General Interest Column
Paul began his career as a sports columnist in 1980 and has written a weekly column nearly every week since. His ability to get a point across without offending and his sense of humor combine to provide enjoyable reading for young and old. Whether you're looking for a "regular" to anchor your publication or an occasional contributor, you will be thrilled with the response your readers will have to Paul's writing. New columns are available each Friday and can be emailed to you in nearly any format. If you have an individualized column topic, not a problem. Just let Paul know your needs well in advance of your deadline.
Sample Columns
"Can You Hear Me Now?"
Maybe I have low self-esteem, but I’ve never found it necessary for me to be talking on the telephone while I’m in a public restroom. Or in my car or a restaurant or a theatre, for that matter.
The building where I work has shared restroom facilities. It’s rather eerie to hear conversation in a men’s room, but phone conversation is just downright off-putting. Yet nearly every day, I am privy to one side of a call apparently as vital as nature’s call.
It seems people don’t much care where they slap open their cell phones and yack. I was on a cattle drive in the Oklahoma wilderness some weeks back. The organizers did their best to transport everyone back to the mid-1800s -- tough to do when cell phones are going off left and right.
I grew up in a time when the specific use of a telephone was to convey a message. Plain and simple. People who talked incessantly were looked down upon as busy bodies. Today, it seems, half the population spends every waking hour talking about nothing mostly.
Next time you’re in a group, take a few minutes to listen to the cell phone calls going on around you. You hear someone’s phone ring. They flip it open and say “hello.” There’s a short pause and the next words out of their mouths are “shopping at the mall” or “at the baseball game.” You know immediately the question on the other end was, “Where are you?”
Does anyone really need to know where you are that badly?
Then there are the individuals who refuse to turn their cell phones off in meetings or seminars. When their phone rings, interrupting the proceedings, they smile and blurt out, “it’s my kid.” Like that makes a difference. If the child is in an emergency, chances are there’s probably someone closer that can lend assistance. Children are no excuse for rudeness.
The other part about this situation that’s puzzling is the fact that all cell phones can be silenced -- set to buzz or vibrate or to immediately record a message from a caller. So why don’t more people use that option?
It’s esteem-building for some, others are just plain loutish and their mothers never taught them better. When a cell phone rings in a crowd, all attention is on the person being called. They’re in the spotlight. That’s what some folks live for. They don’t get the attention anywhere else, unfortunately.
Since all the rules of cell phone etiquette are informal rather than written into ordinance books, it’s likely those of us who don’t find talking on the phone image-building will have to put up with those who do. That doesn’t mean we have to like it. We’ll probably never see phone booths again and cell phone jamming equipment is generally illegal to operate in the United States.
Maybe some sharp inventor could bring back Maxwell Smart’s “Cone of Silence.” It might be worth a try. After all, silence is golden.
© Paul Wahl, 2007
"Ain't It A Gas?"
The first tank of gas I ever purchased cost me 69 cents a gallon. Yes, there are still dinosaurs romaing the Earth. It was the mid-70s. The war in Vietnam was over. The draft was being dismantled. I had just passed my driving test and was anxious to join the world of the free-wheeling generation of teen drivers.
I don't recall anyone contemplating the price of gas. It was a necessity. You couldn't live without it. I was glad it didn't cost any more than it did because my vehicle of choice during my high school years was my father's 1966 Chrysler Newport.
It was 22 feet long. I measured it once because a penpal of mine in Japan didn't believe there were cars that long. The four hoses leading up to the carbeurator resembled garden hoses. If pushed the excellerator all the way to the floor, the g-force would push eight high school students into the back cushions of the seats. Or so I was told.
The first time I remember hearing a discussion of gasoline prices was several years later when I was in college and the gasoline crisis of the late 1970s was in full swing. Remember the lines? I had given up a luxury sedan for a Volkswagon Beetle by that point and was extremely pleased with my trade-off.
You don't mind paying 99 cents a gallon for gas when your vehicle gets 40-plus miles a gallon.
Over the years, gasoline prices of have gone up and down seemingly with the whims of the west wind. Then a couple years ago, things started to get really out of hand.
Having been by most standards a success at my chosen profession, I was now part of a two-car family. Two people, two cars. It made a lot of sense.
Unfortunately, one of those vehicles is a Dodge Ram 1500 4-wheel-drive long-bed. If it weren't equipped with fuel injection, there would probably be six garden hoses linking up to its carbeurator. It will haul anything and will pull a house off its foundation. But every 260 miles, you have to feed the beast with 26 gallons of gasoline. When gas is $3 a gallon ... well, you do the math.
Fortunately, our other car is a compact or we would have had to have had someone else drive us to the poor house.
Who knows where gasoline prices will go next. There doesn’t seem to a good explanation. Oh, some days I think the price is tied to the price of crude oil. But then crude oil prices drop and prices at the pump rise. So much for that theory.
Perhaps corn-based ethanol is the answer. Perhaps cellular-based ethanol. Or maybe hydrogen-powered cars will be developed and accepted by the American public. Maybe the next president of the United States will take action to end our dependence on foreign oill. Maybe the sun will rise in the west.
That’ll be 68 dollars please.
© Paul Wahl, 2007
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Paul Wahl, CEO
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