Honesty is usually best policy, but on occasion, you will find dishonest people. That goes for all walks of life, and shopping for an engagement ring is no different. If diamond or stone you are buying has a pretty price tag, you may want to get values of ring verified by a third party. You can have someone check color, clarity, etc of ring before you have made your purchase.

3. Make deal. Would you pay full sticker price for a car? Most people wouldn't. The same goes for engagement ring shopping. Most prices are negotiable, and you can usually haggle your way to a discount or upgrade.

Don't be afraid to ask if that is best price, and how much of a discount they can give you.

Knowing these 3 easy steps before buying your engagement ring will help you find right ring, get a good deal and be happy with your engagement ring for life!

Kevin Bell, man who runs zoo---a lifer in business who never really wanted to do anything else, stands in shadow of big exhibit, a six inch sheaf of lab results clutched in one hand, other hand rubbing his temples –Kevin Bell can feel it. Like a wind that blows where it chooses. A life force wrapped in eons of elephant time that drives giant creature to hide its vulnerabilities. Elephant’s never look sick or weak. That’s how they protected themselves back on African plains. They never showed a weakness.

Right up until moment that elephant drops.

So while elephant is still standing upright---the elephant looks great. Wankie looks fine. But Kevin Bell and every single other member of that small army of care knows about her lung problems. Just like they knows risks of treatment. So it’s Kevin Bell’s signature that’s on order for that moving van to take Wankie to a zoo in Utah. And he’s ready to accept that. But as he does--a question so loud in his brain that it rings like a steel hammer on bars of exhibit “What’s best for animal? What’s best for animal, what’s best for animal?” A question ringing out like that bass line now coming from trainers’s room to side of exhibit

I know a place

Ain’t nobody cryin

Kevin Bell, actually understanding word accountability, keeps repeating that question to himself. He doesn’t realize that he is whispering question to himself out loud as if by asking question enough times, he could somehow physically will answer to appear.

The air brakes of semi truck whoosh and groan outside service entrance. Off to side, facing some bushes and unseen by truck driver-- a woman is hurriedly putting her TV make up on, getting ready for tonight’s news report. Rae Lynn Henderson, a name she’s grown comfortable with over past 2 years, had just been text messaged from her boss back at Colorado Springs based PDA (People Defending Animals) with order that if Kevin Bell ignored one more e-mail, it would be alright for Rae Lynn to lie down in front of semi truck that was taking elephant out tonight.

As Rae Lynn checked her face, Secretary of Defense and Vice President, are joined in a secure conference call by a man who’s name never appeared in any news stories, now sitting in a comfortable book filled room of a mansion in Arlington Virginia, ,and by blond crew cut, mirrored sunglasses passenger in lead car of President Bush’s caravan. This quiet collection of leaders were being briefed that tiny Cessna had been guided in safely by military air power. There was no threat. It had all been a false alarm. A flight instructor innocently wandering off his path inside restricted airspace. All systems go.

A moment of silence on call, and question was asked: “Do we apprise him of status?” And man with no name answered calmly from his quiet den in Virginia “I don’t believe that will be necessary.”

And as call clicked off; doors of giant moving van in Chicago swung open and that other small army of caretakers circled ramp to watch Wankie take one more walk up inside truck. And here is what onlooker would have seen if they had watched. Every single one of those people got to tell elephant that they loved her. Some of them said it out loud, some to themselves, some said it on their faces with their tears. They told her.

And as that love poured out of those people in this imperfect blessed and full of grace world we all live in, another stroller with a wide eyed child came thru front entrance of Lincoln Park Zoo for very first time. A radio somewhere off in distance plays that bass line

I know a place

Ain’t nobody cryin. . . .

A bass line. Perhaps finest in all of rock and roll soul.

Later that very same night. In cab of truck with windows open on a clear, starlit Nebraska highway. The driver feels load shift. And just as load shifts he too hears bass line

I know a place

Ain’t nobody cryin. . . .

Like a wind that that blows where it chooses. You hear sound of it.. Wankie Elephant goes down.

Loved.

And they told her that.