Rant #2,928: Happiness Is Havin'

 Happiness is havin’ …
 
A pool that works, at least kinda works …
 
I went to the pool store for about the sixth time yesterday, and while my pool’s water is not crystal clear like it should be, its cloudiness won’t stop us fro using the pool this July 4th weekend.
 
We were told that the pool is the way it is this year—and evidently, many other backyard pools are, too—because we had a relatively mild winter, and it upset the pool structure, as algae was able to grow in an inordinate fashion due to the warmth, and thus, the water that we put into the pool months later simply wasn’t right.
 
We were also using the wrong shock, as we should have been using the liquid shock rather than the powder option.
 
I know all of this sounds like baloney—and it very well may be just that--but after a few more shock treatments, we have been told that the pool can be used, and we will give it a few more days, and we will be jumping in by the holiday.
 
Happiness is havin’ …
 
The New York Yankees continuing to win, setting records and new benchmarks seemingly with every game.
 
With yesterday’s win against the lowly Oakland Athletics, they are on pace to win about 120 games with their current 56-20 mark.
 
If this pace continues, the only complete satisfaction is for the team to get through the playoffs to the World Series, and win it all in October.
 
It is not putting the cart before the horse.
 
They can win 120 games, which would be a record for a regular season, and be completely forgotten if they don’t win it all.
 
If they don’t win the championship, the team will be thought of as a terrible failure.
 
I never thought that they were this good this year, but I am fully in for the ride, but they will have to win the World Series for this team to be put up there with the great ones.
 
Let’s see what happens as the season plays out.
 
Happiness is havin’ …
 
A newspaper that not only brings you the news of the day, but coupons too!
 
With all the dreck in the news lately highlighting all the division in our country—or at least, helping to stoke that division—I was excited to bring in the newspaper this morning and go through the usual supermarket ads for the holiday weekend …

And then, stumble upon sheets of coupons for both Burger King and Wendy’s.
 
Along with seemingly everything else, fast food prices have gone sky high, and it is nice to see that I now have some coupons to use to keep the price down a little bit.
 
My family and I eat fast food on the weekends, or at least eat not-prepared-in-our house food on the weekends, so this came as a pleasant surprise after weeks of having no coupons at all for such restaurants.
 
It will certainly make the Whopper and the chicken nuggets taste a bit better when we are able to use the coupons to help pay for them.
 
Happiness is havin’ …
 
A record with the song “Happiness Is Havin’.”
 
This song was recorded by several acts in the mid-1960s, including Bobby Sherman, but the one I have been looking for is by an obscure act called Beaver and the Trappers …
 
Which would be an act that would be even more obscure if its roster wasn’t so well known.
 
After Jerry Mathers’ show “Leave It To Beaver” left the airwaves in 1963, the young star did quite a bit of things, including serving in the military during the Vietnam War era and collect residuals from his show, probably the only TV series in history which never went off the air, going straight from first-run shows to reruns (even “I Love Lucy” took a break from the airwaves briefly).
 
And the residuals continued to roll in, even to this day as I understand it, because Mathers parents designed a contract that pretty much put the younger Mathers as the owner of the show, and the legacy of the sitcom has been going for this entire time.
 
Anyway, Mathers put out a record or two while the show was still on, without much acclaim, and a few years after the series was off the air, he had his own rock and roll group named Beaver and the Trappers, which also featured “Leave It To Beaver” alum Richard Correll (whose father was one of the featured white voices on the “Amos and Andy” radio show).
 
The act put out at least one single, “Happiness Is Havin’ with “In Misery” as the B side.
 
The record flopped—except in I believe Alaska, where it was a hit—and it faded from view or memory.
 
Since none of Mathers’ records were very popular, they are pretty hard to find in their original 45 RPM versions, although they have turned up in various compilations.
 
In 2018, a small label re-released the Beaver and the Trappers single, and at long last, I finally got it, using the gift card my son got me for Father’s Day.
 
The song is a good one, as it was used in I believe a cigarette commercial—in yet another version—during the mid-1960s period, but like the Sherman version, Beavers' version was a flop.
 
But I am glad that I have it, and that hole that I filled in my record collection is not there anymore.
 
Happiness is havin’ …
 
All of these things, a great family, and my health.
 
None of these things I spoke about here matter very much if you don’t have these other things, and I am lucky enough to have them all.
 
Yes, I am a really lucky guy.

Rant #2,927: Get What You Deserve

I am not going to talk about politics today, even though the primaries for governor were held yesterday and concluded, at least in New York State, with the same old, same old, results.
 
New York Stators are the first to complain about everything under the sun with the politicians that they vote into office, but they do nothing to remove these people from office when they have the chance.
 
They did it again yesterday, when voters went for the sort-of-incumbent Kathy Hocul—only in office because of the indiscretions of her former boss, Andrew Cuomo—as the Democrats' candidate for governor.
 
New York Staters are known to ignorantly and stupidly vote for party over candidate, and since the vast majority of registered voters are Democrats in the state, Hochul—“Miss See No Evil, Hear No Evil”—is almost a shoo-in to get into the governor’s position on her own merits come November, voted in by the same people who constantly complain about everything she stands for, including bail reform, and what it is dong to New York neighborhoods.
 
On the other side of the aisle you have Rep. Lee Zelda, who won the Republican primary, and I just can’t see people galvanizing behind him, since he is not well known at all outside of Long island.
 
In my mind, the best candidate for the job was Tom Suozzi, but he had as much chance of winning the primary against Hochul as I did, so …
 
Fuggedaboudit.
 
I just wrote a few paragraphs about politics when I said I wouldn’t, but I guess my white lie will pass.
 
What else is happening today that is worth writing about?
 
I have had some interesting dealings with eBay lately.
 
Let me tell you about them.
 
I ordered a DVD for my son a few weeks back, in anticipation of our vacation.
 
He keeps himself busy in the back seat by watching movie after movie on a portable DVD player, and I bought for him a few videos to keep him occupied.
 
But one that I ordered from eBay never came, and after a few weeks, I decided to contact the seller to find out what was going on.
 
The seller, by eBay rules, is supposed to reply to my messages to him or her, but after three tries, the seller did not respond, so I contacted eBay directly on the matter.
 
I got my money back, which was fine, but I finally got a message back from the seller, who said the DVD had been lost in transit, and that he had another copy of the DVD to sell to me since I wanted the movie so much.
 
Fuggedaboudit.
 
Then I had another recent experience with eBay while using a gift card my son got me for Father’s Day.
 
I ordered a few records with the card, and they all came to me pretty quickly … except one.
 
That one I finally got on Monday, but alas, the seller sent me the wrong record!
 
I contacted the seller, who was very contrite in his reply, stating that I could keep the record that was sent to me—I have it already, by the way—and that he would send out the record I had originally ordered pronto.
 
He told me that he would contact me yesterday about it, “but if you don’t hear from me, contact me to remind me” …
 
Which, of course, was the way it happened.
 
The seller sent me back a message stating,, “Thanks for contacting me. I have searched through my inventory, and I guess I don’t have the record you ordered … but you can replace it with another record from my store.”
 
Classic bait and switch, wouldn’t you say? Give me something I didn’t order that the seller probably could not get rid of, and then try to get me to order something else from him, perhaps at a higher cost—and advertising items that you don’t have, what is that all about anyway?

Fuggedaboudit.
 
“No, please give me a refund,” I replied, and the gift card has now been resurrected from the dead with this money on it.

 
I have found that eBay is still the Wild West at times, even though it has improved over the years, the main improvement being buyer protection for those who run into jams, like I did.
 
But the story isn’t over.
 
I received one of the records I ordered from another seller yesterday, and as I opened the package to take the record out, I took out what I thought was the record—and once again,  it was not the record that I ordered!
 
In fact, there was no record in the sleeve, simply the cardboard sleeve of another record.
 
My blood started to boil, but then I took out what was another sleeve—the record I ordered—and I was happy.
 
The seller simply used an old record sleeve as sort of a protection for the record I ordered.
 
I breathed a sigh of relief.
 
Now, aren’t my eBay stories so much more interesting than talking about politics?
 
And I still have two more items that I am awaiting from eBay … and the end-result of those orders appears to be much more in the air than the outcome of the New York State governor’s race in November.
 
Will I get my items that I ordered?
 
Will New York get the governor it deserves as it digs its own grave?
 
The former I don’t know about … the latter, I am almost sure of. 

Rant #2,926: I'll Be Doggone

Do you know of anyone who has the need for a dog walker?
 
Yes, someone to come to the person’s home maybe three or four days a week to walk the family pooch.
 
It would have to be on Long Island, near to where I live on the South Shore, and the person doing it would need just compensation for doing this job.
 
Who needs such a job?
 
My wife.
 
My wife would like such a job, and she has experience, just working for about two months for a professional dog-walking service.
 
That’s right, a professional dog-walking service.
 
This service has become so popular that some enterprising people have actually made the job legit, and they ask applicants for background references, take Social Security numbers, and run the entire business above board.
 
Why did my wife leave this service?
 
She was being placed all over the place, and not only did she have to take care of dogs, but also cats and other animals, including one rat.
 
Yes, one rat.
 
I guess they have needs, too, but this is not what she wanted out of such a job, so she bailed out.
 
The travel was actually the worst thing, as she just wanted to work in our area, but ended up working throughout our county, and even into the neighboring county.
 
All that she wants is a steady walk or two or three, at regular places, nearby, but they were spreading her out all over, which she didn’t like.
 
She would often be out five or six hours a day doing this, and she found that it just wasn’t worth it.
 
She enjoyed the dogs, for the most part, but not the driving stretches that she had to endure.
 
So if you have something local to where we are, please contact me, and we can work this thing out to everyone’s satisfaction.
 
Who would have thought that walking dogs would become a legitimate profession?
 
Who would have thought that people would actually buy water in bottles, when they can get roughly the same thing from the tap?
 
"Necessity is the mother of invention," as they say, and if there is a need, then there is going to be someone around to fulfill that need.
 
People work out of the home, and they want to make sure that their pets are accommodated, whether they are around or not.
 
People want to carry water around with them no matter what they are doing, and sometimes what they are doing does not have a tap around to get it from.
 
One has to wonder what the next such revolutionary steps are for providing services for those in need.
 
We already have people who do your shopping for you, who stand on line for you, who drive you from one place to another, so what could be next?
 
If I could think of such a service that is needed, I can enter my golden years with a great idea that can generate money for me beyond my wildest dreams.
 
I mean, I can’t provide a service to eat for you, nor, on the other end, to go to the bathroom for you, so what service can I provide to you that I actually can do?
 
I can’t go to the gym and exercise for you … I think that would defeat the purpose.
 
I can provide the seed for women who want to get pregnant but without a partner, but at this point in my life, I am nothing but an old fogey who has already fathered two children when he was young and vibrant … now … ?
 
I just don’t know right now what new area I could provide services for.
 
I can’t figure it out, but I am thinking hard about it each and every day.
 
What could be the next trend?
 
Something simple, but something unique …
 
I got it! I got it!
 
Everyone gets thirsty beyond just water, so how about setting up lemonade stands all over various communities, so when you are out and need a drink, you can get one pretty easily?
 
Oh, that’s right … kids have been doing this for generations each summer, and they don’t even do background checks.
 
Well, back to the drawing board ... .

Rant #2,925: My Prerogative

Late last week, a monumental decision was made by the Supreme Court, that being that the classic Roe v. Wade case—which made abortion legal in the United States—was unconstitutional.
 
It was the law of the land for nearly 50 years, and because of the Supreme Court’s decision, many of the country’s states followed suit, with trigger laws making abortion illegal in their respective states immediately after the ruling.
 
Some states actually went even further, stating that no abortion could be performed in their states under any circumstances—including in cases of rape, incest or possible harm to the mother.
 
Some states even said that if one of its citizens got an abortion elsewhere, she would be subject to criminal prosecution when she returned to her home state.
 
Other states, in reaction to what had happened, ramped up their own abortion laws, trying to appeal to those from out of state to have the procedure done in their state.
 
Many major companies announced that they will give leave and pay for the abortions of their female workers who decided to have this procedure.
 
Many claim that we, as a nation, have gone back 50 years, to when women used coat hangers to perform abortions on themselves.
 
I am going to try to put this in my own perspective in this Rant, and you can agree or disagree with me if you like … but at least just hear me out.
 
I, personally, would have preferred if the then-current laws remained the same as had been for the past nearly 50 years.
 
But being that those laws have now changed, I at least wish that women who decide to have this procedure were able to have it, in another state, without criminal persecution.
 
And certainly, in cases or rape, or incest or the possibility of harm to the mother, an abortion should be legal. Period.
 
However, that being not the case in some areas, this whole decision has led to a quagmire of problems, and while some claim that their personal choice has been taken away, what has actually happened is that women have been given back their own personal responsibility to manage their bodies—and their lives—in a better way.
 
With so many people getting hysterical about this subject on both sides of the ledger, women must take some responsibility for how they handle themselves in certain situations.
 
And men, for that matter, are also part of this, as it take two to tango, so they bear just as much responsibility for this act as the women do.
 
Abortion can no longer be used as a contraceptive tool, the rectifying of an “oops” moment between them and their male partners.
 
While I support abortion, I feel that abortion should only be used when absolutely necessary, not to lick a problem like taking an aspirin to remedy a headache.
 
Women should be cognizant of how their bodies should be treated like palaces, the men should be aware of this fact too about their own bodies.
 
Maybe the new ruling will force people to think twice about doing such things, because let’s face it, the act itself is done, presumably, produce a child, even if it is done recreationally.
 
That is the possible end result; it is not just for self gratification, and men and women must understand this fact.
 
Yes, mistakes are made even by the most responsible of couples, but look, if you participate in the act, you must know its possible consequences.
 
And as far as people railing at the three justices who spearheaded this change of law … what are you complaining about?
 
During President Trump’s four years in office, he had the opportunity to name not one, not two, but three new justices to the court, which is highly unusual.
 
So he went with justices who would follow his beliefs, political or otherwise.
 
That is what presidents do when tasked to name new Supreme Court justices.
 
You didn’t expect him to name one, two or three liberal justices, did you?
 
President Biden has had the opportunity to name one justice, and he did the exact same thing as Trump did, so the demonizing of Trump—at least in this area—is ridiculous.
 
However, I do believe that this thing where Supreme Court justices serve for life is absurd, and is a law that needs to be changed.
 
Three is no reason why justices in obvious ill health—like Ruth Bader Ginsburg was—should serve until their dying breath.
 
That might ultimately be the bigger, long-range problem than the abortion ruling is, based on future rulings.
 
But the bottom line to me here is that while I do believe the original Roe vs. Wade ruling was just and fair, I do believe that this latest ruling gives even more power to women, because the responsibility is now theirs to keep themselves out of such situations.
 
I do not agree with some states about who and who cannot get an abortion, however, so I am kind of one foot in and one foot out on this subject.
 
But remember two things: actually how many women does this impact each year—I would say a small percentage of womanhood to begin with, and as I brought up in another, earlier Rant, in her later years, the woman known as “Roe” became virulently anti-abortion, a point that is never brought up in the current narrative.
 
So women—and men—you are now fully empowered to take on this responsibility. You have been given the personal right to say “no.”
 
You have been fully empowered.
 
Don’t look at this as a negative. Make it into a positive.
 
And stop blaming the federal government, stop believing that the federal government is responsible for your situation and that you are not.
 
I don’t like the ruling as much as many of us don’t, but it has made personal responsibility the key in all of this.
 
Why was that taken away from us in the first place?
 
To me, with this ruling, that is the current $64,000 question that needs to be answered, and it is the question that must be heeded now that the act, and its possible consequences, have been fully placed in the participants’ laps.
 
Personal responsibility … what a concept!