Emptying the Shelves

 All the #1 seeds are out in the men's tourney... while I am not exactly sure that this is a sign of parity across hoops -- wouldn't then every conference get an equal number of seeds -- I think it is a good sign overall; at least the transfer market and NIL stuff has made it possible for more schools to have access to better players (even if only for a bit) and that is good, if not for the game, for the "student" athletes.

OC duty today; the count was 98, and more than half came in the last hour, so we all had the feeling of being busier than we actually were -- I was telling some of the newbies about it, that while they were tired, think of how bad they would be if we had, say, 150 clients.  They were not exactly thrilled to hear that... at least we cleaned off the tables (not much produce to distribute so it all went) and moved some stuff around.  One of the volunteers insisted we put out the clothing racks; of course, when the wind knocked them over, she was not there to pick them up.  Sigh.  It was funny; our ops manager was insisting we clean out freezers, so she was digging around for various hams and such.  I was fascinated because, of course, one client sees one, and they all want one, and -- mercifully -- we had just enough ham/turkeys to distribute.  Two freezers were emptied, and another was consolidated, so I guess it was worth it, but, God forbid we had run out...  

I am not surprised the Fed hiked rates again, but -- given the bank run and low level of job participation rates -- I think they are at the limit of their effectiveness.  I understand what they are trying to do, but I remain convinced that price hikes will be mitigated once the labor market eases, and the only that happens is to get more people into work so the endless parade of "Help Wanted" signs is...less.