The Emerald Rose

   A quote from the great sales guru, Zig Zeigler. When I read it I started thinking about it, and in fact that’s what most people do is “react”, and not “respond”

    “Reacting” reminds me of poking a dog with a stick,….beware! Whereas responding to a dog with a pet,…well, big difference. (Unless your dog came from Michael Vick Kennels!)

   That’s a whole big part of what I do for a living, and I’ll be the first to admit I tend to “react” and not respond! “Why are the recievablesso far behind?”, or the old “Why are we showing a loss this month?” The first instinct is “I’m doin’ the best I can, it’s not my fault” and that would be major league reaction,…instead of “Becasue the folks that owe you money are not paying despite all our efforts, plain and simple.” And of course the old, “You spent more than you took in, and were not concerned about who was not paying you what they owed you.”

       Unfortunately most of us “react” becasue we are too impatient to think before we answer, most definately me included. One of my shortcomings in life is that I think I have to have an IMMEDIATE answer to everything,…well I don’t, but I need to remind myself of that more often. I wonder where that comes from?

      Oh well, on to other matters. REAL football is back, albeit still a few lame exibition games, but Thursday August 28th(Damn, where did that month go?), which is this Thursday the regular college season starts. BUT the fourth week of professional pre-season is on as well. So let me see,….Monday,(tonight) there is one Professional game, Thursday there are 13 Professional games, AND 6 college game openers (ATTENTION Employers of the United States of America do NOT plan on productivity Friday of this week, double check your first aid kits and be sure plenty of extra,extra strength headache (a/k/a hangover) medications are available. Put on an extra receptionist to handle the “I’ve got somekind of stomach flu,..but I’ll be ok by Monday, I’m sure.” calls.)

    Now Friday the networks understand the headaches will have somewhat subsided, but if they go with heavy football scheduling AGAIN two nights in a row,…well they will piss off totally every single female of all ages, sizes and shape by having taken away their “Night of Judgement” . Now the “Night of Judgement” is a period when several things happen. Here follow the sequence and tell me this was not a planned, “master stroke” designed by the women of the world eons ago;

               1. Do you think Friday is “payday” by accident? Hell no! For your transgression of sitting at the Pub with your buddies watching the game, or for that matter sitting home watching the game, equally vast quantities of adult malt beverages of the males choice, will be consumed, both creating the non-productive Friday mode, with headache.

SO when the male makes it home Thursday night, a suitable level of “guilt” has been established, and the wife is expecting “restitution” for her “lost” Thursday. (This usually takes the form of “Mary called, I’ve asked her to help me find a new dress for that potluck supper at church next weekend.” Cha-ching, $49.95, but marked down from $89.98, color it gone from the paycheck you just brought home, and God help you if you even whimper a bit!

2. There will be four Professional Games on on Friday night, so the male will counter with, “There’s a couple of games on tonight, but I think I’d rather watch (insert chick flick of your choice on video, or her favorite sit-com on Friday night. (Good boy, sit, beg, roll-over.)

(Actually there will be three professional games and two college games on, and I guarantee you none of the total of ten teams playing have a snowball’s chance in hell of being any good,…so let it go!)

3. SATURDAY!!!!! It’s the mother lode,…the desert island with 300 Paris Hilton clones that are hot to trot, the winning ticket in the 10 million dollar Lotto game. There are 29 college games on TV !! Yee-haa, many hours of male bonding at the Pub, wearing out two sets of batteries in the remote swapping channels, a sense of “partial freedom” (remember she and Mary are shopping for a dress, that’s a “get out of jail card for four hours right there!)

A “hair of the dog” has been taken, actually by the second game you are in full spinal block mode, no pain is felt. Aaaaaahlife is so good, and the college football Gods are watching out for you. Nobody around you says anything when you cheer for a great catch when it was actually a cheerleader being thrown up in the air. Or when you can no longer read the names of the teams or the score and make some stupid comment about State’s great defense and someone says something like, “Shit man, that game was over an hour ago, go home, you’re blitzed.”

With a supreme effort you are able in about three minutes to focus on you’re watch, and it’s 8 pm,……ooooooops!

And that’s why Sunday is for pro-football, because it just fills a   on TV while you get your sorry ass ready to go back to work Monday, try and drown out the “comments” from your wife, or just plain sit and wonder how anyone can even breathe with that much throbbing going on in the Frontal Lobe!

But six more days it’s week two of College Football, only fourteen more weekends left! Go Team!!

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