From the Wall Street Journal. Thursday March 22 2018

General Mills Inc. will raise prices on some meals and snacks

to reflect higher ingredient and shipping costs, as food

companies battle inflationary pressures that are eating into

profits.

My cornflakes grow expensive and my yogurt is too dear;

For breakfast I’ll eat toast that’s stale on which corn oil I’ll smear.

I haven’t had an egg in weeks and hash browns too are pricey.

And coffee? Not a chance at all -- I drink tap water icy.

This ain’t the life of Riley I’ve been told would come to me;

I’m saving for a rainy day, but it drizzles constantly!

Median pay for the chief executives of 133 of the largest

U.S. companies reached an all-time high of $11.6 million in

2017, up from $11.2 million in 2016, a Wall Street Journal

analysis of proxy statement data found.

I wish I was a CEO, with perks out the wazoo;

I’d have my own espresso bar and front seats at the zoo.

I’d own a minor league farm team and bet upon the ponies;

Big charities would use my name when I made them rich phonies.

My office would look out upon the teeming millions that

Had a few shares of the stock that’s making me so fat.

My yearly bonus would put paid to hunger and disease

In many smaller countries (in particular, Belize.)

Yes, if I was a CEO I’d milk that cash cow dry --

Then flit away to Mexico like monarch butterfly!

Americans are relocating to retirement

hot spots scattered around the country

and returning to suburbia, according to

Census Bureau figures released Thursday.

There’s no place I’d rather retire
Than someplace with sturdy barbed wire.
So children would pause
Before their wee claws
Tore up all the blooms I admire.

There currently are about 150 private rail cars

(also called “varnish”) in good enough shape to

be certified to run attached to Amtrak trains in the

U.S., according to the American Association of Private

Railroad Car Owners.

The castanets of railroad tracks beneath the metal floor

Are memories of traveling I’ll cherish evermore.

Cruising on a train is motion civilized and sane;

You’ll never match it in a car, or on a cramped airplane.

A little sway, a jolt or two; it still can make me smile

To think how once so long ago we all could ride in style . . .