The Irrelevant Preparation

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. My family and I appeared on Breakfast Television this morning. It was very interesting to see how live TV is done. There certainly is a lot of behind-the-scenes activity.
Usually I'm the one who does the public speaking in our family. I'm a Toastmasters CTM who has done presentations and speeches in front of hundreds of people. As a result, I did a lot of preparation for this TV spot. I went over what cystic fibrosis is, and how the FrightLites campaign was involved. I was rehearsing it in my mind constantly. At times it was the only thing keeping me awake.
When we were ready to go, my spouse made an instant connection with the interviewer. I could tell they felt comfortable with each other. When our part in the show began, my spouse did all the talking. My preparation became irrelevant.
Was this right? More tomorrow.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Advertising II

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. What's the best way to advertise? Be interviewed by the media, as in public relations.
Our family will be on Breakfast Television Wednesday at around 7am. We'll get a few minutes to talk about Cystic Fibrosis. Could we ever afford this time to advertise? No way! It would cost 5 digits and be much shorter.
Not only that, but with the interactive questioning, we can deliver a much more powerful message than any advertising could do. And people see us as much more credible, even if they aren't initially interested in our cause.
When weighing this against buying a simple ad, there's just no comparison. Advertising is irrelevant compared to good PR.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Advertising

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. Just wondering why companies advertise.
Obviously they have to let people know they exist. Advertising is one way. But is it the best way? And is it worth the cost?
Most advertising I've seen is irrelevant. Why? Because it doesn't target a specific group, namely people who are interested in the company. Instead, it targets the entire market to which it's distributed, and charges for that entire market, of which only a subset may be interested in the company.
Now many would say it's the best way to get new customers. I don't agree. A mass blitz only gets a passing glance from the uninterested. If you want proof of that, check the Ontario Election voter turnout.
What is a better way for companies to get new customers? More tomorrow.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Wrestler II

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. Do we care about wrestlers? In a word, no. They are irrelevant partially because their sport is irrelevant to most of us.
Even to die-hard wrestling fans, only the elite wrestlers (past or present) are relevant. Why? Because when a wrestler (or any other athlete for that matter) leaves the ring, there's someone there to fill in.
Is this right? Absolutely not. We have to remember athletes are human beings, and are therefore automatically relevant.
Can anything be changed? It will be difficult. If someone is trying to crack the big-time, they're going to probably do it at all costs.
I almost touched Jimmy Valiant, a wrestler, once. Who is he? Irrelevant, just like me.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Wrestler

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. My serious professional wrestling involvement started and ended with Haystack Calhoun back in the '60s. When a young neighbour became interested in Randy Savage and Hulk Hogan, I faked interested. When my dad told him Wrestmania was fake, he covered his ears and said "I don't want to hear it".
It's hard to believe wrestling could be life-threatening. Yet after listening to Bret Hart talk about his career while promoting his book "Hitman", another point became clear to me - wrestlers are irrelevant in our society.
These guys are on display many days of the year. While rehearsed, their moves do involve a fair bit of coordination, and do inflict some pain on both parties. Add steriod use to the equation, and premature deaths are not out of the question.
Do we care? More tomorrow.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Assets II

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. FYI I got a call from the branch today. Turns out we were accepted after all, even though our accounts are still not "option friendly". Maybe our assets were relevant after all!
Having said that, I wonder why the branch let me know, when it's the brokerage who does the approval. Are my spouse and I irrelevant to the brokerage?
And why the delay? Is our business irrelevant to the brokerage?
We're fortunate we don't have to rely on this money. In a way, it's irrelevant to us. That's why I'm not too upset.
What about others who see this as a relevant investment? Would they feel irrelevant?
When does someone become relevant to a brokerage? Do they have to be a "whale", a Las Vegas term for big spender? I guess only someone relevant would know.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Assets

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. Last week my spouse and I applied for an investment brokerage account. We specified me as the main investor, even though I'm unemployed. The person taking our application didn't see it as a problem, probably because we've got over $1 million in assets.
When we got our reply back, we had been rejected. Apparently our desire to be able to trade options was seen as risky because I'm unemployed.
At this point I have to consider our assets to be irrelevant. My spouse makes more than the average Canadian family. I never have to work another full-time job again. Yet we don't qualify?
If being employed is such a big deal, why didn't the person say so at the beginning? Why not have my spouse sign up individually?
Always point out the relevant requirements as quickly as possible.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Ravine II

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Hello. Two ladies and I thought yard waste could go into the ravine. My spouse thought otherwise. So what happened?
The yard waste was picked up. And when my spouse came home, I mentioned the yard waste conversations. My spouse nodded and even laughed a little. However, nothing changed. There was no "well, maybe it could've gone into the ravine". There was no comment at all.
Is this surprising? No. It was an irrelevant story from an irrelevant person, so no comment was required. If the ladies had talked to my spouse directly, their point of view may have been relevant. Since they became characters in my irrelevant story, their credibility went down significantly.
Relevant decisions can only be made by relevant people.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Ravine

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
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Hello. Today I was tying tree branches together to put out with yard waste. During that time I had two separate visits from ladies on the street.
Both ladies wondered why I was putting yard waste on the curb to be picked up. After all, our street backs onto a ravine. All the branches and leaves could go into that area. They would look like they belong.
I told the ladies the ravine was irrelevant.
Why? Because my spouse, being a relevant person, wanted the yard waste at the curb, instead of in the ravine. End of story.
Did this make sense to the ladies? Actually, no. It didn't make sense to me either. I told them my thoughts were irrelevant too.
More tomorrow.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Non-Voter III

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. So how come more people vote for the next Canadian Idol than the next prime minister or premier or mayor? Because it's entertainment.
Therefore, should political elections have an entertainment tie-in? Should all voters get a chance to win $1 million? Or to play "Deal or No Deal"?
How can people feel relevant enough to vote for something entertaining, yet irrelevant enough not to vote for a government? It does boggle my mind.
What happened to the days of Pierre Trudeau, where someone had enough charisma to get people genuinely interested in politics? What would it take to get back to those days? Can it happen given the dirt digging media?
What does it take to make non-voters feel relevant again?

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Non-Voter II

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. What to do about non-voters? I'd start a campaign right now if I was Elections Ontario. Give examples of what happened in other countries/provinces/etc when turnout was low.
I'd also look to see what could make voting even easier. Maybe explore voting online. See if it can be secure enough.
Taking a census a year before the election would ensure the voter's list is more accurate. Right now I believe they're working from an old list. As a result, the 52.6% could be high or low. No one knows for sure.
Maybe giving a tax credit to people who vote could also help. If someone got, say, $500 taken off their taxes for voting, it could be a big incentive.
More tomorrow.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Non-Voter

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. According to a cbc.ca article, only 52.6% of eligible Ontario voters (4.4 million people) decided to cast a ballot for the Ontario election. That means 47.4% of the population decided to be irrelevant non-voters.
Why? Especially after there were efforts made to increase turnout, like leaving polls open until 9pm? Admittedly there was rain in my part of the world, but certainly not severe weather.
Would these same 47.4% vote for Canadian Idol contestants? Or vote online for any of the many opinion polls on different subjects?
I must say that after having 3 uncles in World War II, I will never miss an opportunity to vote. It's one of the most precious things in our society. For it to be overlooked at election time is somewhere between unfortunate and inexcusible.
What to do? More tomorrow.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Illness II

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. Why would a relevant person care for me in my time of illness? It doesn't make sense.
By caring for me, the relevant person would be ignoring relevant duties to look after an irrelevant person, which by default is an irrelevant act. Why do something irrelevant, when there are relevant things to be done?
Since I'm irrelevant, it follows that my duties are irrelevant. Therefore, I don't have to delegate them, especially to a relevant person. However, if I do lie in bed and don't do my irrelevant duties, people will have proof that I am irrelevant. They then will ignore me even more, which will make me even more irrelevant.
Is there any way my illness will make me relevant? Not a chance. My illness will make me more irrelevant. Therefore it's better to pretend I'm well.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Illness

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. I was unavailable Monday because of Canadian Thanksgiving.
This past Thursday evening/Friday morning I was quite ill. I didn't get much sleep. I spent more time in another room (guess which one!) than my bedroom. Yet come Friday morning I was up doing my normal duties.
Why? Because my illness was irrelevant, because I am irrelevant.
If a relevant person would've been as ill as I was, that person would've been bed-ridden. The world would've stood still waiting for that relevant person's condition to improve. All duties would've been delegated.
In my case, everything had to stay as it was. Irrelevant people are not cared for.
Why? More tomorrow.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Intangible Benefits IV

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. Will putting intangible benefits into money terms help you convince someone of their worth? No, if you're irrelevant like me!!
Once you've gotten your argument down and memorized, then you have to walk the "convincee" through it as if it's their idea. In my case, my spouse is an accountant. All I have to do is ask questions for the number part.
It's the whole idea part that will be the toughest sale. As mentioned a few posts ago, it requires getting the relevant person to see that a solution can be reached that is different from their original position yet acceptable. All that has to be done is to take your idea and lead the relevant person into thinking it was their idea. It can be done, but it's very difficult since as an irrelevant person you're not listened to. Go for it!

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Intangible Benefits III

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. How do you make intangible benefits relevant? Simply figure out what it would cost if you no longer had them. The universal language of money is always relevant.
For example, let's use home-care. It has been deemed irrelevant by some that I am wasting my time staying home. Yet, if we had to pay for home-care, our costs would be $10,000+/year for our two kids.
Then there's the stress of having to get off work to get them in time, and having to take a vacation day if one of them is sick. Compute your hourly work rate for what you're missing, because even if you're salaried, your vacation day means one less to take an actual vacation. Then add what any medications would cost if the stress grew high enough. And factor in when certain activities could be done.
Will this work? More tomorrow.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Intangible Benefits II

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. Why are intangible benefits irrelevant? Because they're intangible. As a result, they're difficult to measure.
How much is having someone else get kids ready in the morning worth to anyone? It depends on who that person is. However, a dollar is always going to be worth a dollar. And more dollars usually is better than less dollars.
Unfortunately intangible benefits usually don't become relevant until after they're gone. The people realize they were relevant after all. It makes a difference to be able to sleep in. Or not arrange a vacation schedule around when a home care provider is available.
How can intangible benefits become relevant? More tomorrow.

Regards,
Irrelevant

The Irrelevant Intangible Benefits

This blog is written mostly tongue in cheek. Some points may be informative. Please provide your feedback.
If you suffer from self-irrelevancy, please seek professional advice.

Hello. My spouse was at the doctor today for a physical. The conversation came up about me being unemployed. The doctor asked if I needed some anti-depressants. My spoouse replied with laughter. Apparently the only thing I will die of according to my spouse is possibly excessive free golf rounds.
My spouse is becoming concerned about my "jobs" (part time golf marshall, full time home care) not providing enough income. When I mention the intangible benefits (not having to worry about home care, or kids being sick, or kids not going to school, or having to get up in the morning because I'm getting them ready), it falls on deaf ears. That's because the intangible benefits are irrelevant.
Why are they irrelevant? More tomorrow.

Regards,
Irrelevant