Which Reminds Me

When I was working at Editorial Vida one day Mr. Hoskins accosted me as I was walking down the hall and asked me if I were not horrified at the sweetheart deal that Mr. Hatley and his wife had worked out for themselves, an example of the type of missionary excess he had been sent to Miami to terminate. He wanted my help in charging the missionaries. Mr. Hatley had arranged things so that Mrs. Hatley would be plasticizing or applying shrinkwrap to all the books as they arrive at the warehouse from the printer, before they are shipped to the distributorships and bookstores. That way Mrs. Hatley worked evenings and weekends and took home a fat little paycheck. I have mixed feelings about that. My and sister also benefited from that arrangement two or three summers home from college. We shrink wrapped books during 9-5 hours and helped to reduce the backlog of books waiting to be shrink wrapped because Mrs. Hatley did not really put in enough hours to keep up with that and every summer there was a huge backlog of books waiting to be shrink wrapped. Later, they had the printer do the shrink wrapping at the printer so that the publisher no longer had to worry about when Mrs. Hatley would have time to do that. Anyway, I did not make that arrangement and I find it very insulting that the Hoskins would be accusing us of sweetheart deals when actually it was Mr. Hatley's idea. Also, the Hoskins were widely considered the most offensive missionaries of them all when it comes to sweetheart deals so for them to accuse us of anything is like the pot calling the kettle black. How ridiculous for Hoskins to be demanding respect from the very sheep he only wants to fleece. So they have lots of money in the bank to do whatever they want but what is money? The arsenic plantings seem to be thriving.