The Packers put their stock on sale this morning. The investment is lousy but the intangible things like pride of ownership, a certificate hanging on the wall or an invite to the annual stockholders meetings could be priceless. I don’t know if this investment merits protests by the “Occupy Wall Steet” types. You know! Rich people wasting money. How about poor people wasting money?
My 4 year warranty on the BMW ran out in May. Up until that time, all service was free. All warranty and replacements were “no-charge”. A little white light on my instrument panel came on last week indicating that I needed to service the engine soon. Two days later the light went out never to appear again. I scheduled anyway. Normal service. Things like oil, filter and lube. I also indicated that a light had come on indicating “service required” but subsequently went off. I figured the bill should come to $25-30 but being BMW, I doubled my expectations to $50. Two hours after dropping it off, I got my invoice. $150. What did they do? They ran diagnostics on my instrument panel to check the pre-mature “engine service” light. The diagnostics were $48. I found out the BMW requires 8 quarts of Mobil 1 synthetic oil at $7.00 per quart. Anther $56. Throw in filter, an element and labor and you have $150. But there are some things that go beyond outrageous service charges. They washed my car before I got it back and it was housed in a warm garage until I picked it up. It is those “intangible things” that make the whole thing okay.
For the first time in seven years I got “spammed”. One of my blog entries was targeted and I’ve dumped close to 300 duplicate, nuisance hits to this site. Grasshopper No.5 must have changed the filter criteria letting more comments through. But hey, 300 spams are just a nuisance. It is the knowledge that important information is being imparted to interested readers. It is the intangible things that will keep me “blogging”. Sh–!
Our Christmas tree is in the living room.
The Packers are 12-0. They are North Division Champs and headed for the playoffs.
The Badgers are Big Ten Champions and headed for the Rose Bowl. I’ve got my tickets.
Stay Warm!
Love,
Dad