See this story at BrooklynDaily.com.
By Stanley P. Gershbein
Brooklyn Daily
Several years ago, banks in America needed to sign up more of us to receive and use credit cards. Not a week passed by when I didn’t receive three or four letters offering me a card imprinted with the name and design of my college, state, profession, baseball team, or just about anything that might draw me in to apply for a new card.
Then it seemed that a great big “Stop” sign went out and I no longer received the solicitations. Less than a year ago, it started up again in both e-mail and snail mail form, only now they are enticing me by offering cash back, no-fee, zero-percent balance transfers and, my favorite, frequent flier miles.
Delta’s 50,000 miles deal was just reduced to 30,000 while American is still at 50,000. For those deals, and we have both of them, I could fly anywhere in the contiguous 48 states, free of charge — and I do.
One of the solicitations in my mailbox began with, Dear Mr. Gershbein, You’ve been pre-approved for yada-yada-yada.”
“OK”, I scribbled. “Send it!”
It was returned with the same application along with instructions for filling it out.
“Why?” I asked in my next correspondence. “I was pre-approved. By approving m,e you obviously already have all of the necessary information.”
I never heard from them again.
• • •
There’s a great story on the Internet that describes 50 American cities that everyone should see.
My roommate and I are fortunate enough to have visited many of those municipalities. One in particular stands out.
Photo No. 41 is a glorious portrait of the municipal building in Lincoln, Nebraska. We spent several hours touring this wonderful structure but aside from the beauty of the art in the halls, the gorgeous floors, the fantastic skylights, and the magnificent ceilings, there was one thing in that building that really impressed us.
As we strolled down the many beautiful halls and peeked in to the offices, we couldn’t help noticing that every single employee we saw, and we did see hundreds, was actually working. I know that this is hard to believe — civil servants in municipal offices, really working.
I was a frequent visitor to Queens Borough Hall for many years, and everyone working is a sight I never saw. In fact, I never saw so many goof-offs in my life. In every office I passed there would be one or two people actually working while the rest stood around with coffee cups in hand talking, not particularly quietly, I might add. I could hear what they were saying right through that opened door — the sale at Macy’s, the new hairdo, the lowlife she dated last night, the Mets, and on and on went their personal conversations.
I always thought that a few surprise visits by supervisors would have accomplished a lot.
I am StanGershbein@Bellsouth.net believing that half of the employees in Queens Borough Hall could have been dismissed, leaving the city with the same amount of inefficiency.