[William Tell]

Carolinamom said: "When she had a meeting w/K-Mart executives early on to discuss her marketing in their stores, she served them apple pie and later billed them for it @$20.00 per pie."

This is not enough information to decide that Martha is petty.

Martha was probably already worth a large fortune at the time that K-Mart developed an interest. If K-Mart made the approach to Martha, they may have said, "Come make a presentation to our Board to convince us that we should choose you as our "homemaking" representative. We will pay all of the expenses for you and your staff up to $30,000."

Martha is running a business and owes her stockholders a fair deal. If the K-Mart board was willing to be billed for pie as part of Martha's presentation, then that is the deal that Martha's stockholder's should have. Would it have been "petty" for the K-Mart board to have paid for everything else but refused to pay for pie?

[Carolinamom]

There's no evidence that K-Mart promised to pay anything for that business meeting. Martha was the supplicant there. She was looking for an outlet for her MS wares. The pie billing was petty, sure, but it was but one small instance of her future billings and demands far beyond their contractual obligations w/her.