NOVEMBER 17 UPDATE

COMMITMENTS

Valerie Brungardt, 3B, Kansas Hurricanes to Henderson State Univerisity

Rachael Maulorico, C, Kansas Hurricanes to Henderson State University

Karen Fraggi, OF, USA Athletics, Seton Hall University

Dawn Duggan, P, NY Panthers, to Molloy College , Rockville Center NY

OVERPAID PROFESSIONS

Chris Plummer of CBS’ Market Watch has published a list of the ten most over-paid professions or occupations:

1.  Wedding photographers (up to $2,000 a gig)

2.  Airline pilots ($150-250,000 a year for less than full-time work)

3.  West Coast longshoremen ($112,000)

4.  Skycaps (can earn $70-100,000 a year just in tips)

5.  Real estate salesmen ($200,000, sometimes in just one commission)

6.  Motivational and other speakers ( Clinton took in $9.5 million)

7.  Orthodontists ($350,000 for 35-hour week)

8.  CEO’s of money losing companies

9.  Washed-up athletes on long-term contracts (Shawn Kemp earning $10 million, averaging 6.1 points and 3.8 rebounds a game)

10.  Mutual fund managers

Not sure I agree on all, but, I would have added independently-wealthy ex-wives who collect alimony.  I sent Plummer an email, suggesting he put together a list of people who are under-paid, especially in proportion to the work they do, starting with travel ball coaches.

A VETERAN’S TALE

This morning, while having breakfast at the Comfort Inn, I couldn’t help hearing a soldier, just back from Iraq , who, while having a reunion with his wife and two small children, was also telling people at an adjoining table what it was like “over there.”  Very positive in asserting that the US military was achieving its goals: power and water being supplied to the Iraqis; training of their own military and police; all the while trying to suppress (and live through) the attacks on our people.

Like the warriors returning from other battles in other wars, he may have been a little too pumped, assertive in defense of what the US military had accomplished by invading Iraq, but obviously proud of his comrades as a whole and the US Army in general.

My other observation was about those two kids – a boy and a girl – who were equally pumped, just to have him back.  A great many of the men and women whom we have sent to Iraq and Afghanistan had to put aside their jobs but especially their wives and children, and, some of them aren’t coming back.  It’s ironic that they are so unappreciated after they rid those parts of the world of demonic dictators; something like the gunfighters in The Magnificent Seven.

On a lighter note, my sister was not aware that our father did not come home with his unit from the first World War.  He was wounded on the last or one of the last days of the war, and, sadly, had to billet at a US hospital in Paris until his wounds healed.  The Judge never liked to talk about the combat; his brother was wounded by a mustard gas shell; but, we once had an interesting conversation about life in Paris – after I too had spent some time there. The Judge went to France a boy from a small town in Oklahoma, and came back as something of a boulevardier.  When I returned to France , I would scan crowds to see if anyone looked like me.

End

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