And You Think You Had It Bad?

I don't particularly subscribe to that Kevin Bacon-type six degrees of separation theory, but I do think that we are all definitely connected.

That connection just never plays out the way you think it might.

For the past couple of weeks, I've been following the story of Bernard Madoff and how he got (read robbed) investors for something like $50 Billion dollars - yes Billion with a capital B.

So I'm at work yesterday and one of my coworkers starts telling my about
a waiter from one of his favorite restaurants.

To put things in perspective, my colleague is a self-proclaimed gourmand. Basically,
he eats at the finest restaurants and cooks only on the weekends. You see there is a difference between waiters at say Red Lobsters and waiters at the Four Seasons. Yeah, they both do the same job, but their environments are different and the information they might be privy to is certainly not the same.

Any way, my colleague tells me how he's trying to enjoy his meal the other night, but the waiter is in an obvious funk. After a little pushing, the waiter finally tells my colleague what's going on.

The short of the story is that, this waiter in this fancy upper east side restaurant, where tips are more like $25 than $5, took charge of his mother's finances after she retired. Turns out, he put his momma's life savings into the hands of Bernard Madoff, that's Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC.

I don't know how much money it was, but whatever the amount, it's all gone. I don't know how he ever heard of Madoff's magic returns, or how he even got in a position to give his momma's money over to Madoff, but it's gone.

Then I get home last night and Channel 9 News (in NYC) had a similar story about a retired bricklayer who had all of his life savings tied up in Bernard Madoff's company as well. Just last month, his statements said he had nearly $1M invested, today he has $4,000 (and none of that is with Madoff's companies).

That's some shit.

Imagine working 40 years on your hands and knees laying bricks, developing back injuries along the way, only to find out that you now have nothing. Damn, if I lose $20 today, it's like someone stepped on my corn, I'm screw-facing all day.

Funny thing is, this waiter, his momma, or this bricklayer could be anyone of us.

I must admit, when I first heard about this Madoff guy, I laughed my ass off. $50 Billion, over 30 years, that's a lot of paper. That's 10 Oprahs, 2 Tiger Woods, Magic, Jordan, Bob Johnson, Michael Lee Chin, Jay, 50, Diddy, the entire NBA, NFL, and Major League baseball. That's more (like 2x more) than Chrysler, GM, GMAC, and Ford had to beg the government for. Plus they gotta pay it back. This dude gets to sit in his penthouse while others are jumping out the window....or slitting their wrists. He was getting ready to send out nearly $180M in checks to friends and family, never mind those ungrateful sons. Imagine that, this dude could cut you a million dollar check and not even blink, much less loose sleep.

Most of the people that got caught up initially in this Ponzi scheme were rich Frenchmen, upper-westsiders, retirees, trust funds, endowments, and investors, so it didn't really matter to me. They don't normally show up on my radar anyway, zero connection. They've already lived their lives, just like Madoff.

But, this waiter and the bricklayer, that's you, that's me, and that could have easily been our mommas.

So while you think your life is hard and times are tough.......

-whatdabusinessis.com