It slowly dawned on me that this was basically Dr. Steve's greed disguised as altruism.

The meeting adjourned at that point (time is money!), and Janet approached me before I had a chance to flee. "Rob, I do hope you'll consider joining our group. Please take an application." She turned on her heels and walked away to lure in another potential member.

As I waited for the elevator, I pondered buying a suit. Then I opened the application packet. There was a non-refundable application fee, along with a yearly dues requirement of several hundred dollars. It didn't state what the dues went toward.

Later that day, I got an email from Janet, which was addressed to everyone in attendance at the meeting:

"Members and Guests, thank you all for attending today's meeting. Hopefully I will see you all next week. Since everyone is all up in arms for no good reason to protect the environment, let's do our part and make this a green year, lol!"

The word "green" was actually in green, making her joke quite the amusing double-entendre. I deleted that email and decided to pass on joining the group. Dr. Carol, one of the most down-to-earth people I know, asked me why.

"There's just something inherently shady about it. I don't like the way they disguise their desire for more and more money as some form of charity."

"So you're not against making money per se, just the group's approach?"

"Right. I'd love to make a lot of money. I just don't want to go about it in that way."

"So how are you going to go about that?"

"I think I'll just do some more advertising."

"Was this Janet person upset that you won't be joining?"

"No," I said. "I told Dr. Steve about it, and he's so damn greedy that he joined in my stead. He's already gotten five new referrals."

"He's owes you big time," Dr. Carol said.

"Oh yes. He's already thanked me in his own special way."

"How's that?"

"He raised my rent for 2008."

I'm sure Dr. Steve will fit in quite nicely with the group. I think I really hate that man.