The Economy is Going to Hell- Good Riddance?

In case you haven't heard we are in deep shit when it comes to the global economy. Yes boys and girls- once again the rich and greedy got greedier and wanted more just like the last time this happened in the 30's. Nearly the same results too! Maybe we should do what our ancestors did and lynch those who are responsible! Yeah- Eat the rich! Burn them bitches houses down! Slit our own throats! WHAT?! Slit our own throats? This ain't my fault man! Is it? Well maybe it is a little...

Over the last few years we have once again been convinced by the prime movers in the economy to live in excess. They are heavily to blame for slick ad campaigns, and the highly effective marketing that ensures you will feel like a jack ass unless you have the latest and greatest XYZ or your kids wear brand WTF and that you can afford to drive the biggest POS just by putting a second on your home which will never go down in value. Yep- them dirty ass bastard fuck companies and advertisers are certainly to blame. Their greed has propelled them to new heights and now to new lows. Customer service? It costs money- get rid of it. Make a solid product that will last? Hell no- we need turnover every two years to make more money.

But hold on- it takes two to tango. The fisherman does not eat unless the fish bites on the hook. Yes kiddies- we are just as guilty. It is hard to admit it- but we are all at fault here. I guess I could let you off the hook if you have not bought a new vehicle even though your old one was in good shape, paid for and ran well. Or if you did not buy a home recently when you thought you never would be able to (how does that payment feel now?). Got an iPhone? Do you really need it? Yeah- we are all guilty. We as a society are so wrapped up in what is going on around us that I think we lost a lot of our identity and would barely recognize ourselves in a mirror of self consciousness. I mean it is not hard to get sucked in to the buy,spend and prosper mentality. Commercials only scratch the surface. Materialism as a means of gaining status is the well, status quo.

Go back a minute here with me. We are a lazy bunch us Americans. We are so lazy that we can't get up and brew our own coffee in the morning and are willing to pay up to 20 times the cost of home brew for some go go juice there just to make up the time. We are so lazy that Starbucks decided the best way to make more money was to entice the lazy into not even coming into the store- how about a drive through! And the laziness is not just physical but mental too. I mean it is tough to be a good person who is respected and well thought of. C'mon "earning" respect? So passe` and why should I when I can just buy my "swagger" with some cool threads, smooth wheels and some bah-ling! In fact- I will just replace real friends who care about me with friends who are just like me and only care for what I have. And all I gotta do is open my wallet? What a fucking bargain!

That brings me to ME. I bought a house because I was convinced against my own better judgement to do so and walked away from it when our financial situation did not improve the way it was supposed to, the payment skyrocketed and the homes value plunged. I sold a perfectly good Toyota truck with no frills (but AC) and financed (thankfully with a low payment and short term) a newer car that was faster, looked cooler and has now got broken AC. We spent unwisely. We were taught the right way but were convinced to abandon it. It is really fucking embarrassing when you think about it. I carry quite a bit of shame over our personal financial mess. I finally am at what now? stage of thinking. We plan to stop stupid spending. Think about every dollar and whether or not we are getting value from it and who is getting it. Are they worthy to have my dollars? And that leads me into how the bad economy may be a really good thing.

I am a motorcycle guy who runs a small shop and see a silver lining here. I will use the local motorcycle industry as an example and I think you can easily correlate it to many other industries in the USA and the World for that matter. There is a local chain of stores here that sell motorcycles. Their basic business plan was get into the wallet, do not let anyone leave without spending as much as you can get them too. Now that sounds like a decent plan as long as the customer leaves with what they want and are happy right? Well- how about selling a uninformed young lady a motorcycle that is used at an out the door price of $11,000? Great except that 2 miles down the road when she went to an independent shop her boyfriend was only quoted $6800 for the same make and model with all the same add ons, Oh and it was brand new versus her used one. That is fucked up shit right there. Or milking a customer in service with parts and services they do not require just because the customer doesn't know any better. Some will argue- buyer beware or that they should have done their research. BULLSHIT. That is just industry lingo that came about as a way to make underlings who did the CEO's dirty work feel like what they were doing to unsuspecting customers was alright. I mean who would look a rape victim in the eye and say "Well I guess you should not have been outside when a rapist was around should you?" It is an issue of ethics and morality not customer knowledge. How does this fit in to a small local shop like mine and many others be they coffee shops, restaurants, grocery stores, shoe stores, etc- very nicely I believe.

When people are flush with cash, the total experience does not matter. Cost is the only factor and even then there is no value attached. Value is a tangible good that takes conscious thought to recognize much like empathy or morality take conscious thought to become part of our daily lives. It is like exercise or weight loss. A pill won't do it- you gotta earn it. Anyway back to work here- so now that cash is a more valued commodity and we are not just throwing it about like paper- we are looking for like value when the exchange of goods and money is done. The big mega stores only value was price and selection and sometimes neither of those. The smaller shop makes up for what it can't offer in selection with things like genuine customer service. Things like talking to the customer for a while instead of trying to distract them while you sneak your fingers into their wallet. Customers look for truth not fluff. Suddenly all the cool lighting and snappy uniform shirts of the staff mean a little less than real work being done in a real environment that is transparent and believable.

This principle stretches out pretty far into many types of business and even in daily relations with the common man around us. I would like to hope that maybe people will become a little less distant from other human beings, let their guards down and try to find the real self in the mess of materialism and goods. Don't get me wrong. People should have things, and buy things that make them feel better- but for their reasons not someone else. When we buy smartly using education, emotion and thought versus the nearest credit card- we buy items from those who are deserving of the sale and those people prosper too. Those who were around just to let blood will soon find themselves at the bottom of the heap for a little while until our government finds a way to let them back in the door and we can do it all over again!

Here we go!

So this is it. My own blog. I got to tell you, I never would have imagined as a child in 1977, playing Pong, that someday I would be able to have my very own space, created by me on the internet. I am not a digital freak, on the other hand just the opposite and am still learning all this technology as I see fit.

SO what will I put in my blog? Mainly just my thoughts on things, my ideas, and maybe when I go just crazy enough my manifesto! I get a lot of thoughts flowing through my mind and when I was younger blogged in analog fashion- pen and paper. We called it journaling and I had kind of fallen away from that. Many of my ideas or thoughts come while driving, flying and riding. So many get lost later on or get so convoluted in my head that I can no longer make sense of them.

You see (becuase I don't) I don't visualize things in pictures in my mind- I can look at words and see things though. That is my creative vein (notwithstanding the creative vein that created my son and soon to be second son!) with which I can "see" my thoughts and make them come alive. I have a guy that makes custom motorcycle seats and other things who does stuff for the motorcycle shop I run. I asked him how he "sees" and was pretty impressed with his answer. He said he can look at a three dimensional item like a motorcycle seat or car fender and lay it out flat in his mind to make a template. He flattens the curves and can mentally add fabric (or other product) and know by sight how much to cut and where. Amazing! I guess I can see mechanical things pretty well, but that still requires a drawing or physical parts for me to grasp them.

Along this line- I can visualize concepts pretty easily and am able to read peoples emotions fairly easily.

So this is the first post- time to post it up and come back and look at it. I still gotta figure all this out so I look forward to the ride. Wonder if anyone will come along?