one for the bloke

i work with tammi*. tammi and jason* have a 16 year old daughter named nora*. nora has an unusual habit, she likes to collect coach purses. she has a number of these $100+ designer label handbags. tammi and jason insist that nora pay for the purses using the money she earns at her part-time job at whatta-burger*.

based on tammi's description, nora the quiet homebody type. she doesn't attend a lot of parties and is home most nights. her world seems to rotate between home and work. if that is the case, one kind of has to wonder why several high-end purses are necessary. does she carry her whatta-burger name tag to work in a coach purse?

late last year, tammi chipped in on a coach purse that nora, just had to have. barely a week later, nora announced she needed money to purchase a new outfit for the winter formal. as you can well imagine her parents were unwilling to give it to her and nora lost her everloving mind. she threw a tantrum, the likes of which she hadn't thrown in 14 years. then she gave her mother the silent treatment.

tammi and jason discussed not allowing any more purchases. they considered having her return the last purse to fund the new outfit. they settled on allowing nora to spend an additional $100 on something for the formal. they adjusted the figure to be $100 excluding taxes and finally agreed that the price before tax, could not exceed $125. to ensure nora didn't try to pull a fast one, she would be required to present the outfit with sales tags attached and the bill of sale.

now i have no interest in being a parent, it seems to be a pretty thankless job. i know that parents are motivated by the desire to ensure that their children have a better quality of life than they did. but sometimes things get a little skewed. it seems as though kids are coming to expect every and anything as their due. i fear what will happen to our society as more and more of these self-absorbed, self-indulgent individuals grow into adulthood.

this is tournament time in college basketball. division one basketball is big business in the united states. so earning a tournament berth is an even bigger deal. this year the university of miami was predicted to do well. partly do to the strength of one of their senior players. the tournament is set-up in a 'one and done' format, which basically means, as long as you keep winning you keep playing.

this particular player has a history of breaking team rules. based on how important she was to the team, her behaviour was often overlooked. this year however, her coach had enough. she was left behind when the team headed to spokane for the first round of the tournament. i suspect that the coach counted on the rest of the roster getting them through to the second round. as a third seed they would be facing a lesser ranked team, a team they should best handily. well as they say in the world of sport, 'on any given sunday'. through the selfish behaviour of a single player and truly inspired play by the eleventh seed, the miami hurricanes were sent packing after a single game.

this player was expected to go in the first round of the wnba draft. since she doesn't have any tournament exposure this year, the wnba coaches don't get one last look at her. she let's down her school, the program and the boosters who support it.

it will be interesting to see if she learns her lesson and makes some serious changes or will she spiral out of control. only time will tell.

* the names have been changed to protect privacy

today i opted for a different type of challenge and i asked the bloke to supply me with today's subject. hopefully my treatment falls within the parameters of his suggestion.