Almost every Saturday my wife and I have brunch at a local luncheonette.  The waiter always stops by and asks if we'd like coffee.  Invariably we say yes --- except this Saturday it was warm and I asked for iced coffee (hot coffee poured into a glass with some ice cubes).  Shortly after the waiter set our meals down before us, he came by with a pot of coffee.  He asked my wife if she'd like her cup of hot coffee refilled.  She said "yes."  Some places charge for a second cup, and if that's the policy, we pay for it --- grudgingly.  I mean, c'mon we're talking New York City where at least the first free refill is a tradition (unless you're talking Starbucks, which, for the record, ain't from New York City)

So, the waiter fills my wife's half-empty cup and starts walking away.  I call after him and ask him to please refill my half-empty glass of iced coffee from the same pot.  He says that he has to charge me for another iced coffee.  I'm confused.  Every Saturday the restaurant refills every customer's cup of coffee.   No charge.  Why, all of a sudden, was he charging me for a refill of a glass of iced coffee?  Matter of factly, he tells me that they don't give free refills for iced coffee.  Why not, I ask.  He says it's because they only give refills for hot coffee and it's an extra charge for iced coffee --- more what I'd call an excuse than an explanation.

Ever the argumentative attorney, I asked him if the iced coffee isn't made from the same pot of coffee he's holding in his hand.  He says "yes," but  they still don't give free refills for iced coffee.  I tell him I don't want any more ice cubes (that would open another can of worms because they never charge for refills of glasses of water), just some of the same coffee he just poured for my wife for free --- of course, I could have simply dumped the coffee from my wife's cup into my glass and then asked for another refill for her but for some inexplicable reason I thought that would be unethical.  Regardless,  the fact that every Saturday they gave me a free refill of hot coffee in a cup but were now refusing me the same courtesy in a glass was driving me nuts.  I mean what's the difference?  

As I sat in the luncheonette fuming, and as my wife tried to calm me down, I told her that the silliness reminded me of the phone company's practice of charging extra for an unlisted phone number.  Now think about that for a second.  You ask not to have your number listed.  You tell the phone company not to incur the extra expense of having to print your number in some phone book or to maintain it on a file to provide to others.  Theoretically, when you instruct someone not to do something, that should be cheaper.  However, the phone company charges you more money to have an unlisted number than a listed one.  And much like the waiter refusing to pour me a refill of coffee, the phone company explains the surcharge as one arising from either a so-called premium service or an extra service --- but, HELLO!!!, I'm not asking for a premium or extra service; I don't want you to list my number. Asking you not to do something shouldn't be an excuse for you to charge me more.  

Which leads me to something else I just don't get.  On Saturday, as my wife and I waited for the cross-town bus to take us to the luncheonette, I told her that I was thinking of leasing a car.  For some reason I passed the time by looking at the models on the street.  And I noticed something.  German car.  German luxury car.  German SUV.  Japanese car.  Japanese luxury car.  Japanese SUV.  And then I paid 50 cents more in bus fare because the New York City Metropolitan Transit Authority just raised the fare because of a so-called budget gap.   When we got to the supermarket, everyone was lined up at counters to buy imported cheese, imported fruit, and imported vegetables.  And I notice some of the shoppers (mainly males) are on their cellphones asking such critical questions as how do I tell if it's ripe or do you want the imported prosecutor.  And I notice that their cellphones are manufactured by foreign companies.  

Life in these United States is indeed absurd.  Our federal budget calls for more than $12 billion dollars in foreign aid.  For what?  It hasn't made us any safer.  They still hate us abroad.  We all know that most of the cash winds up supporting corrupt regimes (and when they're overthrown the new regimes blame us for propping up the toppled ones).  Worse, many of the ingrates we help out ignore us or spit in our faces when we ask for a favor.  And now our friends and family are on unemployment and our local governments are cutting back and taxing us more.  Yet we still keep buying foreign goods, not realizing that it's costing us jobs and revenue here.  Economists see troubling signs of deflation.  I'll be happy to fight that problem by paying a few bucks more for "Made in USA."  No, I won't forget those who stand with us:  I just bought some English cheese to have with my Australian wine.  I'm not an isolationist, but you won't see me buying anything French or German for a long, long time.

Somewhere it makes sense to give billions in foreign aid to corrupt regimes and to countries unwilling to support us in times of need.  And somewhere it makes sense for Americans to continue to buy foreign goods when our own economy is weakening and our fellow citizens are getting pink slips.  Which ultimately brings me back to my iced coffee.  Somewhere its more expensive to pour the same coffee from the same pot into a half-empty glass than into a half-empty cup.   

SINGER’S DISCORDANT NOTES
  Copyright 2003 by Bill Singer