Hold on to your rants

Note that I will be gone for two weeks for field work. Look for a build-up of rants starting again at the end of April. In the meantime, please enjoy this elevator music......

Getting What You Pay For

Recently, I looked into getting a custom-made, ergonomic office chair. At my current job, I sit in front of a computer for 9 hours a day. Lately, my lower back and hip area have been making me feel like a 80-year old woman from the Bronx (ah my sciatica!). The problem is that all the office chairs that you buy in big box stores are too large for my 5-foot tall frame. I can choose to either have my feet on the floor or my back against the backrest--but not both at the same time. The custom-made model proved to be out of my league ($1377), but what struck me was one line item in the quote I received. They wanted to charge me an extra $250 to give me "shortened" back and arm supports. So, they have to use less material--therefore I get charged more. Yeah, that sounds fair.

This is not the first time this injustice has come to my attention. In fact, every time I go to buy any article of clothing I think about it. Shoes for example. Shoes come in many sizes--and all are the same price. A friend of mine has a size 14 shoe. His feet are essentially twice as big as my size 6 (4 in men's sizes). If we were to buy unisex shoes, however, we'd be paying exactly the same. Why? I'm not saying we should be biased against big people. The basic fact is that it costs more money for materials to produce something at gigantor scale than at the elfin scale so why shouldn't I pay less?

This is also an issue in the airplane. Actually, the airplane is the one place where I feel I have the advantage over non-petites. I love curling up in the seat and watching the stares of hatred from the bean stalk hitting his knees against the seat across the aisle. But recently, even the airplane has become biased against the wee folk. Now they will make us pay for extra checked luggage. Why? We are too heavy to continue to defy gravity even with jet propulsion. Not that I usually have a lot of luggage, but I feel this is unfair. I think every passenger should have to get on a scale with all of their luggage. If the combined weight of the passenger and luggage is above a certain number--then we have to pay extra. My guess is that I could bring along a grand piano before tipping the scales. That would be fair--and shouldn't be too embarrassing. You could always blame it on the luggage. In my mind I'm picturing the golden egg scale in Willy Wonka. If you're too heavy, a trap door would open and send you down the shoot--no that won't do. I think there should be a box that you have to fit into as well--like the box they have to show you how big your carry-on can be. "If you and your luggage cannot fit in this box, you are too big for this airplane." Yogis would certainly have an advantage there.