Overdone

Alan Weiss's The Uncomfortable Truth®

When you have a great talent on stage, do we really need dancers, other singers, flashing lights, and magic tricks? What does Starbucks gain giving us all those choices in its own strange language? Have you ever noticed how visitors from Europe are astonished at the size and number of our restaurant dinner courses? Have you ever tried to quickly find something in a car’s owner’s manual? Can you read all the menu options at Dunkin’ Donuts drive through window before the person in the car behind you becomes homicidal because they haven’t had their coffee? Do you love being “pitched” to buy credit cards on airplanes (which probably all lower your credit score)? Can you really decipher the bond issues you’re asked to vote upon with their triple negatives and boiler plate language? We tend to provide so many options to appear as if they raise the overall quality of our offerings. Or the lawyers insist we cover all the ground we can and leaver out nothing. Maybe the customers are at fault—do we need instructions that include “turn bike light on at night” or “do not eat or consume any of these pool chemicals”? We don’t recycle all that wasted food. People bring home prodigious amounts, which they don’t finish there, either. Maybe we need to look at quantity in a new way. To quote Miss Piggy, “Never eat anything you can’t lift.”