Things I Know

Over the weekend, every Democrat on the national political scene called FBI Director James Comey’s letter to Congress, “unprecedented.”  What may have happened is unprecedented.  The FBI exposes crimes, and possible crimes all the time.

Comey is in a damned if you do, and damned if you don’t situation.  He revealed the possible existence of new, previously concealed emails from Hillary Clinton.  Remember, that’s possible existence, not existence, or at least not existence yet.  If there’s nothing there, he’ll possibly have influenced the Presidential election.  If he didn’t reveal them, and they prove to be something, he would be excoriated for a cover up. Remember too, nothing that’s covered up ever stays covered up.

I know that Huma Abedin and Anthony Weiner are both public figures, but how can anyone, even two anyones, have 650-thousand emails on one laptop computer, and why would two high-level government officials share one laptop for work?

To be clear, I am a person who always votes.  I once voted by absentee ballot in a school board election, but I’m so appalled by the choices we face next week that I may not cast a vote for President this year.

There will be baseball in Cleveland on Tuesday.  I’d like to see the Cubs win the World Series, but more than that, I would have hated to see the Indians win it at Wrigley Field.

Dos Equis beer has a new most interesting man in the world.  He can tie one hand behind his back with one hand tied behind his back.  I guess a new most interesting man makes sense; they shot the old one into space a while ago.

I am astonished that Ammon and Ryan Bundy, and their cohort were acquitted recently on charges stemming from their occupation of federal land in Oregon last year.  I can’t fathom what the jury could possibly have been thinking, or whether they were thinking at all.

Things I Know

Last week, I was observing to my wife that even though the election was only three weeks away (and now less than two), we hadn’t heard a word from either New York Senator Charles Schumer, or his opponent, Wendy Long.  The thought was hardly out of my mouth when a deluge of commercials began for Senator Schumer, including one featuring a guy I used to work with, Jeff Veatch.

Nassau County Executive Ed Mangano and Oyster Bay Supervisor John Venditto were indicted last week on federal corruption charges.  If they did what they’re charged with doing they may have thrown the Republicans running in Nassau County, NY under the bus.  More than that, they may swing the majority in the New York State Senate from Republican to Democratic too.  Republicans only hold the majority because of a coalition with some rebellious Democrats.  Only one or two seats changing hands could repaint the entire picture.  Damage is done even if they’re both acquitted because their trials will take place long after the election.

Five women I went to high school with wished my wife and me a happy wedding anniversary recently on Facebook.  Saint Karen (she must be a saint to put up with me) and I have similar senses of humor.  We each thought perhaps they were all thinking, “Better her than me.”

A year ago, around this time, I complained about how much the Nissan dealer charged me to replace tire pressure monitors.  I replaced two of them in two months.  At least one more has failed, but I haven’t replaced it.  I’ve decided to live with the warning light lit up.  After all, I have two tire gauges and the two of them together are much less expensive than the inflated (Sorry.  I couldn’t help myself) price the dealer charges for one TPMS replacement sensor.  But, I probably will replace the two remaining sensors soon, when I need new tires on the truck.

I’ve been informed that the idea of having Charlie Sheen throw out the first pitch in a Cleveland World Series Game was widely discussed on sports talk radio in Cleveland.  The consensus was that Sheen’s antics as the character Ricky Vaughn in the movie “Major League” were funny.  Sheen’s antics in real life, much less so.  I just thought it would be funny.  I also think it would be funny to have Bob Uecker in the broadcast booth for a little while during a game.  Uecker was the Cleveland play-by-play announcer in the same movie. Uecker is 81 and retired, so I don’t know if he would be interested, or able to do that, but it would also be amusing.

World Series

No prediction from me, but I do hope the Cubs win.  Generally, I root for two teams, the Mets, and whoever is playing the Dodgers.  The Cubs beat the Dodgers, so I hope they beat the Indians too.

With respect to the Indians, I hope that somebody who works for the team thought to invite Charlie Sheen to throw out the first pitch in one of the Cleveland home games.  If they do invite him, of course they should give him an Indians jersey with 99 on the back.

charlie

Things I Know

When all the accusations emerged about Donald Trump and sexual misconduct, because there were so many, at first I thought most if not all of them must be true.  Then, I thought it could be the best orchestrated last-minute smear in political campaign history.  But, those two things are not mutually exclusive, are they?

If the accusations are true, and I have no way of knowing, it would have been useful to know these things during the primary season.

Polls still indicate that both Trump and Hillary have unfavorable ratings over 50%.  Those poll results seem entirely reasonable to me.

It is amazing to me that the leaks of Hillary’s email haven’t gained more traction, but the Trump campaign has made so many mistakes he might even lose if he were running unopposed.

I bought an auto mechanic’s creeper seat the other day and used it to paint the foundation of my house, by wheeling it along the driveway and patio.  I thought it might be great for interior painting too, but I used it on the porch.   The wheels are designed for hard surfaces, so they left an impression in my porch’s pine decking.  If I want to paint baseboards with it, I’ll probably have to put different casters on it.

Back to our family vacation.  The US Department of Defense runs a resort at Disney World for active duty and retired military personnel.  It’s called “Shades of Green.”  If you visited Disney a long time ago, it used to be the Disney Golf Resort.  Twice a year, in September and January, they make it available to anyone who served in the military and was honorably discharged.  I fit in that category, so my wife and I were honored to be able to stay there.  It’s very nice.  And, it’s self-sufficient.  It doesn’t cost the taxpayers anything to run it.

Our daughter-in-law, when she travels, takes quite a few photos at night.  I like them a lot, so I’ve started doing the same thing.  I got a Halloween-theme picture of Mickey on Main Street in the Magic Kingdom.

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After the Orlando theme parks, we spent a couple of days at Siesta Key on Florida’s west coast.  It’s the nicest beach I’ve ever been to.  I wanted to swim in the Gulf of Mexico and take sunset pictures.  No gulf swimming because of red tide, but I did capture a few pictures of sunset.

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Finally, we headed back to Orlando and flew home a week before Matthew hit.  We had a lovely time.   As winter looms, I find myself wanting to move to Florida.

Things I Know

I’ve been away and I’m going to fill you in or bore you to death.  Your choice.  But first, I’d like to deal with a couple of events that happened while I was gone.

And speaking of gone, I don’t think baseball will be quite the same with Vin Scully gone.

When John Stumpf, CEO of Wells Fargo bank testified before Congress, I found myself guessing that many employees didn’t come up with the idea of opening fraudulent accounts without some boss, or bosses pushing them toward it.

The Presidential debate didn’t change my mind.  I still don’t like either of them.

Gary Johnson is never going to be elected President running on the Libertarian Party ticket, but he sure didn’t help getting his ideas out there with his recent foreign policy goofs.   East Korea Gary?  Really?

Saint Karen (who has to be a saint to put up with me) and I have been vacationing in Florida.  I’d like to move there, but our vacation has made me reexamine things.  Saint Karen thinks Florida is too hot.  That’s nonsense.  Our house in the New York metropolitan area isn’t air conditioned.  It’s hard to find a house in Florida that isn’t air conditioned.  So, if we moved there, she’d enjoy AC and I’d be cold all the time because she turns it down and I turn it up.  Something to bicker about.  Not something new, because we generally don’t bicker now.

New theory:  Florida is so much warmer than a lot of other places because they have fire-breathing dragons there.

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We spent three nights at the Portofino Bay Resort Hotel in Orlando, FL.  It’s one of the hotels associated with Universal Studios Florida theme park.  It’s nice, but it’s expensive.  A few minor things went wrong, but the hotel stepped up to fix them just fine.  Things always go wrong from time to time, so isn’t how things get fixed the real test?

Lindsay at the concierge desk was able to switch my reservation for the Blue Man Group show from Thursday night to Friday night, with no extra charge to me.   I was hoping to take a nap before a Thursday night show, but we had a late check in and without a nap, I was too tired to go.  So, kudos to Lindsay.  The late check in, by the way, is one of the things the hotel stepped up to make amends for.

The Blue Man Group was very good, but extremely noisy.  Before the show, they tell you to turn off all electronic devices.  In case you’re wondering, unless you’re profoundly deaf, you can include hearing aids in that.

This isn’t a complaint about this hotel, but about the hotel industry in general.  Services that are common at lesser hotels frequently carry additional fees at full-service ones.  I have never heard of a hotel where the rooms cost over $200 a night that provided a free continental breakfast.  And, honestly, luxury hotels, free WiFi is almost a basic human right by now.  You don’t charge for cable TV anymore, so stop charging for high-speed internet.  Less expensive hotels don’t, and your Internet isn’t any better than theirs.

We’re on vacation to lift my wife’s spirits.  She had surgery recently.  But, because of the surgery, she didn’t think it wise to ride the roller coasters.  If you’re not going to ride roller coasters, I’d say there isn’t a lot for you at the Universal theme parks.  Also, in late September, the hours are short and they have a separate Hallowe’en event with separate admission after the day’s attendees are turned out.  Admission to the theme parks is costly too and I didn’t like that separate second admission at all.

More on our travels next time.