"It actually feels good from both ends."

Yes. I was engaged to a woman who couldn't understand why I would exchange pleasantries with bank tellers, grocery clerks, and the like. She said that chances were I'd never see those people again, so why waste time joking with them?

I never saw being friendly as an investment; it was just a way to make that moment enjoyable. But even if it's not an investment in a particular relationship, being friendly pays off in the long term. If everybody would do it, the general social environment would improve.

My fiancee and I didn't stay engaged very long.

Wise man!

"each raindrop raises the level of the sea..."

it doesn't hurt to give away your kindness, because it is always replaced by more. This is why people who always calculate their interactions in life on a ledger in their mind, never have enough. They don't realize, it's free.

I’m a real big believer in karma. When I was living in Camarillo in 91, I found a ladies pocketbook laying in the middle of the road. I got off my bike and picked it up and it was packed full of cash and credit cards. From what I could see, it belonged to some doctors wife. I took it to the address on the license and the lady wanted to give me a 20 dollar reward. I told her to keep it. It wasn’t a big deal. Two days later I had to drive from Camarillo to San Diego for a school. I was in a hurry and stopped by an atm and took out forty bucks for gas and food. I picked up a classmate in Long Beach and when we pulled into San Diego we went to get some dinner. When I went to pay for the meal, I had no money. I looked all over the car and eventually figured that I had left it on the car seat and it had blown away because I had the t-tops off. Two days later, my bank called me and told me that I had left the damned money in the slot! And somebody turned it in! What are the odds of that? It was credited back to my account.

One of the reasons I ended up divorcing my ex-wife was that she tended to be extremely rude to people in public. Waiters, cashiers, strangers, you name it. It angered and embarrassed the hell out of me. My mother always taught us to be polite and tip well.

I have totally found that treating people human, really makes life good. Simply smiling at people, even when I don't really feel like it, goes over huge.

Riding public trans a lot, I get the opportunity to practice this. I smile at people pretty much all the time. And it totally pays off. A couple weeks ago, I was under a fair amount of stress. I just wasn't my normal pleasant self. Someone who often rides when I'm on actually noticed and asked if something was wrong. I explained why I was stressed. Not only did it give me an opportunity to get it off my chest, but the guy I was talking to is a retired contractor, who had a very nice suggestion for dealing with the problem.

Ahh, it even cheers me up - to think the contractor, Vito, had a solution involving concrete, in the form of new galoshes for your "problem"...

I try to be as nice as I can as often as I can. I work with a girl who asked me once why I was so nice to other people, and I said, it's easier to be nice that it is to be nasty. Nasty takes to much work! YMMV

Some girls don't like the niceness because it's viewed as flirting. By both men and women.

Source: crazy bitches getting upset because I'm polite and friendly to whoever I feel like it, usually everybody in range.

Sometimes, it makes me want to *actually* flirt and see how they feel about the difference. Insecurity is sooooo unattractive.

People tend to be nicer to you if you're nice to them, so why shouldn't you be nice? If they aren't nice, it's a waste of energy to get indignant, you can just keep walking. Being "nasty" is best kept in reserve for those that deserve the snarkiness (rude cell-phoners, etc).

Besides generally being nice to people lulls them all into a false sense of security for your next devious prank. Erm...if you DO devious pranks, that is. I disavow all knowledge of such things.

Radwaste -

As tempted as I have occasionally been to fit people who have worked for me with concrete boots, this was quite the opposite. It is the biggest problem with running a small business and becoming too friendly with employees. I actually knew what I had to do, it just took hearing it from an objective listener, to accept it. I hate letting people go, especially people who have become friends.

The problem is that I have been adjusting my business to using more subs, for the last year. As I am doing less of the actual work, especially grunt work, I am needing a higher skill set from people working directly for me.

The guy I had to let go has worked for me almost as long as I have been in Portland. He has no real skills and just doesn't pick anything up. On the upside, he is a kick-ass, never complain sort of grunt. Works very hard and will go, go, go. The problem is that he requires very explicit directions and you need to have an eye on him to be sure he understand what you want him to do.

So it goes.

Talmudic saying: you can tell a person's character from three things:
their tipping
their tippling
and their temper.

....Loehmann's!!!!

Flood of childhood memories of accompanying my mom and sister to that store, wandering the racks, sitting with the husbands in the waiting area... glad they're still around.