When I was going to college, I applied for a Sears credit card. They turned me down. I went to Montgomery Ward, applied and was instantly approved. A very short while later, a representative of Sears Credit called me to say they just reviewed my credit report again and were now happy to grant my application. I asked them if they saw the Montomery Ward account and they said yes. I told them that Montgomery Ward was willing to take a chance on me and since Sears didn't care about me, I didn't care about them. I didn't want their card and would not shop at Sears. In the ensuing decades, I can honestly say that I have probably only shopped at Sears 3 times in 40 years...

A number of years ago, a guy I considered a friend, involved me in a scheme whereby I was the alibi when he cheated on his girlfriend. When I found out, I told him to stop. When he did it a second time, I walked away and have not spoken to him since.

When I moved to Hawaii, I opened a checking account with the bank of Hawaii, I put many thousands of dollars in the account. I did not get interest on that account. Eventually, the bank charged me a large fee for not causing transactions (just taking out a dollar or putting in some money would have done it). When I went in to ask them to reverse that charge, they would not. This was even though I had about $35,000 ready to deposit from my farm contract. I immediately closed the account and took my money across the street to my credit union. I also contacted the feds and gave them the new account information for my deposit that week.

A couple days ago I noticed E-trade (where I have had an account for decades) decided they needed to charge me $40 a quarter year, because I was not trading stocks. I had thousands of dollars there, which they paid me some interest on, but because I was not generating fees, they appear not to want me as a customer. I sold what stocks I had there and called today and told them to close the account. When they told me they had to charge me to send me a check I complained. I had direct bank transfers, and the customer rep finally agreed not to charge me. It was like pulling teeth to stop these charges. I won't be using them again.

I can understand their business decisions to generate income, I just won't let them do it to me.

Recently, a newcomer airline (Mesa) came to town and investigated buying one of two interisland airlines who were having financial problems. They appear to have used internal information to determine how much the airlines had in reserve, then decided to not buy the airlines, but rather create a new airline, Go Airlines.

They entered Hawaii with cut-throat prices (I am talking about free flights and flights for just dollars). After many months of the other airlines fighting to stay in business, Aloha Air finally shut their doors. The next day, mesa announced they were filing bankruptcy (reorganization). This is because they had lost so much putting Aloha out of business. At the Aloha bankruptcy hearing, Mesa twisted the knife a bit further into the now dead Aloha, by asking the judge if they could buy the name ALOHA AIRLINES from the court. They sid the money would help thos epoor ex employees, etc. BULL!

I wrote to mesa/Go and told them this was a marketing nightmare and that I would never fly them. Period. I wrote the bankruptcy judge and told him that if he allowed this, I would never fly them and would encourage everyone I talked to, not to fly mesa or Go!

Recently, my health care provider sent me to Oahu for tests and put me on Go. When I fould out, it was too late to change the tickets. HOWEVER, now I know to tell them that I refuse to fly Go and they will accomodate me on another airline.

The other day, Go announced that they were merging with Mokulele Airlines. Since they will be using the Go name, it makes it easy for me not to fly with the new merged airline. I feel sorry for Mokulele, whose pilots were reassigned to the mainland the next day or laid off...

If you are interested, you might read the information on Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Also noted is the item about the Go pilot and co-pilot falling asleep during the 45 minute flight from Oahu t oHilo Hawaii, and passing the airport by 15 miles, at 21,000 feet elavation. Thank goodness they passed Mauna Loa mountain. The pilotes were finally fired after much bad press.

There will be some people who think I take these stands too far. Fine, you stand by your principles and I'll stand by mine. At least I am not asleep at the switch (so to speak).