m highlight a song this Sunday that I ran across right before leaving Germany.  It was part of a Philliips Ambilight commercial I saw and what caught my attention was the part about not talking the easy road.  Why do you suppose that struck a chord with me?  LOL.

I hear a voice calling
Calling out for me
These shackles I’ve made in an attempt to be free
Be it for reason, be it for love
I won’t take the easy road

Prelude to Services

See all of you soon at the top of the stairs!

At the top of the stairs they got keys to Cadillacs, BMW’s Mercedes Benz’s and all of that.

Quick News Carousel

Announcing launch of The Tim Channel’s Quick News Carousel!  Something I hope will amuse and edutain my audience.  You’ll want to hit the pause button and peruse through these at your leisure because it’s my added captions that add “flavor” to the screen captured headlines and ledes in the slideshow.

Expect these types of posts to become a more prominent fixture.  I could hyperlink to each of the original stories but it’ll suffice for now just to do the screen caps since there are all ‘hot’ news items that can be independently accounted for on the basis of personal curiosity via Google News.

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Enjoy.