Rant #2,171: Apple of My Eye

Today is Friday, June 29, the 180th day of the year.

Incredibly, we are nearly at the midway point of 2018.

On a personal note, I would like to wish my long-time friend Howie a nice birthday.

We have known each other since 1964, grew up in the same neighborhood--Rochdale Village, South Jamaica, Queens, New York--and in recent years, revived our friendship after long periods of hiatus.

I wish nothing but the best for him. He was a good kid and is a good adult.

Anyway, Howie shares his birthday with two major events in the history of Apple Computers, both worth noting.

First, today, in 1975, Apple founder Steve Wozniak tested the initial prototype of the Apple I computer.

Thirty-two years later, in 2007, Apple released its first mobile phone, the iPhone.

It is rare that you can say events are monumental and earth changing, but I guess that these two events are and were just that.

Wozniak built the Apple I computer by hand, and his friend, Steve Jobs, was so impressed with the machine that he thought it could be sold to the general public.

And thus began the computer age, as the Apple I was the fledgling company's very first product sold to consumers.

Decades later, with the company kind of floundering and losing its way among the personal computer crowd, Apple released the first iPhone.

Among the world's first smartphones--phones that had the ability to do many other things, including surfing the Internet and taking pictures--the device's popularity lifted Apple into the stratosphere, and it has never looked back.

Personally, it took me many years to move from a PC to an Apple computer, but you are reading this blog, which was generated from my Apple computer at home.

However, I personally have never moved over to an Apple phone. I like what I have just fine--a Samsung--but I will tell you, my wife and son swear by their iPhones.

So today is a big day in Apple history, and if you use an iPhone or an Apple computer, you really have to take pause and think that these advances, well, advanced your lives.

Although we all kind of moan about the use of computers--and the overuse of these devices--we live in the computer age, and these devices are as commonplace as televisions were to earlier generations--and I specifically mean Baby Boomers.

What would we be without TV, and conversely, what would we be without computers?

To co-opt a Beatles song title, we would be "Nowhere Man."

So we have to thank the two Steves, Wozniak and Jobs, for having the foresight to think out of the box a bit, and create something that has changed all of our lives, for better or worse.

And let's be honest about it, the two of them epitomized the American spirit, the American passion to do more, the American passion to excel.

I think we, as a society, have somehow lost that passion over the years, and yes, computers and the Internet have made things too easy for us all.

What will be the next great invention, the next creation that will change our lives forever?

It is hard to say, but you can't argue that computers and smartphones have made all of us a part of the high-tech world, if even we only know how to turn these things on and use their basic abilities.

So today is something of a monumental day in world history, and I will leave it at that.

Me, my allergies are really bothering me today, I have to go to the hell hole I call work, and the weekend is right around the corner.

This day will blur into all the others I guess.

So anyway, have a great weekend, and I will speak to you again on Monday as we move into July.

See you then.

Classic Rant #824 (October 16, 2012): Who's the Boss

Today is National Bosses Day, both in the U.S. and Canada. According to Wikipedia, it has traditionally been a day for employees to thank their bosses for being kind and fair throughout the year.

“Patricia Bays Haroski registered 'National Boss' Day' with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 1958,” said the Wikipedia entry. “She was working as a secretary for State Farm Insurance Company in Deerfield, Ill., at the time and chose Oct. 8 because she forgot that the birthday of her boss, who was her father, was actually on the 16th. Four years later, in 1962, Illinois Governor Otto Kerner backed Haroski's registration and officially proclaimed the day.”

Very interesting, wouldn’t you agree?

I have had some very interesting bosses over the years. One thing that they all share is that I have had a hard time figuring all of them out.

When I was in college, I had a boss who was a real nut case, and ended up being replaced in her position by her secretary, who she mistreated all the time.

Later, I worked in another place where the boss, I do believe, thought I was the perfect match for his daughter. When that didn’t work out, I was on the outs with him.

I worked for other bosses who were nice; alcoholic; abusive; filled with ego; and were horrid.

I had them all, and then some.

You have not really lived until you work for a boss who can’t handle his liquor.

He used to stumble all over the place, viciously insulted people, reeked of the stuff, and slurred his speech.

And due to his drunkenness, most of the time he didn’t know what he was doing.

It was sad, real sad.

And then there is the current boss to end all bosses. Thank goodness I don't work for him.

David Siegel--founder and CEO of Westgate Resorts, a huge national timeshare and one of the largest resort developers in the world--has informed his peon workers that if President Obama is re-elected, their jobs will be at stake.

You see, according to Siegel, he has worked hard to make his company what it is, but his workers haven’t done their part, squandering their paychecks all the time, so he has to make decisions like this to keep him and his company afloat.

But what can you do? You don’t pick your boss any more or less than you choose your parents.

They just happen to come with your job.

But I learned early on that no matter what your boss says to you, you must keep your perspective.

You are a tool that the boss uses to make his or her business run.

You are a commodity that he or she will try to exploit to the nth degree.

And if you lose your perspective, you will become that tool entirely.

You can be your own personal boss, but don’t let your boss at work make you think you are any less of a person than who you really are.

And for that, you don’t need  a day in your honor.

Hey, he or she only runs the business, they don’t run your life.

I have had good bosses, too, who understand that.

But so many are so engulfed with their own ego that they can’t see the forest for the trees.

So YOU have to. And if you don’t, well, I feel sorry for you.

Rant #2,170: Smoke Gets In Your Eyes

I'm back!

June has been such a busy month for myself and my family that I can't wait for it to end already.

And tonight after a long, hard day at work, my wife and I have to go to the doctor for our regular checkups.

No, it doesn't end, does it?

But one good thing is that when they go over our medical history tonight, we can both say that we don't smoke.

To me at least, smoking is one of the most disgusting habits that human beings can have.

I cannot understand how people get addicted to leaves rolled up n a paper, but they do, and have been addicted to this "thing" for eons.

But today, we have another potential problem, and that is the prospect that each state is now contemplating or has contemplated: the legalization of marijuana for recreational purposes.

Pot is already legal in several states, and while it has brought added tax revenue to these states, and certainly cut down on drug related arrests, the book is still out on the numerous problems it might have also brought to these areas, including possible increases in impaired driving and possible increases in the occurrences of diseases stemming from its more widespread use.

Closer to my home, New Jersey is in the process of legalizing its use, and New York appears the next in line to do so.

New York City Mayor Bill deBlasio and Governor Andrew Cuomo are all for it, as is Sen. Charles Schumer, so with the three most powerful politicians in the state able to agree on this one subject--heaven knows that deBlasio and Cuomo, in particular, don't see eye to eye on too many issues--it is almost a given that within time, recreational use of pot will be legal in the Empire State.

I am firmly against this on several levels.

(And let me get this out of the way right away--this has nothing to do with the legalization of medical marijuana, which dispensed under a doctor's supervision, I am all for if it helps people deal with different maladies.)

Legalization would open a Pandora's Box of problems in the state, and what I want to focus on here is how it goes against the credo that the state has adopted over the past 30 or so years, that all smoking is bad.

I can't speak about any other state, but New York State has been running public service commercials for decades about the dangers of smoking.

Some are lighthearted ads aimed at handling the problem in a somewhat less than heavy way.

But others, and many of the most recent anti-smoking ads, are as graphic as perhaps allowed on local television.

Some show the innards of people who smoke; others show the loss of limbs and voice boxes due to smoking; and others talk about the imminent death of the subject of a respective commercial.

These commercials are run during the morning, during the afternoon and during the evening, and they also not only offer graphic reasons not to smoke, but also give various phone numbers to call to get help for a smoking addiction.

(If you live out of state and want to see some of these commercials, they can be found on YouTube at https://youtu.be/qzpPN67V-Ag and https://youtu.be/mhN4CxTHKQo among other places.)

Yes, these commercials are directed at nicotine addiction, but nevertheless, they show pretty graphically that smoking is a dangerous habit, and the the city and state want to help you stop if you have started, and stop before you try.

But now, we have legislators all of a sudden become proponents of recreational pot use.

It simply goes against the grain, and goes against the grain of what New York State has been saying for the past generation, that smoking is a terrible habit that can wreck your life and your family's life.

So it is obvious why New York State is currently in a frenzy to make recreational pot use legal.

It is called $, and we all know that that subject often is more important than any other subject--including health concerns--when it comes to just about anything that we are talking about.

Sure, the findings are inconclusive about the impact of legal pot use on the populace, but for a state that was the leader in the nation against smoking to all of a sudden take a pro-smoking stance is not only hypocritical, it is ludicrous.

Those commercials and print ads warning against the habit will become moot the moment pot becomes legal, because even politicians can't talk out of two sides of their mouths and convince the populace that both sides are being genuine.

You can't advocate smoking--any type of smoking--yet in the same breath, speak about its evils.

It is wrong on all counts, and beyond the other reasons why I personally don't believe pot legalization is the panacea some think it is, it is disingenuous for New York politicians to be promoting a habit that they once dumped on, because smoking is smoking, and whether you are smoking regular cigarettes, a joint or vaping, this habit can't possibly be good for you.

And the possible side effects of such legalization, health and otherwise ... is it really worth it all?

I don't think so, but again, I am against the smoking of anything and everything, have been since childhood, and I am highly allergic to smoke derived from cigarettes of all kinds.

So perhaps I am prejudiced against this practice to begin with, and should not be even bringing it up to talk about in this blog.

But I simply feel and believe that on several levels, this "dumbing down" our politicians are giving us about the evils of smoking in general--and of pot specifically--is just plain wrong, and undoes one of the good things New York State has done for decades, and that is warn the populace on the dangers of smoking.

Are we that stupid now that we will be led by the nose by politicians who see nothing but dollar signs related to pot legalization, and nothing else?

I would hope not, but it is an admittedly slippery slope that I am trying to climb here, and I think that the tide goes against everything I have said here.

And that really is sad.

Classic Rant #823 (October 15, 2012): We Still Love Lucy

Back in 1951, television was still in its infancy.

A lot of the programming on television at that time looked like either televised radio broadcasts or stage shows brought to the small screen.

Many people didn't even have televisions in their homes and color TV was still years and years away.

Few movie starts were emigrating to television. That medium was still thought to be somewhat second or third rate, a place for vaudeville acts, radio acts, or performers who had seen better days.

Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz were known commodities back then, but not really household names.

Ball had been in numerous films--she is the only actress to have appeared with both the Three Stooges and Abbott and Costello on film--but her star was not shining as brightly as it had been.

Arnaz was looked at as something of a novelty act, a second rate Xavier Cugat, with a Cuban band and his signature song, "Babalu."

CBS took a chance on their brainchild--a situation comedy about a nightclub entertainer, Ricky Ricardo--originally named Larry Lopez--and his show biz wannabe wife, Lucy Ricardo--and "I Love Lucy" was born on this date 61 years ago, debuting on the CBS network on this day.

Its presence changed the face of television forever.

The show was an immense hit from the start, showing the comedic sense of Ball and the brains of Arnaz, who helped develop many of the camera techniques used to film the show, including shooting the half hour show on film, which allowed it to supposedly take place in Manhattan, while it actually was filmed in Hollywood.

This led to the show being shown countless times in reruns, another first for a network sitcom.

The Ball/Arnaz partnership made them probably the most famous Hollywood couple of their time, and brought them countless riches, and the creation of the Desilu studio, which churned out hundreds of shows through the mid to late 1960s, including "Star Trek."

But all good things usually come to an end. The half hour show morphed into the hour-lomg "Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour," which doubled the show's time, but was only about half as funny as the original. Ball and Arnaz eventually divorced, and the studio was later sold to Paramount ...

But "I Love Lucy" lives on in almost uninterrupted reruns. Does anybody ever remember a time when it wasn't on the air?

But "I Love Lucy" wasn't just about the Ricardos. The supporting players on the show added to its popularity.

Something must be said about the mismatched pair of Vivian Vance and William Frawley, who played Ethel and Fred Mertz on the show.

They were essentially sidekicks to the main characters, but the probably were the best second bananas ever on a situation comedy. Playing frumpier versions of the stars, the mismatched pair--who supposedly didn't get along with each other in real life--added to the show's success by their characterizations of the Ricardo's landlords and best friends.

And Little Ricky--played by Keith Thibodeux--well, he was there, added to the sitcom's later shows, but he was often used as little more than a prop for the adult stars to use to further the storylines, such as when Lucy gave birth to him--that episode--"Lucy Has a Baby"-- is probably the best of all the show's episodes. But that kid could drum, couldn't he?

Anyway, 61 years later, "I Love Lucy" stands as probably the single most popular TV show ever. There's been nothing like it before or since.

Is there anyone who doesn't like this show?

My mother tells the story of her and my grandmother watching the show together, and my grandfather huffing and puffing about "what all the fuss was about" as they laughed and laughed and laughed some more.

Maybe he didn't get it, but just about everyone else did.

Rant #2,169: Bits and Pieces

Welcome to another installment of Bits and Pieces, the Ranting and Raving Blog's off-again, on-again, semi-regular compendium of stories that may not deserve an entire entry, but certainly deserve some mention.

Let's see what Bits and Pieces has in store for us today.

Sarah Sanders Deprived of Service In a Restaurant: The other day, Sarah Sanders was denied service from a restaurant that she decided to eat in, and the reason given by the restaurant for this denial of service is that they objected to her boss--President Donald Trump--they objected to the Administration's stance on various issues, including LGBTQ rights--and heck, they just objected to her presence, period.

She had already ordered a couple of appetizers for her and her small entourage, and they were delivered to her table, but afterwards, she was called aside, told that she would not receive any further service, and she and her group left the restaurant.

Yes, this is America today, where we are coming to the point where you are going to need the proper papers simply to eat dinner outside your home.

The restaurant--the Red Hen in suburban Virginia--and its workers are just so proud of themselves, basking in the glory derived from their 15 minutes of fame.

Some are linking this with what happened a few months back, when a gay couple was denied a wedding cake by a local baker, who objected to their union due to their religious beliefs--a move which was recently OK'd by the courts.

I liken these actions to what happened in Nazi Germany, where you always had to have your papers in order--even if you were Aryan--to move around and to do much of anything.

Are we coming to this in this country, where either you are of the proper "background" to the particular shopkeeper, or you will be denied service and asked to leave?

Sure, these are minor political statements--not to be confused with the Starbucks disaster, which morphed into a clear, major political statement by the idiocy of Starbucks itself and the handling of this event--but they show that America is crumbling at the seams due to its own intolerance.

Me, I go by the almighty dollar, a plan which these establishments should also follow.

If you have the money to pay for whatever you want, you get what you want. You don't have the money, well, then, too bad.

Weaving politics into this is ridiculous, and while the Red Hen is basking in its own glory, reports are that other restaurants with the same name are feeling the backlash.

Many people mistakenly think that the Red Hen is a chain restaurant--which it clearly is not--since for some reason, there are many Red Hen restaurants operating around the country.

There are several in the New York Metropolitan Area, and they are losing business to this mess, with people thinking that the behavior of the Virginia Red Hen represents the beliefs of the "chain," one that actually does not exist.

So several Red Hen restaurants have experienced cancellations, and more importantly, have received death threats over the phone and via social media, and some have had to post notices that they have nothing to do with the Virginia Red Hen or its policies.

Of course, the Virginia Red Hen--which should be admonished by whatever local restaurant association they belong to, but probably won't face any retribution--is basking in its own glory right now.

But what they don't understand is that this is not America, this is not the American way, and they will suffer in the long run for their idiotic actions.

Are we going back to the time when some Americans couldn't get served in some places because of their racial and religious backgrounds?

Dan Ingram Passes: If you do not know who Dan Ingram was, well, I am sorry that you didn't know him. I will fill in the blanks for you, or at least try to, Keemosabe.

Ingram, during the 1960s and 1970s, was probably the No. 1 radio disk jockey in the world. He plied his trade on WABC, probably the most popular Top 40 station in the country at the time and the one certainly with perhaps the widest reach.

He took the role of DJ very seriously and he, along with a stable of local New York DJs including Harry Harrison and Bruce Morrow, molded the role of the disk jockey into an art form.

Ingram was the best of the bunch, touching listeners with his humor and his understanding that listening to the radio was not akin to performing brain surgery. People came to the radio for relaxation, to get away from the trials and tribulations of the day, and he played upon that, with regular listeners relying on him to deliver the goods--and the music--in his own, venerable style.

The DJs role was different back in the 1960s and 1970s than it is now, and Ingram was the ultimate salesman of the music and of WABC as the powerhouse Top-40 radio station that it was. He played off of the music, often changing the names of the songs to suit his humor, and listeners loved it all, and loved it for decades, and when he moved over to oldies WCBS-FM, he carried his audience with him lock, stock and barrel.

He also did many voiceovers for TV commercials, but Ingram was the consummate DJ, a part of our lives that we will probably never see, hear or experience again.

Ingram was 83 when he passed, and my suggestion is to look up his airchecks--they are plentiful on the Internet--and then you might understand, if you don't already, how talented this guy really was.

"Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" Found: This is just one of my personal news items, nothing earth shaking, but something fun to mention.

When "Mary Poppins" came out in fall 1964, it tickled the fancy of millions of young Baby Boomers, and it remains in our hearts as one of our favorite films of our collective childhood,

Many parents loved the film, too, and when the movie ended, they ran to their local record stores to buy the record album as a keepsake of this movie experience.

In 1964, in the midst of the British Invasion led by the Beatles, the biggest album hit of the year was led by another Brit--Julie Andrews--which not only rose to the top of the movie box office, but whose album hit No.1 and stayed there for 14 weeks, making it one of the most successful movie soundtracks of all time.

We all had the album, but does anybody remember that there was a 45 RPM single that was released from this soundtrack?

Yes, there was, and "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious"--featuring both Andrews and her co-star, Dick Van Dyke--backed with "A Spoonful of Sugar" was released a bit later than the LP, in late April 1965,to keep the momentum going for both the film and the LP, but with everyone buying the album, who needed the single?

It rose to No. 66 and fell without a trace.

Now in 2018, I was noodling around Ebay during lunch a few weeks back, and lo and behold, on a lark I looked the single up, and several people were selling their copies. I found the cheapest one--with a nice picture sleeve--and bought it, and it came in the mail just the other day.

This was a dream come true for me, as I remembered the single, but never actually owned it. My mother ran out and bought the LP all those years ago, but the single ... nope, I never had it until now.

It is one of my personal great finds, and I just wanted to tell everyone about it, because I am overjoyed that I finally found it.

It is not the rarity of this record that I am talking about, it's that I personally found this treasure that I had been looking for for decades.

So we end this installment of Bits and Pieces with a story that really means nothing to most people, but means everything to me.

As I warned you yesterday, June has been a super-busy month for me, and it continues tomorrow.

I won't be checking in with a Rant tomorrow, but I will be back here on Thursday all ready to start my engines again.

So, Keemosabe, I won't ever turn down anybody who wants to read the Ranting and Raving Blog, and expect another "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" Rant on Thursday.

In the meantime, take a "Spoonful of Sugar" and I will speak to you again on that day.

Classic Rant #822 (October 12, 2012): Fast Asleep

This is going to be a short Rant today, because I am dead tired.

I overslept today because I stayed up way too late yesterday into today.

I watched the Yankees-Orioles game last night, and my attention wasn't gratifying, as my beloved Yankees lost, 2-1 in 13 innings.

Yikes!

I used to be able to stay up until all hours, even during the work week.

It never bothered me at all.

But since I hit my mid 50s, things have taken a different turn.

I take naps. Prior to this, I hadn't taken a nap since I was a baby.

I can't see straight even early in the evening. Heck, I sometimes go to bed at 9 p.m., and sometimes even earlier if I am dead tired.

Well, last night, I figured that since this was the playoffs, I needed to stay up to support my team.

Well, they couldn't hit a ball hard if they tried with or without me, and last night, I sat through the whole excruciating exercise.

And due to that misstep, this morning, I feel like I got hit by a truck.

My wife and I both overslept. I just got my son up.

My wife just went to work, and I will be going there real soon, right after I bring my son to school.

So everything looks copacetic, but it really isn't.

Hopefully, I can get through the day, watch the Yankees finally finish off the pesky Orioles ...

And then go back to to sleep.

Rant #2,168: Do the Monkee (Not)

I'm back!

This June has been a very, very busy month for myself and my family, and it continues this week.

Happily, June will soon end, and we will move into a hopefully more sedate July.

But Friday was another one of those ultra-busy days, or at least what we all thought was going to be an ultra-busy day.

I took the day off from work--I alerted by workplace about this months and months ago--in anticipation of my wife, my son and I traipsing into the big city to see the Monkees--or what constitutes this act in 2018--perform at the legendary Beacon Theater in Manhattan.

The day was all laid out for us. My wife also took the day off, and after my son ended his workday at 2 p.m. as he normally does, we were going to pick him up and go directly to the Long Island Railroad Station, where we would wait for a train to take us into Manhattan.

From there, we would walk over to my son and my favorite Manhattan eatery, Clyde's Wine and Dine, Walt Frazier's restaurant, we would eat an early dinner, and then walk over to the venue.

We would see the show, and make our return trip back home.

It was going to be a long, but fun day in the Big Apple ... but it was not meant to be.

On early Thursday evening, word had gotten out that one-half of the current Monkees configuration, Michael Nesmith, had taken ill, so much so that he was hospitalized for a still-undisclosed ailment.

I did read that he had "breathing problems," and as you know, that can mean just about anything.

Anyway, I was alerted to this by a close friend, checked up on it, and found it to be true--Nesmith was ill, and the show had been either postponed or canceled--later confirmed to be postponed by the venue itself, until January, although that has yet to be officially confirmed--so we did not have to go into Manhattan after all.

So the day was wasted, or so we thought ...

Weeks prior to the announcement that the Monkees--Mike and Micky Dolenz--would be touring this summer, the annual "Happy Together Tour" multi-act show was announced, and as usual, it was playing Westbury, right in our own backyard.

I immediately bought tickets, and kept those tickets until the Monkees show was announced--for the exact same evening.

I ended up selling the Happy Together tickets, and I thought that was the end of that.

But with the unfortunate circumstances we were now in, I thought that what comes around goes around, and that I could make the day a successful one by once again getting tickets to the Happy Together tour at Westbury.

And that is just what I did!

We didn't have the greatest seats this time--the show was about 98 percent sold out--but once again, the Happy Together tour lived up to its goals, which is to cram as many acts as possible into a roughly two and a half hour format, have each act sing their hits, and have each act move on as another one took the stage.

The Cowsills. Mark Lindsay, the Association, Gary Puckett, Chuck Negron, and the Turtles with Ron Dante appeared, sang their hits and moved on for the next act in rapid succession.

Look, the show is a no-brainer. You literally get what you pay for here, there are absolutely no politics involved, and it is a very relaxing evening, and that is what we got.

So, even though it was a circuitous path to us getting to this show, it all worked out for us.

We still have the Monkees tickets--at least right now, I have not turned them in for a refund--and if all stays good, we will be seeing Mike and Micky in January.

We wish Mike Nesmith well, hope it was just a temporary setback, and hopefully, we won't have a major snowstorm or at least inclement weather in January, if, in fact, that is when the show has been rescheduled for.

This whole episode proves that you can turn coal into diamonds ... with a bit of luck on your side.

Now, it is back to another busy week for me, and I will tell you about that as the week unfolds.

Classic Rant #821 (October 11, 2012): You Talking To Me ... ?

May 4, 2009.

That is when I started this blog.

I had a lot to get off my chest, and other venues weren’t affording me the space I needed to tell you how I really felt.

This blog, I felt, was the best forum to talk about serious things, about things that were much lighter, and about other topics that were somewhere in between.

I talked about everything from hating to wear ties to child abuse.

And you, my valued audience, responded.

Maybe not every post, but you did respond to maybe two or three of every 10 posts I would put up.

I really liked that, enjoyed the give and take and hearing about what you felt.

Fast forward to October 2012, or some 800-plus posts later.

I have over 20 subscribers, pretty good for a blog that I really don’t trumpet about enough.

But I don’t received your views anymore. I haven’t received a response on my blog in quite a while.

I am not paranoid, but is there a reason for this?

Is it too difficult to post your views?

Are you turned off about the things I write about?

I try to keep it light most of the time, but I do write about issues that are important to me.

If you are looking for all light, all the time, you won’t find it here; conversely, if you are looking for newsworthy topics all the time, you won’t find it here either.

Please let me know what your opinions are. I feed off of the discussion we could have, even on light topics.

Yes, I am planting a seed here. I would love to get some responses to this post and to all the other posts.

But it goes beyond that.

Although it may not seem like I do, I put a lot of effort into this blog.

Each weekday morning, I try to come up with topics that both satisfy me and also interest my audience.

I know I can’t possibly hit the bull’s eye each time with you, but if something moves you, makes you laugh, infuriates you, or makes you cry, let me know about it.

I know people around the world are reading this blog, so let me know what you feel.

Thanks, I really appreciate it.

Rant #2,167: Here Comes Summer

Yes, in less than two hours, the summer season will have officially started for this year.

The summer might just be the best time of year, with the heat bringing us outdoors, into shorts and lighter wear, and into pools and beaches to cool off.

It means baseball also heats up, and we wipe our brows a little bit more, but it's better than wiping our brows after shoveling snow.

Me, I have to really watch myself this year.

I love the water, even though I am not much of a swimmer, and therefore, I have to use proper sun protection, in particular on my nose.

I had that pre-cancerous growth removed a few months ago--it was so stubborn that it took about three sessions at the dermatologist to fully remove it--and I don't want that thing to ever come back, because if it does, it might just be cancerous this time.

So in preparation for the coming of the summer this past weekend, when I went into the backyard pool with my wife, I wore a T-shirt, my hat to protect my bald head, and lots of sunscreen on my nose.

I think I can head this thing off at the pass by being proactive like this, but honestly, I feel like I am all dressed up and ready to go when I prepare for swimming like this, and I personally hate it, but I guess at this point, I would rather hate it than have to deal with skin cancer.

Anyway, when my wife and I are in the pool, we also take out the radio, and although we can put in a CD or listen to a thumb drive in this particular radio, we usually just get a little lazy and try to find a station that sets the mood for the heat.

Let me tell you, on New York radio, it is getting harder and harder to find a station to suit this mood.

The oldies stations are fine for what they do, but they are not the oldies stations of prior years.

They play 1980s and 1990s songs, the DJs don't tell you anything about the song that was just played, and the endless commercials are repeated often.

It is pretty boring.

And don't get me started on the Top 40 stations--argue with me if you like, but they are horrid because the music they play is pure garbage, created as files, not as works that will last for generations.

Really garbage.

And no, we don't want to listen to the news stations when we are swimming. We all need a break from that.

So we have to settle for a station that kind of fits the mood and kind of doesn't, because there isn't anything else to listen to.

Last week, on Father's Day, we had a barbecue. I love to cook on the grill, but it really was so hot on Sunday that mixed with the grill heat, I was truly pooped at the end of the day.

But it was a lot of fun, a lot of fun seeing my family get together, and I hope to do some grilling again throughout the summer months.

As I am typing this, summer is creeping closer by the second.

I hope you have as good a summer as I expect to have, and my early summer continues my recent trials and tribulations of being busier than all heck this June.

And that continues tomorrow.

I have some things to do tomorrow, so I won't be at my familiar perch on Friday, but I expect to come roaring back on Monday, the beginning of another super busy week.

So enjoy the first days of summer, stay cool, and I will speak to you again on Monday.

Have a great--and summery--weekend, and we will speak again next week.

Classic Rant #820 (October 10, 2012): You Don't Have To Be Jewish, But ...

Did you see the other day that Esquire magazine named actress Mila Kunis as “the sexiest woman alive”?

I don’t know if I agree.

She does have beautiful eyes, and since she’s Jewish, that is another feather in her cap, at least in my book.

There haven’t been very many Jews that have been listed as “sexiest woman” in any generation.

That is not to say that Jewish women don’t deserve the honor. They most certainly do.

But I guess that it’s another affirmation that the Jews are just like everyone else.

We are fat and skinny, bald and full of hair, stupid and smart, and ugly and yes, incredibly sexy.

Just like everyone else.

I had to think about the goddesses that the Jewish community has produced over the years.

Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor were Jews, but they converted due to their husbands’ wishes. They never renounced their Jewishness, so the continued to be Jews to their dying days.

Sultry singer Abbe Lane was another Jewish sexpot, who they tried to market as being “exotic” rather than Jewish.

Before I found out she was Jewish, I could have sworn she was Hispanic. She was a beautiful woman, one who is pretty much forgotten since Johnny Carson’s “Tonight” Show went off the air.

I remember in the late 1960s-early 1970s, Lainie Kazan was supposed to be the next “big” thing, a combination of Barbara Streisand and Raquel Welch.

She had that exotic look, and heck, she did something that many other of the women I mentioned would never do: she took it all off for Playboy.

And yes, she had the goods way back when, but little else.

She never rose to the heights of a Streisand nor a Welch, and actually, as she put on lots of weight, became a better actress than singer.

There are a number of current actresses besides Kunis who fit the bill.

One is Scarlett Johansson, whose mother, I believe, is Jewish, is one. She accepts her Jewishness, even if she doesn’t necessarily practice it.

I think Bette Midler was at one time thought to be sexy, although I never found her to be that.

But that gets me back to this: who do I find to be the sexiest woman alive right now?

Well, I find my wife to be incredibly sexy, but if you are looking at actresses, well, I’ll go for the goy:

Salma Hayek, if you please.

Rant #2,166: A Beautiful Morning

OK, ladies ... I am going to tell you right away that this column really isn't for you, although you are free to read it if you must.

And I am not going to apologize for being male, and having male tendencies toward female beauty.

I know that the slightest inference of this in today's world can lead to sexual harassment charges, but why shouldn't I be impressed with those ladies who have both beauty and brains?

I wake up at 3:30 a.m. in the morning on weekdays, and I watch CBS for my early morning news.

And let me tell you, both nationally and in New York, there is an array of female newscasters who are both good looking and have the brains to back it up, which makes them even more attractive.

So here is my periodic update on the female newscasters that deliver the news in the early morning on CBS and Channel 2, the local CBS affiliate and flagship station of the network in New York.

And if you consider this sexist, so be it.

On the CBS Morning News, I start my day with Ann Marie Green, originally from Canada, who has that "girl-next-door look" that I find quite attractive. She is professional, has a bit of a sense of humor that she displays at times in her banter with other newscasters on the show, and she pulls it all off with a lot of talent.

One of the news reporters on the shows is Hena Doba, who recently subbed for Green when she took a few days off. I remember her as Hena Daniels from an early stint in her career on Channel 11, WPIX here in New York, and this lady is not only talented, but she seems to get better looking each and every day. Eye candy with talent, if you will.

At 4:30 a.m., the local news begins, and right there at the starting point, and the starting point for all of this chatter, is Mary Calvi. The veteran reporter is already in my personal female newscaster Hall of Fame. She is absolutely gorgeous, and if you need eye candy to perk you up in the morning, she is definitely it.

Working the traffic beat is Alex Denis, another veteran newscaster who is long and lean and does what she does with a lot of aplomb.

And her occasional substitute is another Alex--Alex Lee. She hadn't been on the air in a while--she only subs when the other Alex is either off or is moved to the leadoff spot to sub for Calvi when she has time off-but she came back having lost a bit of weight, and she looks great!

The show has numerous younger male and female reporters in the field, and one of the veteran ones is Janelle Burrell, You can't forget her rhyming name, but she is way, way beyond that. As probably the most talented early morning reporter on the show, she has seen it all and covered it all, and I am sure you will be hearing of her years from now, when she gets off the early morning beat and maybe one day anchors the show. She is that good.

A recent hire--I assume to replace another early morning hire, Magdalena Doris, who moved to a Philadelphia station in the CBS network--is Natalie Duddridge. When she came on the scene a month or two ago, when I first saw her, I said to myself "who is that?" and now I know--she is a very talented street reporter, again with that girl-next-door look that I find attractive.

There are others on that station that are both very talented and easy on the eyes, but I will leave you with this group.

If you are in New York, take a gander at CBS News. Don't tell me that these ladies weren't hired simply for their newscasting talents. Yes, they are talented, but yes, they are also eye candy, really easy on the eyes, and yes, they get your attention each and every morning.

And you can say what you want to about me, but heck, I am a red blooded American male, and there is nothing that I find more attractive in the opposite sex than the two "Bs": beauty and brains.

And these women that I just described have them both, in great abundance.

Yes, they are sights for my sore eyes each and every weekday morning.

Classic Rant #819 (October 9, 2012): Puppy Love

We all have crushes when we are growing up.

Whether it’s for a neighbor, a teacher, a kid in your class, or someone in TV or the movies or in music, we all have these “puppy” crushes that usually don’t last very long, and are bypassed when we learn more about what love is as we get older.

One of my crushes during my childhood was Angela Cartwright, who just happened to turn 60 years old a month ago today.

Cartwright was a cute, talented kid, and her sister, Veronica was also cute, but in an episode of “Leave It To Beaver,” she gave the Beav his first kiss, so she was taken already.

Angela was not.

She came to national prominence as one of Danny Thomas’ children on “Make Room For Daddy,” the first show in my memory where the kids weren’t just precocious, they also had big mouths.

Later, she was the younger daughter on “Lost in Space,” one of my favorite TV shows as a kid.

She started to fill out a little then, and, as I was also getting older, I kind of look at it as if we were growing up together.

In between, she was one of the Trapp children in “The Sound of Music,” and along with Julie Andrews, she was the only actor I knew about at the time from that film, so I, again, became enamored of her.

And later, on shows like “Room 222,” she was one of the high school students, and by this time, I was older, and I still thought she was cute.

I guess I was drawn to her because she was on TV, on her shows, just about every day of the week as I was growing up.

She was around my age—or so I thought, now that I know that she is actually five years older than me—and she had those expressive eyes, which even captured me when I was a little kid.

No, I did not hang her pictures around my room, but when she was on TV, I took notice.

As I said earlier, puppy love usually doesn’t last that long, and once I didn’t see her on TV much anymore, I found others to pin my hopes on.

But Angela Cartwright might have been the first for me—and probably millions of other guys around my age.

So happy belated birthday, Angela. You are a part of my childhood that I won’t soon forget. 

Rant #2,165: Kick

The baseball races are heating up.

The New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox, the two teams with the best records in baseball this season, are revving up for classic confrontations later this month and later into the season.

The All-Star Game is about a month away, and people are beginning to vote for their favorite players to appear at the mid-summer classic.

And the World Cup is on.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz ...

Do most Americans really care about the World Cup?

Well, with our PC world, Americans are supposed to care about the World Cup, and supposed to care about football, or what we call soccer, on these shores.

I will call it what we call it, soccer, and this sport has been shoved down our throats for generations, and sorry, the summer is baseball time, and baseball and soccer do not mix.

Look, the fact is that this boring sport--where players basically run back and forth on a large field and try to score, and 99.99 percent of time, they do nut succeed--is the world's most popular sport, filling stadiums to the gills with people.

And with some knocking our current administration for being so nationalistic, is there a more nationalistic sport than soccer? And in particular, during the World Cup competition?

American advertisers who have bought into this nonsense--feeling for the seemingly 320,859,039th time that soccer would finally take hold here--were taken aback when the American men's team did not even qualify for the tournament.

They had already committed millions in ad dollars to the promotion of the World Cup, and their millions are being wasted, because our own team isn't in it.

Sure, there is more interest in soccer now in America than there has been in previous generations.

Again, I am not being political here, but with so many nationals living in our country now, both legally and illegally, the interest has to be up, but for most Americans, the only sporting cup anyone cares about is probably hockey's Stanley Cup.

And no one can deny that on the junior level, soccer is a popular sport, but once those kids move up in age, they seem to lose interest in the game ...

Because of its "boring" factor.

Those that claim that soccer is the most "scientific" of sports use that as a cover for its lack of scoring, and overall boring stature.

And in the championship series like the World Cup, there can actually be ties?

What other sport, in particular in their respective championship series, allows this nonsense?

And if I hear the use of the world "nil" by supposedly with-it sportscasters to describe zero goals, I will scream.

Look, we have tried every permutation of this sports in this country--indoor, outdoor, professional leagues, network coverage--and it has simply not worked well.

Remember Pele? His coming was thought to be the turning point for soccer in America, an international sports celebrity who was actually going to try to get Americans interested in the sport.

Sure, I guess it worked briefly, but by the late 1970s, it all fell apart.

The sports has had other celebrities try to bring Americans up to speed with soccer--David Beckham, for one--and it simply has not worked.

So soccer, and its World Cup, are simply the PC world's dream, highlighting a sport that will be nothing but a niche competition in the U.S. for the foreseeable future.

And sure, Mexico can rock its nation to a minor earthquake when it comes out of nowhere to win a game, sure, American sportscasters can all of a sudden become interested in a sport that they normally wouldn't cover, and sure, Americans can all of a sudden have some interest, like they have in certain sports during the Olympics, but no, soccer is never going to take off here, no matter what some people think, and more importantly, like some people want.

So if you have any interest, watch the World Cup, feign interest as if your very life depended on it, but honestly, I would rather watch Aaron Judge hit a mammoth shot into the stands than see Rinaldo take a shot at the goal and try to score.

There is really no comparison, is there?

Classic Rant #818 (October 8, 2012): Our National Pasttime

I just love baseball.

There is nothing better than the six months of drama that unfolds every year when the baseball season begins in April and ends in October.

Yesterday, the baseball playoffs heated up, and the New York Yankees were among the winning teams in yesterday's games, pulling out a nail biter that turned into a route via a five-run ninth inning, leading to a 7-2 win.

Today, they face the tough Baltimore Orioles again, and hopefully, the game won't be delayed by more than two hours by rain as last night's game was.

It's just one win on the road to the World Series, but it was great getting off on the right foot in game one.

Anyway, 56 years ago today, the Yankees won another game, but this game was something different entirely.

Don Larsen, basically a journeyman pitcher during his career, cemented himself in the annals of baseball history, pitching a perfect game against the crosstown rival Brooklyn Dodgers.

No one has matched this game, either before or since.

Larsen would have been, pretty much, a forgotten pitcher if not for this feat. and he normally shows up at Yankees oldtimer games, and gets a warm round of applause for his achievement during that game, a contest during which, at least for a game, he was the greatest pitcher on earth.

Larsen made the news recently, as he decided to sell some personal memorabilia from that game in order to finance his grandchildren's education.

Good for him. He has been a class act since that wonderful day.

Also yesterday, the Atlantic League's Long Island Ducks won their league championship in a game that was decided in the ninth inning.

It's the second time the Ducks have won a championship, and although it's independent league, minor league baseball, there is something to say about the popularity of baseball, even when the weather begins to get colder.

The Ducks are the centerpiece of this league, the league's most successful franchise.

They have a beautiful ballpark, they have fans nearly as boisterous as the Yankees do, and their league started from nothing and has become a resource for major league baseball teams to find players who fall through the cracks.

How about Lew Ford, who was in the starting lineup for the Orioles last night? He is an alum of the league and the Ducks.

This is the league that allowed Roger Clemens the chance to pitch this year, and a league which will soon announce a division devoted entirely to the state of Texas.

Yes, the Atlantic League will field several teams from that state.

Go figure.

But as Yankees radio voice John Sterling has said many, many times over the years, "You just can't figure baseball."

And you can't.

Even though some would deny it, it remains our national pastime, a game that is so easy to understand that pre-schoolers get it, yet so complex that it takes cybermetrics to understand it.

And I love it, I really do.