While the series was a pretty neat contrast of life in the minors versus life on campus, one thing that stuck with me was how very little money minor league ballplayers make. The league minimums can pay them $750 a month. That'll work in most of the bum-fuck Egypt towns that most of those teams call home. But how the hell can someone afford to live on their own on that little income someplace like Schaumburg? How could minor league teams exist (much less five of them) exist in such economically inhospitable places as the Chicago suburbs?
Today's Chicago Tribune explained how: The teams seek out and set their players up with local host families, similar to how foreign exchange students are placed.
Clearance sales are way cool. I wound up in Radio Scam with Kumar, 'cause he needed to look into things like RF modulators and color correctors for hooking up his DVD player. They had $25 burglar alarm code keypads marked down to $2-$4 apiece. These are items in the category of "I can't think of a use for them today, but I likely will later, and they won't be this cheap then." I cleared the shelf of them.
Listening to my mom and sister bitch about their jobs, I'm reminded of why I left Qualcomm. So I wonder how much of what Jamie Zawinski wrote about Netscape applies to Qualcomm, and at what rate it increases. While Qualcomm hasn't been bought out and sucked dry by a much larger company, Jamie's comments about the creativity and accomplishments of small groups versus large organizations ring a familiar note.
