I first coined the phrase 'the maniacal laughter of the damned' in a still thankfully-unpublished manuscript I wrote in the early ?80s to describe something that happened to me in the third grade. At one time or another, every kid asks a question which results in the whole classroom erupting into laughter, leaving them to wonder, 'Why in the hell are y?all laughing at me?'

It's the smug laughter of those who know the answer but whose arrogance won't accept that others didn't know it as well. But it's also the nervous laughter of both those too shy to ask the question and those who didn't think of it for themselves in the first place. Theirs is the laughter of wanting to fit in, to belong with the rest, to not be seen as 'different'.

We've all been on both the giving and receiving ends, haven't we? Regrettably, some are indeed 'damned' because they will spend the rest of their lives exerting more effort at trying to conform than searching for meaning and truth. Tragically, this relatively harmless peer pressure of youth often grows into more severe and cruel acts later in life.

The remaining part of the title alludes to the conflicts inherent within a phrase known to us all: 'There?s more to life than working and making money'. When you play by the rules but don't see the results, one is left to wonder if indeed the real 'secret' is to be found in some sort of 'deal with the devil'. We already sell our time and labor, but it's as if our souls must also be put up to the highest bidder.

Tyrants want two things: Obedience and subservience. Each of us struggles with how far we willing to go in our obedience for nothing more than a paycheck. If your daily mantra becomes 'I can't do this any more', it's time to move on.

Subservience, however, is selling your soul. Most tyrants will settle for even reluctant obedience once he sees your soul is intact. If not, he might send you packing. Never underestimate the beauty of blessings in disguise. But never give them both.

5. You refer to a three drop rule. What is this?

'The Three Drop Rule' comes courtesy of a great chap with whom I worked while doing commercial plumbing. We were in a ditch, laying ductile iron pipe, and it began to drizzle. We were thinking nothing of it when the foreman came over and told us to keep working. In a little while it was raining. No downpours, just enough to be annoying. Again the foreman told us to keep working. Well, soon it was raining, the stuff of Biblical proportions. I was following my pal out of the ditch when the foreman again told us to keep working. 'The first drop hits me, it's God?s fault,' he said. 'The second drop hits me, it's your fault,' he said to the foreman as he and I kept gathering our tools. 'The third drop hits me, it's my fault.' We left for the day. The 'three drop rule' is about drawing a line in the sand, or mud, and refusing to cross it regardless of the consequences. It's about heart.

6. What is one of the three 'Cs' of success?

Of the three, the one which causes me the most personal grief is 'conformity.' You're expected to conform in speech, in dress, in nearly every manner conceivable. A president of a facility new to the area asked me what I thought would be good menu choices for their first Christmas banquet. The words 'chicken cordon-blue' never once crossed my lips, nor that of anyone else from this area. The next year, however, you'd have thought 'chicken cordon-blue' was just a fancy way of saying 'fried chicken.' I've yet to try it.

7. Has the workplace changed that much or are we just looking at it more closely these days?

I wrestle with this one constantly. On one hand, the disregard for the humanity of employees isn't particularly new. The emphasis and requirements for college degrees, however, certainly is. Throw into this the purposeful removal of production and manufacturing occupations in this country--in the name of greed?and you have people like a gentleman I met just a few weeks ago, a man my age who has four four-year college degrees now working at Wal-Mart for seven dollars an hour. He?s now considered 'over-qualified' even for teaching positions! What are the statistics, something like seventy per-cent of employment is based in the 'service industry'? Yes, that part of employment has changed dramatically in my lifetime. Put this way: The old work ethic, the 'thirty years and a pension,' assumed room temperature a long time. But it's still being sold as the 'American dream.' Young people, God bless 'em, see it for the lies and exploitation that it really is.

8. What can you tell us about Bob Cratchit's work situation in 'The Christmas Carol?'

Bob Cratchit could be the poster-child for most of today's workforce: Overworked, underpaid, and underappreciated but feeling both powerless and too frightened to do anything about it. I've a feeling that ol? Ebenezer Scrooge was like many of today's corporate executives, sitting there on the front pew on Sunday morning, nodding and agreeing when the preacher reads 'the love of money is the root of all evil' and never seeing that those words apply to themselves. I, for one, refuse to wait for ghosts to scare these greedy bastards back into the reality that humanity and human decency trump the color green, so I work when and where I can and, to the furthest degree possible, on my terms, not theirs. Scrooge is the main reason we have workplace violence.