“Daddy, why do people say Happy Holidays in the store?”
“Well, because we are only going to see them probably once and that means Happy Thanksgiving, and Merry Christmas and Happy New Year all combined. Unless maybe you celebrate Hanukkah, then it’s Happy Hannukah too, so that’s just the shorter way to be polite and wish Happy Everything!”

That’s the true conversation I had with my father when I was about 7 years old in his store. As a small businessman, my father was meticulous with his manners and polite to the extreme. He taught us that the customers paid for our dinner and breakfast and school clothes. He taught us that you have to be polite to the customers if you want them to come back and continue to pay for those things.

Not only that- “Happy Holidays” taught me as a child to wish well to all people- even if they were different from me.

That certain people in this nation think to wish people a happy set of holidays is in someway a malevolent, thinly veiled plan to undermine their way of life is not only anthropocentric, but also extremely paranoid… almost to a comic extent.

I can imagine a red faced guy hiding in his basement window, (with the NRA decal), cracking a beer and telling his son, “That’s it, Billay- I kin see them librals cummin and thayz gonna trah to take away our plastic baby Jeezus. They’ve already outlawed the plastic jeezus in californie!”

Guess what?

The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought (Hardcover)

is on sale at amazon.com, down from 24.99 to 4.99.

Maybe people just aren’t “buyin it”.

Look, here’s the reality: some folks are trying to make Happy Holidays an issue for no other reason than to use fear as a tactic to influence people into behaving how they want them to behave. Don’t fall for it. When someone wishes you Happy Holidays, they really mean it. They really are wishing you are going to be HAPPY during this holiday season.

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You know, the season that includes many holidays? Okay? Great. So take a deep breath and don’t worry- there is no real plot- it’s just people trying to be nice. Nothing suspicious going on.

This week we loyal viewers of Flipping Out on Bravo watched the final episode of the season. Thef very Bravo-ish custom of having a reunion show after a reality show has ended. And after watching this, I’m convinced Jeff Lewis in my opinion, is a total asshole.

It seems most of America is amuzed at his apparent OCD. I’m not so sure it really is OCD. I think it’s more like Passive-Aggression and Aggression. The man acts like a tyrant in his home, which he pretentiously refers to as “this office”. hahaha… give me a break!

A drama queen with money to employ people- and that’s what this jerk off needs to survive emotionally. If he didn’t have money- he couldn’t have employees and then he’d have no one to dictate how many seconds they are allowed to have to go to the bathroom.

Here’s the sick dysfunction of it, truly. And this is what his employees do not realize. He uses his power to divide and conquer. At the Pollo Loco lunchtable he is shown picking on one scapegoat at a time. The other employees always join in to gain his approval. The scapegoat either winds up in tears, defeat or submission. If they don’t, they are fired or quitting by the end of the episode.

In this way, Jeff Lewis culls his herd so that his only employees are approval seeking- either for emotional needs or financial needs. One day, I’d like to see Zoila the housekeeper really tell him what she has long ago sized him up to be. But she will not- because she gets bribes to participate in the game- like watching soaps while on the clock.

Meanwhile, we are supposed to feel sorry for the long suffering Jenny the Assistant, the shrinking violet with the squeaky little girl voice, (no mistake there). Women who speak like little girls really irritate me… she clearly pleases him by making sure she remains submissive and meek, and only taking 50 seconds to pee.

Look, is the California Department of Labor watching this show? Has anyone informed the Jeff Lewis Office that regulations involve mandatory break times? Has he ever heard the term hostile work environment?

Jenny, (resembling a cutesty anorexic Shirley Temple), sometimes breaks into a fake alter ego, Deb. It’s all in jest really- as Deb is a trash mouthed lesbian who pulls no punches- something Jenny could never be and someone who could never be employed by Jeff Lewis.

If there is a fourth season, I don’t think I can bear to watch it. Unless it would involve one of his employees suing him.

This film was released in the US in 2008 and I recently found it at my local library. Beautifully shot in France, it stars Nicolas Cazale as a 30 year old man who is somewhat estranged from his parents. But as a result of his father’s health issues, he agrees to return to their small town in Provence and work at the small grocery market which they own.

This is where it turned fantasy for me: a beautiful little town in France, set in summertime in the rolling hills. Gorgeous residential architecture and quirky character abound… with the main theme being the mobile grocery store on wheels which is run from a truck.

Part love story, part dysfunctional family story- it all hinges on the main character’s acceptance of his feelings toward himself and those around him. It’s woven through grassy hills, farms and rural villages… small town French beauty shop, gorgeous girlfriend, ubiquitous European mother figure… and of course, plenty of bread and cheese.

Just the summer fantasy I needed to take me away from the now settling Fall.

The plot was subtle- gentle and intriguing. The beauty of the scenery and the carefree lifestyle of rural Europe were just the cure and little escape I needed. I recommend this film!

Let’s take first things first. The Niagara Gazette has recently reported that ten teachers have been given their notice of termination from the Board of Education for failing to comply with the residency requirement. Now the teachers are angry and threatening action against the city. Someone claimed the residency requirements violate their civil rights!

OH BROTHER! These are our children’s role models? They lied to their employers and now they feel wronged.

This reminds me of the guy that gets a job knowing that there is a drug test- and then gets pissed off when he fails the drug test and is terminated. His defense is that marijuana should be legal. His defense is that it’s on his own time. But those aren’t valid defenses because he knew the company’s requirement and agreed to it when he was hired.

And sure enough, you betcha our teachers in the City of Niagara Falls knew that they were required to live in the city. They signed an agreement stating as such upon their employment!!! And, WKBW of Buffalo recently reported that the NFCSD Human Resources Office said that many of the terminated teachers have had this residency issue come up in the past- so they shouldn’t be surprised.

Is the residency requirement unconstitutional? (I don’t know but I doubt it). Is the residency requirement good or bad for us? (I’m not sure but I tend to believe it’s good for the city).

HOWEVER; teachers, those points are mute because YOU AGREED TO IT!

You know what’s really outrageous? I own an apartment building and when I have an apartment for rent in the paper, I usually get a call from someone wondering if they can “rent” the address only to fulfill a residency requirement in the city. One was so bold to give me her name and number and tell me she was a teacher in the NFCSD.

I had to be honest and tell her that I didn’t want to be involved in any fraud and that quite honestly, I like the idea of teachers living in the city because I think it would create a sense of ownership and increase the tax rolls, improve property values, etc. She said, “oh.”- and hung up on me.

Role Models.

Anyway… all of that being said… if people did not agree with the residency requirement, they should not have agreed to it and allowed that coveted full time teaching position go to another candidate who would have lived in the city.

The real issue isn’t the requirement, it’s the dishonesty of the employee- and that should definitely be our focus.

We can speak separately about whether or not the requirement is good at another time. But in this context, it is not pertinent.

Perhaps these teachers need a few lessons in ethics.

Empty toilet paper rolls.
Being behind a pick up truck in the drive thru bank.
Canadians at toll booths.
Bike thieves.
Pumpkin smashers.
Christmas light cutters.
Nylon.
Questioners of our sexuality.
Pens without ink.
People who stand too far apart in a liine.
My neighbor’s screaming toucan.
Mimes.
Outdoor urination.
Naked babies in public.
People who don’t weed their fence line in the city.
Propane.
Any type of white sauce.
Wood paneling.
Button-fly pants.
The words, “any-who”, “reckon” and “montage”.
Broken shopping carts.
People who cannot close their mouth when not speaking.
Sensitive teeth.
Jello with anything extra in it.
Sporks.
Mold.
Conservative talk radio.
Long drives.
Gerber daisies.
Food in the mesh drain cover in my sink.
People who take 2 parking spaces.
Bad smells in the city.
Grapple.
Cheese on chicken.
Chicken on pizza.

I spent several years working as an Emergency Medical Technician in Ohio in the past ten years. My territory was a population of about 20,000 and included servicing probably 6 or 7 nursing homes, several rural hospitals, several major medical centers and two psychiatric facilities. I did this not as my primary vocation but, initially, as a volunteer for the emergency squad and then later, as a way to supplement my income for a private ambulance company.

Because of the nature of the community and it’s population- I have spent more than enough time in nursing homes to come to know much of the staff, recognize many residents and know the character of different units of those nursing homes. Of course- there is an array of levels of care at nursing homes. And within a community, some nursing homes are just better than others.

My cohorts and I recognized an alarming trend over the years within the nursing homes. The residents started getting younger and scarier. They were mixed in the same units as fragile - and vulnerable - elderly residents. We started being called to the nursing homes on emergency and non-emergency bases to deal with combative, violent, out of control young men and women with serious psychiatric crises. Frequently, they had violent criminal histories. Some were extremely violent and had been transferred to the nursing home directly from prison. Frankly, we were unprepared.

Many times this incidents involved the patient assaulting and attacking the staff or other patients. Sometimes it involved serious injury- fractures, head injury- sometimes the incidents had been complicated by the patient being barricaded in a patient room with or without hostages.

The odd thing- these incidents weren’t being called crimes, assaults, hostage situations, etc. They were being called “psychiatric crises”. They were on the same units as 80 year old women recuperating from hip replacement surgery. They were living long term with developmentally disabled and emotionally vulnerable young adults.

Many times, this was out of our league. Lucky for me, I had a partner for a short time who was a prison guard full time. Unlucky for my partners, I am 5′2″ with no training for dealing with prisoners. Unlucky for both of us, sometimes my partners were just like me. Sometimes we were charged with transporting these people for one hour alone through a rural area. That is a scary thing.

MedPage Today, an online journal for the medical community states that, “Nationally, the number of mentally ill individuals placed in nursing homes increased 41% from 2002 to 2008, according to data obtained by the Associated Press under a Freedom of Information Act request. ”

As we watched this unfold, we as support personnel in the medical community, started noticing that the nursing homes were becoming a dumping ground for the seriously mentally ill, and for those long term prisoners who had reached an infirm state due to age or physical ailment.
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Would you want your grandmother or grandfather to leave their homes, their lifetime of hard work- and end up being vulnerable to mentally ill violent criminals? I am not disparaging the nursing homes- but the staff are trained to heal, rehabilitate, facilitate health for people in states of disease. They are not, however, trained on how to restrain and control violent criminals or criminally insane patients.

I believe that legislation must occur that will force nursing homes to segregate patients who have violent tendencies for the protection of the staff, the other residents, and for the protection of the violent patients themselves! They do deserve to have caretakers who understand how to take care of them.

And our elderly deserve to know that if they have to go to long term care, or even short term rehab, they can be safe.

For more information about this topic, I would encourage you to read the full article on MedPage Today.