Stella Awards

BlueRado · December 9, 2002

Subject: Stella Awards

It's time once again to consider the candidates for the annual Stella Awards. The Stella's are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled coffee on herself and successfully sued McDonalds. That case inspired the Stella Awards for the most uniquely successful lawsuits in the United States for last year.

Actually, joint awards should be given to the plaintiff attorneys and the flaming idiots on the juries who awarded anything at all to these morons--who deserved NOTHING!!!!

The following are this year's candidates:

Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas, was awarded $780,000 by a jury of her peers after breaking her ankle tripping over a toddler who was running inside a furniture store. The owners of the store were understandably surprised at the verdict, considering the misbehaving little toddler was Ms. Robertson's

son.

A 19-year-old Carl Truman of Los Angeles won $74,000 and medical expenses when his neighbor ran over his hand with a Honda Accord. Mr. Truman apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel of the car when he was trying to steal his neighbor's hub caps.

Terrence Dickson of Bristol, Pennsylvania, was leaving a house he had just finished robbing by way of the garage. He was not able to get the garage door to go up since the automatic door opener was malfunctioning. He couldn't reenter the house because the door connecting the house and garage locked when he pulled it shut. The family was on vacation, and Mr. Dickson found himself locked in the garage for eight days. He subsisted on a case of Pepsi he found, and a large bag of dry dog food. He sued the homeowner's insurance claiming the situation caused him undue mental anguish. The jury agreed to the tune of $500,000.

Jerry Williams of Little Rock, Arkansas, was awarded $14,500 and medical expenses after being bitten on the buttocks by his next door neighbor's beagle. The beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced yard. The award was less than sought because the jury felt the dog might have been just a little provoked at the time by Mr. Williams who was shooting it repeatedly with a pellet gun.

A Philadelphia restaurant was ordered to pay Amber Carson of Manchester, Pennsylvania, $113,500 after she slipped on a soft drink and broke her coccyx (tailbone). The beverage was on the floor because Ms. Carson had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument.

Kara Walton of Claymont, Delaware, successfully sued the owner of a night club in a neighboring city when she fell from the bathroom window to the floor and knocked out her two front teeth. This occurred while Ms. Walton was trying to sneak through the window in the ladies room to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. She was awarded $12,000 and dental expenses.

This year's favorite could easily be Mr. Merv Grazinski of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Mr. Grazinski purchased a brand new 32-foot Winnebago motor home. On his first trip home, having driven onto the freeway, he set the cruise control at 70 mph and calmly left the drivers seat to go into the back and make himself a cup of coffee. Not surprisingly, the RV left the freeway, crashed and overturned. Mr. Grazinski sued Winnebago for not advising him in the owner's manual that he couldn't actually do this. The jury awarded him $1,750,000 plus a new motor home. The company actually changed their manuals on the basis of this suit, just in case there were any other complete morons buying their recreation vehicles.

P.S. - Guys, don't know what happened, but it lost the other 6-8 entries when I posted x 2! ??? (appears to be OK now - maybe formatting? )

elboberino · December 9, 2002

It's just like the lawsuit McDonalds is facing with moms suing them for making their kids fat. Well, if the moms hadn't drove their kids to Mickey D's then they wouldn't be fat, now would they!! I think I am going to change my major, go to law school and become a judge. I will do all this just so I can throw out stupid cases like this. Shame on stupid people.

Bob

General Lee 01 · December 9, 2002

I think they all deserve slots in the dipsh*t hall of fame.

BDBWTE · December 9, 2002

My dad's friend owns his own company right. Well some guy came to their shop and stole a company truck. Then while trying to hotrod wrecked and hurt himself badly. Anyways he sued the company for hardship and was awarded 500,000.00.. This time and age is BS with how the laws can be bent to help crooks and screw honest hard workers.

Kania2k1 · December 11, 2002

I totally agree with you Elbo! If y'all have a chance, pick up the book, "The Death of Common Sense". It's fairly short, for you non-habitual readers, but sorry, no pictures.

On the fat issue, maybe they could name the gasoline companies for making the gass that got the fat sh!t kids to McDonalds, the SUV/Minivan ("SUPERCARS") manufacturers for providing "safe" transport to and from said establishment, the Department of Transportation and state government for allowing easy access to the restaurant, and for allowing such a "dangerous" eatery to remain open.

If you are too stupid to realize that a Quarter Pounder (a.k.a. Royale with Cheese) has almost 550 calories, and is drenched in fat, along with the rest of the Super Sized meal, which works out to almost half of the recomended daily allowance of calories for an adult, is unhealthy, then I recommend you swiftly go to your local Wal-mart, purchase a shotgun and ammo, load it, and aim it at you genitalia, so you cannot reproduce. Can that sentence be any longer? Anyway, I feel that there should be a mandetory waiting period, and licensing, for reproducing! You gotta have a license to do almost anything now-a-days, then why not having a child also? People expect these large faceless companies to reemberse them for their own stupidity. "Hey, I'm a F*CKING MORON!, gimme some money for it! I beleive Eminem said it best... "Appaerntly you ain't parents".

When a case like this comes before a judge, he should stand up from his seat, gavel in hand, walk over and nail the Plaintiff in the head till they realize their level of stupidity. Then dis-bar the lawyer representing them, order the Plaintiff to pay the defending company travel and court expenses, have their children placed in foster or adoptive homes, and then throw the case out. Just my 2 cents!

BlueRado · December 12, 2002

I gotta agree w/ Kania here also; it's not surprising to me that there are morons out there who try to take advantage of the system;

it's the courts and juries that let them get away with it that really frosts me!!

Roofer · December 12, 2002

it's not surprising to me that there are morons out there who try to take advantage of the system;

This is way off subject, but has to do with taking advantage of people, the system, etc, etc. It is also not directed toward any one particular person. It is just a question, and here it is.

How many of you actually EARNED the money you made today? I mean, is what you do really worth your company paying you?

There is no right or wrong answer here, just a question.

I would have to say, most of the people "higher up on the ladder" in their company, work less for their higher income.

Kania2k1 · December 12, 2002

I know I bust my @ss for every dollar I make, Roofer, I'm sure you do also. I was off today, so I didn't make any, but today is my "Sunday". First day of the work week for me. I am going to follow the tangent here and agree that most if not all executives don't really "work" for the incomes they make. But I'm not going to pass up some 6 figga income, I don't think anyone would

bummed-n-Md · December 12, 2002

In the same vein, how many Pro athletes are really worth the millions they get?

Playing the devil's advocate here:

the monies they get are based on how much revenue they can generate back to the parent organization. In many respects, the same is true of upper management. Their 'value' is based on how much business (read $ ) they can bring in and the level of responsibilty assigned. Greed being what it is, if the 'company' is willing to pay that kind of money to hire a particular person, they must see a potential return in investment to make it worth the risk and cost.

I won't argue that there is a lot of dead weight in the upper levels of management in many larger companies, but I will say (having finally reached a low level management position after years of working up the ladder, and no, no 6 figure income yet ), that the there is lot more going on behind the scenes that management has to handle and deal than most employees never see or hear about. For example, in my case, I now have a lot more 'fiscal' responsibilties (to include finding enough work to keep 'my' people employeed and not layed off), while still doing 90% of the work I used to do.

The further up the ladder you move, the more 'background' the work is. In many cases, the 'value' of an upper management person is not 'what they do', but 'who they know'. If I know Mr X, an executive vice president over in company ABC, I stand a better chance of getting work from him than a total stranger from a another company (it is a "presssing the flesh" issue, like in politics).

In the trades, a private contractor plumber may know and have a friend who is an electrician. If the plumber is out on a job, and the customer mentions they have an electrical problem, the plumber is likely to recommend his friend first and vice versa. Why? Because the plumber knows the electricain and he also knows that if he gets the electrican a job or contract, the electrican is likely to do the same for him when the oppportunity presents itself. In this case, the 'plumber' is the blue collar worker, the corporate executive and the marketing staff all in one.

However, all that being said, I do think there are some 'executives' that are grossly over paid.

bummed

bummed-n-Md · December 12, 2002

When a case like this comes before a judge, he should stand up from his seat, gavel in hand, walk over and nail the Plaintiff in the head till they realize their level of stupidity. Then dis-bar the lawyer representing them, order the Plaintiff to pay the defending company travel and court expenses

I agree.

Frivouless lawsuuites like those mentioned above are one reason insurance rates a so high.

There was an old 'cowboy' movie I remember watching as a kid with my dad that had a crusty old newpaper editor in it. The banner headline on each day's paper was this guys favorite saying: "all lawyers should be taken out and Shot."

bummed.

BlueRado · December 12, 2002

it's not surprising to me that there are morons out there who try to take advantage of the system;

This is way off subject, but has to do with taking advantage of people, the system, etc, etc. It is also not directed toward any one particular person. It is just a question, and here it is.

How many of you actually EARNED the money you made today? I mean, is what you do really worth your company paying you?

There is no right or wrong answer here, just a question.

I would have to say, most of the people "higher up on the ladder" in their company, work less for their higher income.

Just for the record, my statement about "morons taking advantage of the system" was directed only at those criminals, etc getting money in these frivolous lawsuits.

Now, having said that, I'll go w/ the redirection here and agree w/ bummed. No question there are management people who simply do not "pull their own weight" as measured by any reasonable standard. But I think that bummed is correct in that often times it's the experience that a person in management is paid for.

I agree it's difficult to put a worth on many fields, particularly entertainment (pro sports being a prime example), and somewhat easier to put a worth on task-oriented jobs.

I know I personally feel like I really accomplished something useful when I spend a week replacing siding and windows on my house, vs. sitting on my a$$ in my office cold calling potential customers - the vast majority of whom don't want to talk anyways.

Roofer · December 12, 2002

What I am getting at, and has been said, is that if a person brings in money on their own actions, then they should be paid. The ones that get me are the ones who are paid salary and they go to the golf course 4 times a week. The point is, if a person brings in enough money in order for the company to make money and still pay them. Not getting paid because of other peoples work.

On a side note:::

As for doing work on your house yourself, well good for you. It sure doesn't help the world go round though if you know what I mean. I hire almost everything, even though I can do it myself. This is mainly because my time is worth more than what it would cost to get things done. This is unless it is a trade of mine.

Roofer · December 12, 2002

BTW, I apologize for taking this topic way off subject.

BlueRado · December 13, 2002

BTW, I apologize for taking this topic way off subject.

No apology necessary as far as I'm concerned, Roofer.

bummed-n-Md · December 13, 2002

As for doing work on your house yourself, well good for you. It sure doesn't help the world go round though if you know what I mean. I hire almost everything, even though I can do it myself. This is mainly because my time is worth more than what it would cost to get things done. This is unless it is a trade of mine

I am in the final stages (baseboards, window trim, etc) of putting a 1380 sqft addition on my house. Except for the foundation and the HVAC (requires special license), I've done all the work myself (electrical, plumbing, carpenty, etc), along with the help of friends and family. (I tested and got official 'homeowners' electrical and plumbing licenses to do all of the work).

One of the biggest reasons is cost. While my time is very valuable, the cost to hire someone to do what my wife and I wanted done was very cost prohibative. If I had everything 'contracted', the house would have been worth less then the cost to build the addition. (for example, with the addition, the house went from 110K to where it is now worth about 200K, but if I had contracted the work, it would have pushed my mortgage 'debt' over 225K. Doing it myself, my "debt" is now only 165K). Also, I had a lot of difficulty finding a contractor who would even consider what I was doing and using the materials I planned on using. Where I live, almost all of the 'builders' are local good old boys. Except fror septic systems, this county didn't even have a residential building code until 1991. "Well what you want to do is ok, but I figure I'll just cut this here off and add some 2-bys and put you a second floor on top". His cost for "labor" was more than twice what the materials would cost,(I think he was going to 'hire' all of his relatives as the framing crew) and on top of that, he would not finish it any faster than I would doing it myself. While I am all for supporting people in the 'trades', I am not going to 'waste' money hiring a 20 person crew to do a job that 5 can do in the same time frame.

Another big reason was BRAGGING rights. It also gave me an excuse to 'upgrade'a lot of of my power tools and 'add to my collection'. :thumb:

bummed