The Elephants Duel
When elephants duel the only ones who really get hurt are those poor souls unlucky enough to be between them. Locally we have a somewhat nasty fuel between two health care behemoths. The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (“UPMC) has not so quietly been gobbling up hospital after hospital after hospital. They have built an impressive array of first-class medical facilities and propelled the Pittsburgh Region to the forefront of quality health care centers. Highmark is is behemoth 2 and has been the local service for Blue Cross/Blue Shield and one of the larger insurance providers in the area. UPMC go irked recently when Highmark took steps to purchase UPMC’s largest (actually quite smaller) competitor, West Penn Allegheny who have severe financial problems.
It’s an often used phrase to indicate your sincerity, word, honor about something when you swear on your mother’s grave…assuming she is dead of course. It really is a meaningless statement for those who think nothing of lieing to achieve their goals. Why would a sleazebag care about his mother when he has an agenda to push or a point to make. Perhaps they consider it “poetic license” to use a loved one in such a manner. I believe it is despicable.
Brief 1: Finally some decent news for those of us men on the higher end of the weight scale. We cannot really wear tight Lycra bike shorts, Speedo swim briefs (no one except for competitive swimmers should anyway), or vertical stripes, but it seems that
I wasn’t sure whether to list this posting as an update to 
Last Saturday morning I slept in a little and headed off to go grocery shopping at my favorite warehouse club. I didn’t have time to eat breakfast before I left so I planned to have lunch at the club after shopping. Plus it was Saturday and I knew the sample booths would be out in force attracting crowds of shoppers. The free sample thing really works as I picked up a few extra items, but the traffic jams near the little carts can be irritating. I am not sure why folks feel they have to eat the sample in front of the server. That’s one of my pet peeves.
I don’t know if you saw the suspense movie, When A Stranger Calls, but when the police made this call to the young lady in the house, chills went up my spine. The stalker was actually inside the house where everybody assumed that she was safe. Where we all think we are safe.