[ {"chunk": 39, "story": 5, "summary": "The son slipped a love note into a customer's envelope; the customer mocks it while pressing a claim, the father berates the foreman before learning it was his own son, and the son answered the foreman with a joke.", "predicament": "Someone's careless personal slip at work has embarrassed their superiors before a customer, and they answered the rebuke with a joke.", "advice": []}, {"chunk": 40, "story": 5, "summary": "Personal business belongs outside working hours, which the employer has bought; the foreman says the son can work hard when he chooses but seldom chooses, and a wandering mind cannot do even trifling work right.", "predicament": "Someone who can work well when they choose lets their mind wander at a dull task, and the mistakes surface later.", "advice": [ {"move": "do your own business on your employer's time", "outcome": "it amounts to stealing from the employer", "quote": "Your time is money--my money--and when you take half an hour of it for your own purposes, that is just a petty form of petty larceny.", "stance": "avoid"}, {"move": "let your mind wander from a dull task", "outcome": "the work is done wrong", "quote": "A man can't have his head pumped out like a vacuum pan, or stuffed full of odds and ends like a bologna sausage, and do his work right.", "stance": "avoid"}]}, {"chunk": 41, "story": 5, "summary": "Success lies in kneading commonplace virtues into the job; a clerk who crawls in each morning and springs out each night would not be trusted with a branch.", "predicament": "Someone arrives at work sluggishly and leaves on the stroke, not seeing that this decides whether they are ever trusted with more.", "advice": [ {"move": "work the plain, commonplace virtues into your job", "outcome": "it turns out well", "quote": "if a boy will take these commonplace generalities and knead them into his job, the mixture'll be cake", "stance": "do"}, {"move": "come in slow and leave the moment you can", "outcome": "you are not trusted with a post of your own", "quote": "I'm a little afraid that if I sent him off to take charge of a branch house he wouldn't always be around when customers were", "stance": "avoid"}]}, {"chunk": 42, "story": 5, "summary": "A town sinner was always last to be saved at the yearly revival and first to backslide, and grew vain of how much effort his rescue took.", "predicament": "Someone keeps reforming and relapsing, and grows proud of how much effort it takes other people to set them straight.", "advice": []}, {"chunk": 43, "story": 5, "summary": "One year the preacher refused to hold extra meetings for the backslider and left him to himself; a merchant likewise has too many promising young men to waste time on those who will not help themselves.", "predicament": "Someone who keeps needing to be rescued finds that the people in charge have finally stopped spending time on them.", "advice": [ {"move": "leave it to others to keep hauling you back into line", "outcome": "they soon stop wasting time on you", "quote": "Very few men are worth wasting time on beyond a certain point, and that point is soon reached with a fellow who doesn't show any signs of wanting to help.", "stance": "avoid"}]}, {"chunk": 44, "story": 5, "summary": "The owner filling a vacancy picks the one who keeps work and play apart and gives full measure, and passes over the one late in and early out; the son's love note cost the firm sixty dollars on a disputed claim.", "predicament": "Someone in line for the next opening does not see that small habits of punctuality and full effort decide who fills it.", "advice": [ {"move": "keep work and play apart and give full measure", "outcome": "you are the one picked for the next vacancy", "quote": "He's pretty apt to pick some one who keeps separate ledger accounts for work and for fun, who gives the house sixteen ounces to the pound", "stance": "do"}, {"move": "come in late and leave early", "outcome": "you are passed over for the vacancy", "quote": "to pass by the one who is late at the end where he ought to be early, and early at the end where he ought to be late", "stance": "avoid"}, {"move": "let your personal affairs get mixed into the firm's business", "outcome": "it weakens the firm's hand and costs it money", "quote": "I just had to allow Donnelly his claim on those hams, though I was dead sure our weights were right, and it cost the house sixty dollars.", "stance": "avoid"}]} ]