Your Sentinel for Today July 1, 2020

The Sentinel All the news that's fit to print and some that's not.
Advertising New and improved, why is everything "new and improved?" Why not just better? Every new I Phone is the "newer, better I phone." I worked in an electrical engineering department for 4.5 years at Burroughs computer corporation and it takes a very long time to conceive, build, debug and produce a new product. So how much change can there be in an I phone in less than a year? I do not know the answer. Another advertising thing is "bigger and better" or "10-X more cleaning power." My question is always, better or more than what? Was the old product 10 ounces and now 11 ounces? Was the old product so lacking in cleaning power that they couldn't sell enough of it? Was it 3/4 water before and now it has less water?	Giant Economy Size I have done the math on things when I see that on a product. It turns out there is really little difference than buying 2 of the smaller sized products. With giant economy sized products a person needs to find room to store them. Sometimes by the time I got close to the bottom the product had broken down and separated and I threw the last of it away, losing my savings in buying it earlier. These days when we are now elderly citizens, we don't need to be lugging big heavy soap products or huge trays of chicken breasts or milk by the gallon. What size of refrigerator does one need to put a gallon of milk in there and have room for all the other groceries? So you buy a $1500 refrigerator to save 15 cents at a time?	Beer I like beer and I believe I am in good company because so many other people like beer. I used to have a "T" shirt that said "beer is proof God loves us" quoted from Ben Franklin. I had to quit wearing it because people kept stopping me in stores so they could read the shirt and then they wanted to tell me a story about beer. Back then I had better things to do than idle chit chat in Walmart. There is one downside to good beer. You can never buy it; you can only rent it. I am normally a reasonably quiet man, but give me enough beer and I become a story teller. I can rattle on for well over an hour, remembering things I had not thought about for years. Some of my finest hours were at a casino at a card table with other old sailors or marines at the table. The stories went on for hours and everyone had a good time. The tables would fill with people because as they would pass by they would note that we were having a good time and that drew them in to be with a fun crowd. I always had a sober driver with me, so I did not endanger anyone.