Memoirs of a Geezer!
Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth
to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!
This Episode: A "Paperless Society"?! -- What a Load of....
[Bayview,WI -- Special to MofaG, LLC (An Homage of a Sort!)] Is this a "Green" concept, or is it a "Greed" concept. I get confused! We hear lots of talk and we certainly read a good deal in various media about moving toward a "paperless society." Being a skeptic, and something of a cynic, I have to think it's an idea promulgated, and propagated, too, by the industry that comprises all manner of financial institutions. You know... banks, brokerage firms, investment companies... credit unions, too, I suppose...
In this country, it seems whenever an idea is put forth with such unbridled zeal, it has to do with money! Making more money, saving lots of money, a reluctance to invest or re-invest company profit! It's a money thing! Why would a bank want to mail bundles of canceled checks to a patron, for example, when it's a whole lot cheaper to post that information through some sort of electronic medium. The idea is, one has to admit, I suppose, somewhat laudatory in terms of movement toward a "Green Society," but, I'm convinced it's more about greed than green.
Here's another thing about the so-called "paperless society" toward which we're allegedly headed. Haven't we all noticed the receipts we now receive at our local pharmacy, or grocery market, for example? They hand us enough stuff to choke a rhinocerwust -- coupons for unwanted hair remover, oils, sweeteners, pimple stuff, feckless fat-melting pills, balms, fungus ointments, wart dissolvers and other unwanted products many if not most will never use or interest us as consumers! Clerks roll up the receipt with the coupons and it all looks like a wad of bills, a bank roll! (Would that it were!) There's enough paper wadded up with the receipt to wallpaper a small bathroom! (I tried origami, making a paper duck; didn't work!)
I keep a recyclable, webbed handled bag next to my desk specifically for recyclables. It's constantly filled with paper material received through the mails... Credit card offers! I mean, Great Jumping Interest Rates! I'm astonished at how many lunatic companies want to offer anyone a credit card! It's clear they know or care nothing of one's history or fiduciary proclivities or wanton squander or what if one should accept each and every offer, max out the proffered credit cards and go live in luxury in some obscure east European duchy with which the U.S. has no extradition treaty??!! I mean, the concept of unsolicited credit card offers is simply irresponsible! Isn't it? We must all guard against the specter of economic demons in their many insidious forms!!
As a child, I remember my dear mother -- a model of responsible frugality and deportment -- using the comic pages or newsprint or grocery sacks in which to wrap gifts. (She chose never to wrap gifts given to her children, the fact of which prompts me to heap praise upon her memory, as the bounty from that and other methods of frugality accrued to her issue!!) In today's world of paper waste, we purchase great quantities of decorated "gift sacks" and stuff them with forests of tissue paper, we buy truckloads of gift wrapping paper slicing pieces to size while discarding snippets and snibbles... Greeting cards, envelopes, ribbon... Too much of it a tragic waste!!
One Final (final, at least, for this episode) Rant: Bean counters who seek to destroy our nation with its proud history of economic success -- one that used to be achieved through investing and re-investing in the future of commerce including infrastructure, manufacturing innovation and scientific progress -- ought to be strung up by their beans. Not all bean counters are inherently fatuous and evil, one must admit. But those who are shortsighted and unduly directed by elements of greed -- those who seek to destroy the economic well-being of the nation through exclusive devotion to wealthy and overly-privileged shareholders and corporate moguls -- should be papered with cancelled checks and shipped off to an isle of exile. When there, they can endlessly count beans and babble fiduciary drivel.
Frugality is a good thing when it benefits the whole. (This needs to be elucidated so as not to condemn all money-savers, particularly those who operate from a platform of common sense for a common good!!)
The conclusion, therefore, is that ill-guided bean counters may be responsible for the false, misleading and misguided aims of a so-called "paperless society." The nation cries out for a committee of righteous, volunteer bean counters who'll dedicate themselves to "paperlessness" in a truly responsible fashion... e.g. Remedial training for merchants, collection of newsprint, including Sunday comics, for distribution to all gift-wrapping citizens, support groups for compulsive paper wasters -- including inveterate tissue and gift sack purchasers -- electronic receipts, widely expanded usage of E-coupon-ing, excise taxes on wallpaper and paper gift sacks, "no-paper" zones in public gathering places, paperless pickets... (just a few random suggestions).
And, we can all do our portions by refusing paper receipts at our local pharmacies and green grocers, super markets and retail stores, and through organized protest marches that circumnavigate shopping malls using computer-generated picket posters, vs. printed ones, held aloft while chanting, "Paper receipts with shafts of coupons attached are the arrows of Satan!" (Something of that nature!) And finally, we should all mark credit card, magazine and other unwanted offers received by mail, "Return to sender; send no more; curses upon paper wasters!!" (That oughta do it!)
(Special Note of Attribution and Gratitude: The perpetrator of this Blog extends enormous thanks to his cherished, lifelong friend and colleague, Steve J., a man of exceptional talent in the written word, along with other skills and triumphs some of which he'd prefer to remain solely among intimates and confidants! Thank you, my friend, for your superb suggestion that ultimately led to this episode! Or please forgive me, as the case may be!)
As a child, I remember my dear mother -- a model of responsible frugality and deportment -- using the comic pages or newsprint or grocery sacks in which to wrap gifts. (She chose never to wrap gifts given to her children, the fact of which prompts me to heap praise upon her memory, as the bounty from that and other methods of frugality accrued to her issue!!) In today's world of paper waste, we purchase great quantities of decorated "gift sacks" and stuff them with forests of tissue paper, we buy truckloads of gift wrapping paper slicing pieces to size while discarding snippets and snibbles... Greeting cards, envelopes, ribbon... Too much of it a tragic waste!!
One Final (final, at least, for this episode) Rant: Bean counters who seek to destroy our nation with its proud history of economic success -- one that used to be achieved through investing and re-investing in the future of commerce including infrastructure, manufacturing innovation and scientific progress -- ought to be strung up by their beans. Not all bean counters are inherently fatuous and evil, one must admit. But those who are shortsighted and unduly directed by elements of greed -- those who seek to destroy the economic well-being of the nation through exclusive devotion to wealthy and overly-privileged shareholders and corporate moguls -- should be papered with cancelled checks and shipped off to an isle of exile. When there, they can endlessly count beans and babble fiduciary drivel.
Frugality is a good thing when it benefits the whole. (This needs to be elucidated so as not to condemn all money-savers, particularly those who operate from a platform of common sense for a common good!!)
The conclusion, therefore, is that ill-guided bean counters may be responsible for the false, misleading and misguided aims of a so-called "paperless society." The nation cries out for a committee of righteous, volunteer bean counters who'll dedicate themselves to "paperlessness" in a truly responsible fashion... e.g. Remedial training for merchants, collection of newsprint, including Sunday comics, for distribution to all gift-wrapping citizens, support groups for compulsive paper wasters -- including inveterate tissue and gift sack purchasers -- electronic receipts, widely expanded usage of E-coupon-ing, excise taxes on wallpaper and paper gift sacks, "no-paper" zones in public gathering places, paperless pickets... (just a few random suggestions).
And, we can all do our portions by refusing paper receipts at our local pharmacies and green grocers, super markets and retail stores, and through organized protest marches that circumnavigate shopping malls using computer-generated picket posters, vs. printed ones, held aloft while chanting, "Paper receipts with shafts of coupons attached are the arrows of Satan!" (Something of that nature!) And finally, we should all mark credit card, magazine and other unwanted offers received by mail, "Return to sender; send no more; curses upon paper wasters!!" (That oughta do it!)
(Special Note of Attribution and Gratitude: The perpetrator of this Blog extends enormous thanks to his cherished, lifelong friend and colleague, Steve J., a man of exceptional talent in the written word, along with other skills and triumphs some of which he'd prefer to remain solely among intimates and confidants! Thank you, my friend, for your superb suggestion that ultimately led to this episode! Or please forgive me, as the case may be!)
Humbly Submitted, 06-03-14 -- Joel K.
