Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/74678
THIS WEEK WITH MARGARET by MARGARET DICKSON THIS WEEK WITH MARGARET This, That and the Other We have reached the point in the summer when life seems to slow down and just cruise along at a lazier pace through the haze and humidity. People we might want to talk to are nowhere to be found — dozing on a beach, perhaps? Meals are more casual — too hot to eat. Even the news seems to relax a bit, with fewer stories about world calamities and atrocities, or maybe I am just giving myself a mini-vacation from hard news before the deluge of an American Presidential election sweeps all else away after Labor Day. Whatever the reason, here are a few of the news items that have caught my attention lately. Coffee, which I am sipping as I write this, may well be good for women. It may reduce our stress levels, allow us to collaborate with others more effectively and may even lower our blood pressure. For men, not so much, even though science has no idea why. • • • • • • Two movie stars, Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, longtime favorites of the tabloid and popular press, have just gotten what seems to me like the world's quickest divorce. The couple, parents of a 6-year-old, announced they were throwing in the towel, and before the media had time to really chew that one over — WAS SCIENTOLOGY TO BLAME?!?!? — a settlement was reached and Tom and Katie were back on the market. Meanwhile, whichever Kardashian it was whose marriage to an athlete lasted 72 days is still haggling with her one-time honey over who is going to pay whom what. Go figure. three different prospective treatments for Alzheimer's disease by three different pharmaceutical companies are nearing the end of their clinical trials and are showing promise in un-gumming the brains of people suffering from this heretofore dreaded condition. We should have some idea about their effectiveness within a couple of months — fingers are crossed around the world. If one or more of them do not prove effective, experts fear that drug companies may withdraw from Alzheimer's research out of years of frustration over finding any treatment that can stop the disease's mind-robbing progress. • • • On another medical front, Even the news seems to relax a bit, with fewer stories about world calamities and atrocities, this time of year. There is always someone out there who wants to fool and/or cheat his • • • fellow man. Some fellow in Georgia is trying to convince North Carolina court officials that telling people they missed jury duty and could be fined $500 or even go to jail is just a joke and that everyone should lighten up. The same day I read that news story, I received not one but two recorded telephone calls from the Fayetteville Public Works Commission warning me of a scam operation telling me that the federal government will pay my utility bill if I just give the scammer my bank account number. P. T. Barnum is often credited with saying, "There's a sucker born every day," but he denied it. • • • clerk who guides you through and shows you how to lift your purchases correctly to record the price. I had large trash cans which was a nightmare because the electronic eye is stationary so you keep having to wave the thing over it time and time again. Then I went to the grocery store and they've turned three quarters of the checkouts … into self-checkouts. I am convinced it is collusion. They all decided together because they knew the push back would be huge and folks would go to another store, which I did after my first encounter at Big Box store #1 only to find the same thing at Big Box store #2. "I hate it. Even Big Warehouse # 1 doesn't make you do that. I watched elderly people trying to wave their purchases over the magic spot, things like window units, and I thought one old man was going to throw it at the clerk helping … It's not progress … no matter how much they save." Likewise, I hated to email her back with the news that our Big Warehouse #1 in Fayetteville is already phasing in self checkout. • • • Happy mid-summer to all … MARGARET DICKSON, Con- tributing Writer, COMMENTS? Editor@upandcomingweekly.com. And from the "This drives me crazy!" department comes this from one of my cousins, who stands a lovely and proud 5'1," a fact of life relevant to her rant. "You need to write about the 'self-checkout' trend that is sweeping the world! Went to Big Box store #1 and had to check myself out or wait in one full- service line. Big Box store #2 is all self-checkout now (in her city) but during the transition you have a WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM JULY 18-24, 2012 UCW 5