Monica Kochelee

I was just reading an article on Time.com that France has decided to extend their 35 hour work week. I didn’t know that France had a 35 hour work week! That meant that if they worked more than 35 hours, they got paid overtime! Anyway, France’s government has decided that they will allow businesses to require that their employees work longer hours without paying them. Understandably the businesses are happy about that, the employees not so much.  I know I’d rather have a 35 hour work week!

Well, we did it!  We drove 64 miles one way to buy a pair of those crazy Z-Coil shoes!  I thought my hubby was planning to buy a pair, too, but when we got to the store and he saw how ugly they were he would not even try a pair on to see how the felt!  I really thought it was too bad, if he had at least tried on a pair and someone someday talks about those shoes he could say “oh yeah, I tried on a pair of those once!”  But he had this look of disgust on his face that would not come off. 

Well, the shoes ARE ugly, but they are comfortable.  So I bought a pair of them for myself.  I NEED a comfortable pair of shoes, I am going to be working in a job where I stand up all day long, and I’m not used to doing that.  So I want the most comfortable pair of shoes I can find!  They cost me over $200, so I sure hope they are worth it and make my feet “happy” when I’m working in them!  If they do, then they will be worth their weight in gold!

I’m waiting for my hubby to get ready to go shopping for shoes with me.  We’re planning on buying some of those crazy Z-Coil shoes, and the closest store that sells them is 64 miles away!  The experts say that you should never buy shoes before 2pm, so we should be getting to the store just about right on time!  I printed off directions to the store from Mapquest, and we’re taking our GPS, so I hope we can find it OK, it’s in a town that I haven’t been to in over 30 years!

When running a business, one of the most important decisions one makes from an administrative aspect is whether or not to accept credit cards as a form of payment. There are pros and cons to accepting credit cards.  Accepting credit cards expands your customer base; more customers will be inclined to buy your product or service if you accept credit cards.  However, accepting credit cards will cost your business money in the way of fees.  So you have to weigh out the costs and the benefits and decide if it is worth it.

A lot of businesses have made the decision to accept credit cards but offer their customers that pay with cash a cash discount to encourage them to pay with cash instead of credit cards.  I’ve heard that some gas stations have decided to stop accepting credit cards at all!  But I think that is a bad decision, the culture of America now has credit cards firmly entrenched into its psyche.  Orbit Payments is a company that offers merchant processing of credit cards.  By that I mean they will set up your company to accept credit cards.  What sets Orbit Payments apart from other companies is that they provide secure transactions with only a one week turnaround, so their clients get their money faster than with most other companies.

The economy worries me more than I’d like to admit.  According to the news programs that I watch and the Internet news sites that I read, the ever increasing gasoline prices, the increasing food prices, the floods in Iowa are going to result in HIGHER food prices, the price of milk will be going up to $6.00 gallon soon and the higher unemployment rates all spell bad times ahead.  We’re already in bad times; I hate to think of them getting much worse.  I hope that when the Presidential election is over and done with the economy will recover.