In All Fairness

I've had a number of people complaining about fairness to me in the past week or so and I thought it might be a good idea to get it out of my system and see what anyone else had to say on the topic.

Fairness is a difficult thing to claim. Everyone can claim they were unfairly treated, when in fact they were treated exactly as stated in the rules, or exactly as they deserved, or exactly as they SHOULD be treated. Much of it is a matter of perception, methinks, and oft times it seems that some who claim unfairness simply don't understand the whole situation or the rules or the laws involved.

And I've been smacked on the head a few times by the law for that one... and even I have said that "it wasn't fair".

I've had a few situations where people have complained to me at my open mic for this, that, or the other. One person thought it was unfair that some other people played before them... another thought I gave them less time than the large group of people who just happened to play before them.

Well, in the latter situation, is it fair for me to give a whole band the same 20 or so minutes I give to any individual jammer when there are 5 of them playing in the band AND they came all the way from San Diego on tour and graced my little show with their awesomeness to promo their local shows AND they really rocked the house (and I'm all about making a good show first) AND they were very cool about it? And in the former, well, I think it was a matter of perception because the complainant was actually next-to-last to arrive and I adhere to the fairness of the "first come, first choice" rule.

At work, my entire division has been pretty unfairly treated by our parent company. Of course, from our perspective, that's undeniable... on the other hand, all they see up north is the dollars and cents... and they see no sense in treating us any better since our sales are in the toilet.

Of course, a smart man would have realized long ago that sales is something that a salesman does... and no sales? Well, who would YOU punish?

Right, the so-called salesman. Instead? They punished the one salesman who was actually making sales, limited as they were by them tying his hands together. And then they've punished the development staff ... which makes NO sense. Without a development staff, how are we going to deliver software in the WAY off-chance that our non-salesman actually manages to bullsh@t his way to a purchase order?

That's not just unfair. It's stupid.

But I guess that's just MY perception, eh? It's not my buck that's paying for us to get screwed down here, is it? Ahh well...

It was also recently stated that I had unfairly treated an ex. Now, in all honesty, for MOST of my exes? Well, yeah, probably so... but relationships are such a 2-way street and there is always a lot of tit-for-tat going on. But in THIS particular case? Not so.... and I won't even go into details about how unfairly I was treated that made us both exes in the first place. I'm just glad, honestly, that she's found a path to a smile and that it doesn't involve putting me under asphalt.

There was another situation from the way back machine. I managed to get in good with a local production company that ran a lot of the big name concerts in the Richmond area. Actually, it was a friend of mine who got us hooked in to this deal. What we did was brought them sushi from this great little local shop, and gave it to the production company. In return they gave us tickets and back stage passes. Cool, yeah? ( too bad the company went under around here! )

Then came the Metallica show (the big tour for their "black" album). 10 of us got involved in getting sushi and it cost us an average of 10 bucks each for our share (we all split the costs, cause that was fair). Unfortunately, there were only 8 backstage passes. Well, my friend and his brothers and their friends took 6 tix and passes, leaving me 4 tix and 2 passes.

I had my best friend with me, another good friend, and this girl who really wanted to hook up with me all along with me. That's 4 people and only 2 passes. I complained to my buddy who got the deal and his brothers said, well, first come, first served and they got to the sushi shop first.

Great.

So then I got to complain about fairness...

And then we got to the show and my best friend snagged one of the 2 passes, since she really did do a lot of the leg work for this deal and really got in good with the promoters (she's SCARY good at that sort of thing and has gotten me backstage to all sorts of events with her talent at talking to people and not taking "no" for an answer). So that was fair. And it was my friend who got the original deal, so that's one for me. My other friend started giving me grief about it and so did the girl who wanted to hook up with me.

Mind you, I never said one way or the other about reciprocating those feelings at the time.

So I had to hear them complain about fairness. Of course, they were invited last minute cause we had the 2 extra tix, and they didn't do any work for the sushi so they basically got $30 tickets for only 10 bucks. So how unfair was it, really?

All in the perception.

In the end, they managed to get 2 more backstage (Snake Pit) passes and we all enjoyed the show from under/in the stage and got to watch Lars and all the rest of them hammer out the heavy metal from WAY close up.

And I got an autographed drum stick out of it.

Sweet.

So, alls well that ends well, I guess.

the challenge

What follows is not the most cohesive entry I've ever written, but the drugs they gave me to keep me mobile, upright, and keep my lungs and back from exploding are being NO help with that.

Rewind it a few days though and between fits of coughing my brain cells out of my head, I managed to go see my niece graduate from college this weekend while at the same time enjoy, for the most part, a miniature (and all too short) family reunion.

My favorite first nephew, or at least the oldest one, and I have had an ongoing smack-talk fest about our billiards skills. It has been going on for years, but the last time we managed to be in the same pool hall, much less the same state, was four years ago.

It was a draw.

No, really.

Okay, well... I did manage to win a few and we both had large laughs as we both flirted with the cute waitress at the bar.

That was a weird experience, flirting with a waitress with your much younger nephew... but, hey, it was fun.

He currently lives in Texas and serves in the Army, for those interested in the details, while here I am in RVA (Richmond, Virginia, for those not in the know with the lingo) so our chances to play are few and far between. He has been serving our nation in Iraq for the past 7 months and we've been "harassing" each other about that 9-ball rematch for months with fine little jabs as these:

So when you get back, make sure you're ready for another lesson.
Exercise your back... cause you're gonna bend over all those times to rack 'em.
I'm ready to play - the extra money will make a nice down payment on my next new car.

You get the idea.

Well, he managed to get lucky and his short 15 days of leave would occur right when my niece was graduating from JMU and everyone in the fam just happened to be able to get free for this one weekend.

Next thing you know, it became a family reunion.

It's nice to see family - it's really nice to see how easily we fall back in to the same old family routines we had from the way back time - after dinner kidding, the younger generation jumping up on the getting old one for some rasslin', hootin, and hollerin... and discussions of bad jokes past and times aplenty fill the rooms with warmth of memories of hearth and home...

Ahhh... reminiscing... both my brothers and their wives and all the kids... Even the newest youngest one has started to come out of his quiet little shell and show he does indeed come from the same obnoxious, arrogant, funloving family tree.

And, of course, with my first nephew back in the same state, well... we were gonna get to settle the smack talk for real. He even brought his own sticks to his flight so he'd be well-armed.

And wouldn't you know it? Security changes from 9/11 have caused such a ruckus in what is allowed and NOT for luggage.

His pool cues?

Not allowed.

I guess they're afraid he would knock the pilots balls into a corner pocket or something...

Anyway, we had to deal with the Lords of Lost Luggage as his sticks had to come over on a completely separate flight, arriving some 3 hours after the rest of the family. These are the people who claim complete and total ignorance as to the true location and/or nature of your lost luggage. Plausible deniability, I say, in case they happen to like whatever happens to be "missing".... either that, or they are the ones who send lost luggage to the place where ball point pens and single socks go...

And as the black sheep of the family, I got to stay behind and wait for Nick's Sticks to arrive.... but, hey, Nick waited with us.

It was really nice getting to chill out on my deck for a few hours, just sitting in the beautiful sun, drinking beers with my nephew. He's a good kid... and chicks dig him.

Bonus. Almost as good as taking a puppy to the park, having him with me at the bar.

Oh, and the rematch?

A draw.

And I've been informed that the rubber match has to be held in Texas, his home turf.

Great.

Anyone here know how to speak Texan?