There's a lot of talk these days about The Economy and how bad things are, and news stories that lead off with the phrase "in these uncertain economic times" and "in these troubled financial times," and so forth.  But I think it's important to note that our economy is now at the point it was in about 1996.  We haven't fallen off the map.  

In fact, it's instructive to remember that America's economy was once so lousy that companies bought copies of Who Moved My Cheese? by the pallet load, and handed them out to their employees.  If you worked in the high tech sector during the bust (Who Moved My Cheese? was published in 1998) then you undoubtedly received at least one copy of this book.  Typically, they would be distributed to employees right before a round of layoffs.  

I in fact received no less than three copies over my years with high tech start-ups.  I sold two to used book stores after I was laid off.  I kept the third copy, because I figured it was the lucky copy, since I didn't get laid off after they handed it to me.

If you haven't read Who Moved My Cheese? then kick back, make yourself comfortable, and settle in for a solid ten minutes of reading.  Fifteen if you get interrupted by the phone.  If this book has more than 2,000 words in it, I'll eat my hat.

We are introduced to four characters: two mice, and two very small people.  The mice are named Sniff and Scurry.  (I do not know why there are two mice, when only one character is required.)  The littlepeople are named Hem and Haw.  All four of them live in a maze, and eat cheese from location A.  One day the cheese is gone.  Sniff and Scurry, being mice without intellect or second thoughts, immediately pack up and go looking for more cheese.

Hem and Haw - not to give this away - hem and haw about what to do.  One of them bemoans the fact that someone moved his cheese.  In psychiatric terms, he has an external locus of control.  The other one is dragged down by the whiner, but eventually decides to take a risk and go looking for more cheese.  Surprise!  He finds it.

Who Moved My Cheese? performs a wonderful trick, which is that it absolves management of all blame.  We never do learn who moved the cheese, or why.  The answer of course is that management moved the cheese, but quit bitching about it and do as you're told.  The lesson being that you have to take charge of your own destiny, adapt to your changing circumstances, and accept that you are completely powerless in the universe.  The only power you have is to keep running after the dictates of management.  

I am torn.  On the one hand, I would like to write a book where Hem and Haw realize that they're getting a raw deal, climb out of the maze, and go to the store to buy their own damned cheese. 

On the other hand, I would also like to dash off what amounts to a picture book for adults, the underlying message of which is that "Management is always right, and you little peons can suck it," add a dollop of "blame the victim," charge $20 per hardback copy, and make eleventy billion dollars like Spencer Johnson.