On the side: What? Us? Lazy?

Chris Kolmar,Marketing DirectorZippia28 2nd St., #300San Francisco, CA 94105Dear Chris:Earlier this month, you and-or your company issued some sort of “analysis” that ranked my community, Red Oak, as the laziest in Iowa.I wanted to share a few things with you about your diligent “work” to inform the world, and in the process, drum up free marketing for your business. Yes, we’re smart enough out here in the sticks to know your agenda. First, you offended a bunch of good people. Second, it’s very Iowan to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes before you cast aspersions. So, perhaps if you made a trip to Red Oak, there would be people here willing to arrange some work for you.You could try to keep pace with the guys at the local co-op while they run fertilizer units from before dawn to after dusk this time of year.The other day I met a woman who was waitressing, works at the school during the day, and owns a pizza business. Want to follow her?How about taking an overnight shift at the hospital, or working a CNA’s shift at a care center?Do you want to work some cattle with the local growers or spend a day with one of the veterinarians on their calls?It’s too bad it’s spring; otherwise, we could have set you up with one of the local guys who work a day job and then move snow starting at 2 a.m. as a second income.It doesn’t take much “work” to spend your day punching keys on a keyboard the way you apparently do. I should know because I do it, too. No, hard work is running equipment to build anti-erosion terraces and dig drainage tile. Hard work is laying cement. Hard work is running your own lawn care business in the spring in Iowa when the grass grows an inch a day or more. Hard work is loading out plants and trees from the greenhouses here. Hard work is cleaning offices after hours. Hard work is dealing with upset customers in a satellite TV call center. In terms of your assumption that belittles folks regarding a lack of four-year college degrees, there are plenty of trades people here who do just fine, thank you, with their specialized training. Maybe you should spend a day or two with them on a job site. Some of them probably have college degrees anyway, and there are teachers, lawyers, doctors, nurses, social workers, bankers, sales people, machine operators – many folks who are highly trained or have work that require degrees. That’s not the only criteria you used that seem amiss. High unemployment doesn’t necessarily correlate to laziness. It more likely correlates to the fact there aren’t enough jobs. Maybe you should try creating some here, since that’s part of what your company brags about doing. Google, Facebook and others are investing in Iowa. We have room here in our industrial park and even have a building you could finish.In the same vein, with regard to this matter of a short commute being a negative, I know a lot of people who are too busy to choose to lazily waste their time sitting in traffic morning and night. That might be normal in your urban mess, but here, there’s work to be done and sitting on one’s duff in a jam doesn’t get it accomplished.I am probably wasting my keystrokes here, but as the self-appointed responder for the citizens of Red Oak in this matter, I felt it necessary to write. Around these parts, some might consider as lazy a group of latte-sipping San Franciscans who slap a label on folks thousands of miles away without ever going to meet them. No, I take that back. They would like to say it’s lazy, but they’re too nice to cast aspersions. I’m not.Brad Hicks is the Editor/Publisher of The Red Oak Express. He can be contacted at publisher@redoakexpress.com.