My old spanish teacher, Señor MacDonald, often said “You pays your money, you takes your choice.” I think he meant that there were limited choices in life and that you were supposed to do what you could. Play the hand they deal you. That sort of thing.
We all make compromises. At least, most of us do. The rest of us, depending on the nature of the desires on which we refuse to compromise, are called idealistic, pigheaded, quixotic, exacting, annoying, stupid, or insane.
Recently I wonder about bicycle helmet laws. Lady K, friend of the nauseated bloggers, died in part because she wasn’t wearing a helmet. I blame the car, of course, more than I blame her or the helmet. But would a helmet law have saved her life? Would constantly mussed hair have ruined her artistic career? Would a helmet law make it too inconvenient or too expensive for some people to bicycle, make them walk more, be late more, lose their jobs, exercise less, ultimately creating greater obesity and killing more people than it would save? What about the lives of the sweatshop workers in Indonesia manufacturing the helmets, ruined by the sudden popularity of newly mandated styene foams?
You pays your money, you takes your choice.
Secretly Ironic 