Taking Action

March 28, 2020

A Blank Check From A Billionaire

When I was 12 years old (1969), I experienced two events that changed the course of my life: I got my own paper route, and my mom drove me to the bank and opened a checking account in my name. The reason she opened the account was because she didn’t want the job of writing a check every week to the company that owned the newspaper, the Peoria Journal Star. When we got home from the bank, she taught me how to write checks. When the first bank statement arrived in the mail, she taught me how to reconcile the account.

March 14, 2020

A Crisis That Is Spiraling Out of Control

On Friday (March 13), the chief judge of the state courts that are located in Central Illinois issued an order that applied to all attorneys and court personnel. Here’s what the order said:

March 7, 2020

The Coronavirus Reveals An Evil Government

When I was growing up during the 1960s and 1970s, there was one TV in my parents’ home, and there were only three television stations to choose from. The stations were affiliated with the three national networks — ABC, NBC, and CBS. The programming for each of the stations ran from 6:00 AM in the morning until 1:00 AM the following morning. After the last TV program ended at 1:00 AM, there was usually an instrumental patriotic song that was played and then the images on the station were replaced with several thick, horizontal, colored lines that appeared while an annoying audio tone played in the background.

February 29, 2020

A Little Bit of Knowledge Can be Dangerous

When was the last time you used a proverb while you were speaking to someone else? I would bet that if I followed you around for a day, I would hear you repeat a popular proverb to get your point across to a person you were talking to.

February 22, 2020

Ready or Not, Here It Comes!

Last week, I wrote about how we spend a good part of our lives in sorrow because of suffering that is, in most cases, unavoidable. I provided a short but specific definition of the word “suffer,” which is, to undergo or feel pain or distress.” I then provided the definition of “sorrow,” which is “a feeling of deep distress caused by loss, disappointment, or other misfortune suffered by oneself or others.”

February 15, 2020

Suffering And Sorrow Are Here To Stay

In a perfect world, there would never be any suffering or sorrow. Unfortunately, we don’t live in a perfect world. Our world was forever marred by the sin of Adam and Eve. It was their sin that condemned each of us to a life that would include suffering, sorrow, and death.

February 8, 2020

Is This Another Angel of Death?

We recently learned that a newly discovered virus — the “Coronavirus” — was spreading in China. It didn’t take long before other countries began reporting that some of their citizens had been infected with the virus. When I first read about the virus, the thought occurred to me that it would be a good idea to order a box of face masks, just in case the virus got out of control.

January 25, 2020

Are You An Average American?

About 10 years ago, I attended a four-day marketing conference in Chicago. One of the speakers was a young woman who was in her early 30s and was a well-known expert in email marketing. In one of her presentations, she talked about how she hires other people to do what she considers non-essential tasks — grocery shopping, meal preparation, and house cleaning — so she can spend her time on higher value activities.

January 18, 2020

A Valuable Lesson From An Old Man

I see him at least once a week walking on the side of the road. He’s an elderly man who appears to be in his 80s. I don’t know his name. For now, I’ll call him Wilbur. I’ve never met Wilbur, but last week when I saw him walking, I had the urge to pull over, introduce myself, and ask him a few questions. But I didn’t follow through on my urge. As usual, I passed by him and continued driving.

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