THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, February 19, 1995 TAG: 9502170187
SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Random Rambles
SOURCE: Tony Stein
LENGTH: Medium: 92 lines
I am a warm-hearted, lovable person, and if anyone disagrees with that I will fetch them a clout with my walking stick.
But even us warm-hearted, lovable people get ticked off now and then. That's why, with our keen insight and deep understanding, we generously like to set the rest of you straight.
For instance . . .
Why is it that every time I telephone a business, the women almost always answer with their first names and the men never do?
Ring, ring.
``Good morning, this is Susie (or Janet or Agnes). How may I help you?'' And I tell them, and they transfer the call and the guy answers. ``Tom Smith (or Ed Wilson or Sam Glutz).'' Never just Tom or Ed or Sam. Maybe it's even ``Mr. So-and-so,'' but it's never just the first name, the way the women answer.
Is it company policy? Or do the women think it's friendly sounding, and the men prefer to sound a little more professional? Because unprofessional is what it sounds like to me when women in the business world use their first names as telephone tags.
And while we're on the subject of first names, I'm going to edge over into downright cranky turf and say that I don't much like it when people I'm dealing with in business situations immediately use my first name. I know that sounds like I'm a cantankerous old grouch, but it makes a lot of people of my generation uncomfortable. Yet saying anything about it makes us sound like we're in the ranks of the irritable elderly.
Oh, well. I guess I'll just change my first name from Tony to ``Mr. Stein.'' ``Mr. Stein'' Stein. That will be the new me. That way, when strangers first-name me, they also last-name me.
On the other hand, I would like to bad-name a supermarket situation I often encounter. Nertz to the markets that let people in the express lines write checks. That converts it from an express line to a slow freight line.
I'm in the express line because I'm in a hurry. Like, being semi-retired, maybe I have warmed the rump area of my recliner just right and want to get back to it before it cools down. However, I am willing to compromise. If there is a racy story in one of the tabloids about Madonna or Princess Di, I'll read it while you write your check. That way, you get to write your check and I get to devour the scandal without paying for it. Best of all possible worlds, right?
Speaking of reading, my grandson told me the other day that he has been reading Nathaniel Hawthorne's ``The Scarlet Letter'' as a school assignment. His verdict: ``Boring.''
I wondered about that and pulled a copy the other day at the Central Library. My verdict: Boring.
Seems to me that the book would deaden any enthusiasm for the printed word that might be kindling in a kid's mind. Get 'em started with fun reading, I say. My suggestion is Mark Twain's ``A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court.'' That's the one about the guy who gets zapped from late 1800s New England back to Camelot.
It's got a touch of science fiction, some laughs and a bit of social comment. It would convince kids that books are wonderful companions, not printed sleeping pills.
And while we're talking culture here, let me put in my two cents worth on the city's need for a fine arts center at the local campus of Tidewater Community College. Cities - real cities that are more than overgrown bedrooms - have art galleries and theaters.
My first brush with Chesapeake's lack of an arts facility came in 1975. That was the year the Chesapeake Humane Society put on a fund-raising variety show. The only place we could find to rehearse was an abandoned dairy barn. No running water and - heaven help us - a two-hole indoor privy for a bathroom. That was 20 years ago and, though there is some serious talk and planning afoot, we haven't progressed that far toward an arts facility. Art exhibits hang on library walls and dance recitals are held in Norfolk and Virginia Beach. If Chesapeake is really Virginia's future like the signs say, it's not going to be a class act without a class place to do the act in. One with indoor plumbing.
While it isn't exactly high culture, there's a wonderful notion that Pat Higgins, retired ranger at Northwest River Park, came up with a few years back. Park land, secluded and forested, used to be a happy haven for moonshine stills. Pat suggested recreating a still site, complete from fire to firewater.
Great idea. There is a vast store of moonshine history and moonshiner lore. Moonshiner songs, too. You could have a story-teller and banjo and git-tar players and even have make-believe rev'nooer raids. And show a souped-up getaway car, too, because those cars are the automotive grandpas of today's Southern stock car racers.
OK, Chesapeake people in charge, I have called your attention to these matters that need action. No, don't thank me. Just get busy.
This is the Great Bridge Grump signing off. by CNB