Rant #3,082: Some Guys Have All the Luck

Well, here I am, I am back at my usual perch, and I am a bit brow-beaten, but otherwise, my usual critical thinking, old fogey self.

Yesterday was a difficult day, and a long one for me, but before I get to that, the craziness actually started on Saturday … and yes, it had to do with another fast-food experience.

As you know, I go out on the weekend to bring in food for my family, and I did just that this past Saturday and Sunday.

Really nothing out of the ordinary happened during Sunday’s food outing, but it sure did on Saturday.

As part of my food travels that day, I went to Boston Market. My wife likes their chicken, and they have recently reinstituted turkey offerings, so I have what to eat there too.

So I go into my local Boston Market, there are two people in front of me, so I wait patiently until they can take my order.

The two people ahead of me ordered ribs and turkey and non-chicken items, which did not prepare me for what was about to happen.

It was finally my turn, and I said the usual for my wife’s order: “Half chicken white meal to go.”

The server’s response was this: “We have no chicken.”

“You have got to be kidding me,” I said, but then I looked at the spits that they have at the back of the counter, and lo and behold, there was nothing on them.

Boston Market not having chicken is like McDonald’s not having hamburgers, Arby’s not having roast beef, and a Chinese take-out not having egg rolls, and this was on a Saturday night yet, a busy night for the chain.

And there were no signs up about this, no warnings, nothing out there to alert customers.

I called my wife, ordered turkey for both of us, and then as I was paying, another younger guy came in, and when he heard they had no chicken, I thought he was going to literally explode into nothingness right before me, as his reaction was such that it was almost like he was having a root canal right then and there without the use of anesthesia.

I paid, went to the soda machine to get a Coke, and lo and behold, not only did they not have chicken in this restaurant, but they didn’t have Coke either.

That completed my food journey for the evening with a loud thump!

I did contact the company about this, and here is the empty response that I received:

“Greetings Larry

Thank you for taking the time to contact us. We  would like to apologize to you for your most recent visit at your local Boston Market. We take great pride in providing our guests with the best experience possible. It was very disappointing to hear this was not the case during your visit.

Unfortunately, our suppliers and our distribution center is experiencing shortages that is affecting many business nationwide.  This is leading to menu shortages as well as late deliveries from our distribution center which is beyond our control.  While we understand how frustrating it may be for our guests, it is equally frustrating for us as well.

We hope you’ll visit us again, and give us another opportunity to show that we’re committed to providing you with an extraordinary experience.

 Boston Market Corporation”

Yup … I will have a better chance at getting a chicken meal there if I go out and shoot the bird myself.

Then yesterday was tax day, piled onto everything else I had to do that day, including taking my mother to the doctor and getting a small problem with my car fixed.

The small problem actually started on Sunday morning. I went to the supermarket to pick up a few things for my mother, and once again—and for the first time in many months—I noticed that my front driver door was closed, but on the dashboard, it was saying that the door was open, which is a little problem that becomes a big one when you can’t use some of the inside security features of the car with the door “open”—and with inspection right around the corner.

So I panicked, went to a couple of auto body places on Sunday morning, but even those that were listed as being open actually weren’t, so I had to wait until Monday to take care of this.

I made an appointment at Firestone, in the meantime, where an attendant in the store told me that “they couldn’t do the work” on Sunday because they were backed up, but could do it on Monday, and a woman on the phone gladly made me an appointment for Monday morning at 7 a.m.

I went to Firestone yesterday morning, and the attendant told me, in no uncertain terms, they did not fix door jamb problems. I asked him why two people told me that they did, and he did everything but literally pick me up and throw me out of the store.

What was I to do?

I went to the auto body place that fixed this problem all those months ago, waited an hour until they opened, and when they opened, I told them my problem … and they remembered me, and fixed the problem, and did it at no charge!

I gave the guy who worked on it a tip, and I was off to the races.

And then we had our taxes to do … .

Rant #3 081: I Know Where It's At

Perseverance and panache, that is all it takes.

Confronted with complete ineptitude, I kept my resolve, stayed on my course, and I got things done.

Yes, my battle with local fast food franchises and their lack of care at the drive-through window continues.

Last Saturday, I did what I always do on the weekend, which means that I go out to bring in food for my family and for my mother, and I also do this on Sunday.

I do it to give a break to my wife, who cooks our family food during the week (not for my mother, but it also gives my mother a break, giving her something else to eat than the usual stuff she eats).

But on this particular Saturday—one of many weekend days and other days that this has happened to me—not everything went smoothly at the drive-through window when I went to get us something to eat …

And it is an occurrence that has definitely increased exponentially since the coming of the pandemic.

I have personally found that the lack of a strong work ethic during this period has grown to epidemic proportions, whether at the drive-though window or in government offices.

My experience is that on more than one occasion, I have not received the food I have ordered through the drive-through area of just about all the fast food outlets that we use—Burger King, Wendy’s, Taco Bell and to a much lesser extent, McDonald’s.

I have also had some other problems with the drive-through process; as you know, a few weeks back, one of the workers accidentally dumped three big cups of soda in my car while trying to hand me an already broken drink caddy through the window.

But let’s bring this all up to date …

I went to Wendy’s. made my order, picked it up at the drive-through window, and sped home with what I thought was my full meal—

And I got home to find that we did not get what my son wanted, which was a 10-piece nuggets meal.

I had a sneaking suspicion that the order was going to be messed up, because the girl that I gave it to seemed preoccupied when I told her the order, giggling and laughing and talking to her fellow co-workers when I relayed the order to her.

When I got to the window to pay and pick up the order, she—and I noticed that she had a big earring in her nose, and I mean the biggest earring in someone’s nose that I have ever seen--was still seemingly pre-occupied, initially fouling up my drink order, and after I asked her, “Is everything in there?” meaning in the bag that she handed me through the window, she insisted that it was.

I called up the establishment, got who I thought was the manager on the phone, told her the problem—mentioning the girl with the huge earring in her nose--and she said that she would write my name in her “book” and that, at my urging, I would get my full order replicated—my son’s missing order and everything else I ordered—when I came back to the restaurant during the week.

I was agitated, because as I said, this has happened many times during the past couple of years or so, including at this place, but at least I would receive my order again at another time.

Yesterday turned out to be a busy day for myself and my family, so I figured it would be the perfect day to pick up the order.

I did my food shopping, and on the way home, I stopped off at the Wendy’s to pick up the order—with my receipt in my hand.

I got there, told them through the drive-through why I was there, and the woman taking the message seemed to be completely befuddled as she told me to drive up to the window.

Here is how the conversation went as I arrived at the window:

She: “Look, I am the manager here, and I don’t have any recollection of you supposedly getting your entire meal redone.”

Me: “I spoke to a woman who told me she was the manager, and she said that I could have the entire meal over again, because this has happened here several times to me in the past.”

She: I AM THE MANAGER HERE, NOT HER (Editor’s Note: She did raise her voice, not screaming, but to a visibly annoyed level), and I was not told that you should get the entire meal once again.”

Me: Look, this was our agreement, because it has happened several times at this location.”

She: BUT I AM THE MANAGER, and this was never communicated to me by the other person, who is actually the assistant manager.”

Me: It doesn’t matter, This was agreed upon between the two of us.”

She: “But—“

Me: “Look, if you won’t give me the entire meal again, then I am just going to have to report you.”

She: “But—“

Me: “I am just going to have to report you. Simple as that.”

Saying that got the manager into motion, and I got my full order and drove away content … and yes, when I got home, it actually was the full order.

I have found that telling a fast food restaurant that “I am going to have to report you” is akin to the days of yore was fighting one thing or another due to my rights as a parent being violated with school districts who did not want to deal with me as a custodial parent of my daughter without physical custody, or even more recently when I was fighting government bureaucracy, and you tell whoever you are on the phone with—

“I will get a lawyer and sue you.”

They don’t want to hear it, the fast food place doesn’t want to hear that they will be reported, and everything pretty much turns out hunky dory when you are pretty much forced to utter those respective magic words.

And it worked again yesterday.

I have become so used to not venturing inside fast food restaurants since the days of the pandemic, and whether I do go inside, or make my order on the outside, I am still paying the same U.S. greenbacks for my order to be fulfilled to the letter.

So, if I am missing an entire portion of what I ordered—and paid for—because the workers are having a jolly old time while at work, they won’t do it at my expense, period.

And if this type of incompetency happens to you, take a page from my book … it is a small victory, for sure, but you pay for something, you should get what you paid for.

Looking ahead to next week, I have an extremely busy day on Monday—it is “tax day” for my family, among the many things I have to do that day--so I will have to skip the Monday Rant.

Have a great weekend, and I will speak to you again on Tuesday.

And don’t forget to always stand up for your rights, whether the situation is a small one or a large one.

Rant #3,080: Good News (?)

“Beltzer.”

That is how TV news anchor Norah O’Donnell pronounced actor/comedian Richard Belzer’s last name during a short report on his passing last week on the CBS Evening News.

Why she mispronounced his name—it is said exactly as it is read, as Belzer—was infuriating, because here you are trying to report his death, and you can’t even get his name right.

Each time she said his name—and it was at least a couple of times—I cringed, because as the news anchor of this broadcast, she not only should have known the correct pronunciation, but it is her job to know how to say his name correctly.

But that is the state of TV news today.

This slip by O’Donnell not only shows that she is no Murrow or Cronkite, but quite honestly, that TV news ain’t what it used to be.

I am a big watcher of TV news—both local and national shows on the big three networks and the local outlets as opposed to national news networks like CNN—and this slip really opened up an old wound for me.

Today, TV news shows are more like appendages of “Entertainment Tonight,” and the same news shows covered Rihanna and her halftime show at the Super Bowl as much as they covered real news items, like the wild weather we are having across the United States this winter .., and by doing so, you might be entertaining, but you are not informing, which a news show is supposed to be doing.

Look, we all know that the news shows, both locally and nationally, are biased, bending over backwards to cover one side and never showing anything good about the other side.

As you probably know, I thought President Trump was a good president, but nothing but a crybaby when he lost the election, and the destruction that he directly caused on January 6 is something that should never have happened, and would never have happened if he did not spur it on—so I am not praising him in what I am going to say now, but only reporting what I saw during this Presidency.

But before these horrid acts, during his Presidency, he was never given an even break by the TV media nor the media in general.

When he did something good and newsworthy—and don’t doubt, in hindsight, whether we want to admit it or not, that he did do come good things—he was derided by the media.

For instance, he did put the creation of a COVID vaccine in motion, whether anyone wants to admit it or not.

Operation Warp Speed saved lives, as we now have a shot to prevent worsening effects of the coronavirus.

Sure, the President was a non-believer himself, but whatever the case, he got the ball rolling … but ever hear any praise from the media about this?

Heck, it wasn’t expected by me, since I saw right away when his presidency began that it took about a month for the TV media, at least, to call him not just :Trump” but “President Trump.”

And again, that is not lessening his misdeeds—which were many—but what I am saying here is fact … the TV media, at least, did not give him a fair shake from the get go, and thus, his mistrust of the media was born.

And in comparison, it appears that President Joe Biden gets the benefit of the doubt no matter what he says or does, and whatever the case, I have never seen or heard him derided by the TV news shows like President Trump was on almost a daily basis …

Which is kind of odd, since major news polls on Biden’s Presidency have shown that he is not a very popular President … nor was Trump, for that matter, but you kind of knew that by the reporting on these shows.

But let’s fast forward to today, when the TV media continues to twist major news items in one direction, and even worse, misreport news that greatly impacts our daily lives.

Because of their misreporting, the shots that were generated to ward off the coronavirus were originally marketed by the media as real vaccines, shots that if taken, would 100 percent prevent the shot taker from getting the virus.

That was simply extremely poor reporting, because as we know, these shots are simply mitigaters, preventing most shot takers from getting worse symptoms.

It is not a true vaccine, like the measles shot is, and this misreporting has spawned a whole group of people who not only don’t believe that the virus exists, but won’t get the shots even if it is proven to them that it does exist.

Their poor reporting about a “vaccine” forced dictionaries to change their meaning of what a vaccine is, for crying out loud.

And move things more into the present time, the TV media—and the media in general—again misappropriates words and phrases to suit their own needs.

Look at the illegal alien crisis that we are going through now.

The media has changed the phrase “illegal alien” to “migrant,” so as to soften its tone about who these people realky are. We see film on these news shows on a daily basis that shows how these people are being welcomed into America, almost as if they were conquering heroes when they get off the bus and clog our urban centers, including New York City.

And locally, the portion of Manhattan known as Harlem has been targeted for rehabilitation by these news shows, painted as if this area is the “garden spot” of the nation … and no other area of New York City—a city made up of distinct ethnic neighborhoods like Chinatown and Crown Heights—gets this special coverage.

Once viewed as a crime-ridden cesspool, the area has its own ‘embedded” reporter on the local CBS outlet here in New York, who not only looks like she just stepped out of a past edition of Playboy Magazine, but who only covers the soft stories about Harlem.

When there is a disturbance there, a shooting, a drug bust or some other incident, this embedded reporter is nowhere to be found in the coverage of the story … and since these incidents continue to happen in this “garden spot” on a daily basis, you have to think that this supposed reporter was simply hired and ensconced as the show’s Harlem=embedded reporter because she is, in fact, nothing but eye candy.

That is not the right way to think, but unfortunately, this is the way it at least appears to be.

Sorry, Harlem is as far away from Disneyland in miles as in sensibility, and the placement of this supposed reporter in this area would make you think that she would cover both the good and the bad … but like it simply does not happen that way.

No, this is not journalism when compared to the Murrows and Cronkites of the past news business, but it is the way news is covered today, whether we like it or not.

“Beltzer” indeed.

Rant #3,079: Age Ain't Nothin' But a Number

Good morning!

Get up, it is time to rise and shine!

It is Wednesday, the middle of the week on February 22, and it is time to get up out of bed and jump into the day!

I had to tell myself all of this earlier today, because quite frankly, I couldn’t get out of bed.

Here is how I have “progressed” since I lost my job going on four years ago—

I used to jump out of bed at 4 a.m., do what I had to do to get ready for work, write this Rant, and then go to work around 6 a.m. or so.

I had to wait for the doors to open—we had someone who pretty much lived there, which is another story for another time—and I would sit there waiting, and keep myself going by reading the newspaper and reading a book.

Once the doors opened between 7:30 a.m. and 8 a.m., I was often the first one in, and I started my workday by getting everything I needed ready, going through my email to see if anything needed tending to, and by 9 a.m., I was really all set up for the day, which lasted, with a lunch break, at 5:30 p.m., when I would zip out of the office and drive home.

Now, I can barely get up at 6 a.m., and often sleep past that point.

Being retired—or being semi-retired in my case—is such a disincentive to rise and shine and to push oneself like I used to do.

So the question has arisen, in my mind at least, about whether I could reset myself and do it all over again like I used to.

In other words, could I go back to working a full-time job again?

The answer is very complicated.

I guess I could if I had the opportunity to do so, and as you know, I have applied for some positions, but I haven’t heard from anyone.

I guess I could reset myself if I had to … I mean, in spite of what the world thinks, being 65 years of age, and going on 66 in late April, doesn’t make me decrepit by any stretch of the imagination.

But there are so many other factors involved in this question.

How would my son get to work if I were to work full time again?

He does not drive, and quite frankly, I don’t know if he will ever be able to drive.

On Long Island, there are two separate bus services for the disabled. One services Nassau County the other Suffolk County, and the twain doesn’t meet at all.

In other words, since we live in Nassau County and my son works in Suffolk County, he would have to literally take two buses to work, as the Nassau County bus does not cross over the line into Suffolk County, and the Suffolk County bus does cross over the line into Nassau County but just barely.

So a 25-minute car trip would translate probably into at least an hour if he had to go by bus, and yes, you have to pay for this privilege, too.

It simply would not work, and I am happy to drive him back and forth, door to door.

And then we have my mother, who does have aides come in, but really at this point, needs as much care as she can get.

Not only do I provide some care when the aides are not here, but I also drive her to all of her medical appointments … and take it from me, when you are 91 going on 92 and have some dementia, you have plenty of doctors’ appointments.

And then, of course, there is the mindset, that of working full time, which you don’t realize that you have when you are actually in the midst of working an eight or nine or ten or more hours day … it is a mindset that I had for more than 40 years, but I just don’t know if I have it anymore.

Your retired years are supposed to be just that, but when you are forced to retire early like I was, it kind of messes up that mindset years before it is supposed to do so.

I honestly don’t know if I have the “get up and go” that I once had when it comes to working full time. I just don’t know if I could do it anymore.

I see in the news that Phil Regan, a former Major League pitcher and also a former pitching coach for the New York Mets, is suing the team and the team’s former general manager for age discrimination, claiming that he was fired from his pitching coach job with the team because of his age.

Regan claims that he was hired to fix a then-failing pitching staff in the middle of the 2019 season, when he was in his early 80s, did just that based on pitching statistics, and then was summarily fired after the season—he was told that he was too old for the job by the team’s GM.

If, in fact, what he says is found to be true by a court of law, then yes, the Mets did practice age discrimination, and Regan is due whatever money is coming to him.

Me, I know I have been a victim too, but go prove it.

And again, could I do it all over again?

I honestly don’t know … and until you walk in my shoes—God forbid you have to—you can’t possibly know if you could do it yourself.

Rant #3 078: Out of Touch

How was your Presidents’ Day?

Mine was pretty dull, to be honest with you.

I did have a story to edit for work, one which I bypassed during the past few days, so I did that early in the day to get it out of the way.

I did my normal daily stuff—including writing this Rant—and then I went to the supermarket to cash in my family’s bottles and cans.

I do this every other week, and this just happened to be the Monday where I cash in my bottles and cans, so I did just that—and it went smoothly, which it rarely does.

The supermarket I go to has the old-fashioned bottle machines, where you have to shove the bottle into the machines for it to process the can and for you to get your money, not the ones with the belt that basically pulls the bottle seamlessly into the machine.

Those old machines break down all the time, but yesterday, I had absolutely no problem with those machines, and, in fact, I was the only one returning bottles, so it took me about 15 minutes to return all the bottles and get my payment, as opposed to the at least 30 minutes or more it normally takes.

And then, the rest of the day was as dull as could be, which was fine with me.

Having no other work to do, I was basically a couch potato during the rest of the day, but I did digitize a number of my records.

I often get on musical kicks, and right now, I am on a Daryl Hall and John Oates kick.

I have always liked their music, and during their time of their highest popularity—the early 1970s to the late 1980s—I bought as many of their singles and albums as I could possibly could, so I have a pretty wide selection of their music in my collection, maybe 20 to 25 albums and 45s combined.

I decided to digitize all of their singles that I have, so yesterday was the perfect time to do this, and I rediscovered just how good these records still sound all these years later.

The duo really jumped all over the place in their sound—from doo-wop to blue-eyed soul to rock to pop to new wave and back—and some would probably call them “pretenders” for not staying in one groove for very long.

But their singles do hold up, and if you watch TV, you know that their music is being used to sell one item or another, so their commercial sound is now being used in commercials, which I guess is a somewhat natural progression for what can be considered an ‘oldies” act nowadays, since the duo hasn’t had a real big hit single in about 30 years.

And later, I watched the news, and saw the mentally ill legislator George Santos pee all over himself once again, admitting in an interview that yes, he did lie about just about everything … but he did not lie about attending the prestigious Horace Mann High School—even though there is no record of his ever attending this elite educational institution—that his mother died in the 9/11 attacks—even though her name is not found on any list of deceased people that anyone has from that horrible day—and that he is Jewish—even though he said himself that he is “Jew-ish.”

This dummy also can’t answer to his financial improprieties, either, such as where he got money for his campaign and how he misused certain monies on himself—but he stressed that he is not going to resign.

Funny how this interview took place on Presidents’ Day, and that our Founding Father and our first President, George Washington, claimed to have never told any lies in his life.

Whether true or legend, Washington can’t have told as many lies in his entire life as Santos has told in just a couple of months, and what’s worse, he continues to stick to these lies as truth as if they were affixed to him with Gorilla Glue.

And later on, at about 9 p.m., I nodded off into dream world, and although I woke up once or twice during the night, I did have a restful sleep.

So that is what I did on Presidents’ Day.

Nothing too exciting, but it was a nice day just to be able to R-E-L-A-X.

Today, I am really back to the grind …

I just found out that the aide that we have for my mother cannot make it today, so I know that I am really back to reality as Presidents’ Day 2023 slides into the rear-view mirror.

What other wonderful things will happen today?

I do have to wonder.

That’s the way it is, I guess, so “forward march” into Tuesday, the day after the day we honor our Presidents.

“Tally-ho, and away we go!

Rant #3,077: Hail To the Chief

Happy Presidents’ Day.

Notice where I put the possessive—after the “s” in “Presidents,” because I do believe it really belongs there.

I have put up “Presidents’ Day” with the possessive after the “t” in “Presidents,” and I have left it off all together in the past, but I do believe that the proper way to do it is to put the possessive after the “s,” because this is a day for all of our Presidents, whether we are talking about Washington or Lincoln or even Arthur or Polk or Obama or Trump or Biden or Carter.

Jimmy Carter is 98 years of age, and it was reported that he is in hospice care, that he agreed to live out his life at home in that situation, which means he is taking no further drugs, or will have no further surgeries, to keep him going.

I wish him well.

This is a guy who conquered brain cancer, and he has developed into a real fighter in his later years …

Unlike when he was on the international stage as our President, where he was a powder puff, probably one of the worst Commanders-In-Chief we ever had, a true one-term leader if there ever was one.

But today is his day too, and even though we know that the inevitable is coming, we wish him well.

Here are some of my thoughts on Presidents’ Day, as I posted them in Rant #1,845, on February 17, 2017:

“On Monday, we celebrate Presidents Day, the day we honor our commander in chiefs from all eras, from George Washington to Donald Trump, everyone in between.

It is really a day that we honor the office of the presidency, and what it means to us as a nation.

When I was a kid, since Washington and Lincoln--two of our most important presidents--were born in the same month, we used to have two holidays, one for each of their birthdays.

I don't know how many years ago we combined them into one, single holiday, but it has been some time, that I do know.

So Presidents Day it is, and most importantly, it is a day of respect, a day that we look at all of our presidents, and the office that they have held, and give it the respect that it deserves ...

Even if we don't like a particular president.”

Notice that I did not use any possessive way back six years ago, but since the day is for ALL or our Presidents, well, I do believe that a possessive is needed.

But just for the sake of that post, I did not edit it the way I think now; leave it as the way I thought back then.

One can change, you know.

And this is not a very good segue way, but ...

Over the weekend, Stella Stevens and Richard Belzer both left us, and while I don’t have that much to say on either one of them, their passings should be noted.

Stevens was another actress in the “Marilyn Monroe-wannabe” line of beautiful women who tried to pick up Monroe’s mantel of our top sex symbol, but she never really got even near that level, although she did have many successes in her career, including her roles in “the Nutty Professor” and “The Poseidon Adventure.”

And unlike the also recently-departed Raquel Welch, she was quoted as being pretty much satisfied with her career work and her place in Hollywood.

And she WAS a beautiful woman with an absolutely killer figure too, so Stevens proved that you can have it both ways if you really want to.

Belzer was a pretty funny and well-known comedian like several other comics of his day, but he proved that comics can act—and can be serious—if given the opportunity.

He became a mainstay of the “Law and Order: Special Victims Unit (SVU)” TV franchise, and he was associated with that show for such a long time that I doubt most people even knew that he started his career as a stand-up comic who appeared on every variety and talk show that was around when he way plying that trade.

So kudos to Stevens and Belzer, and may they R.I.P.

With all that wrapped up into one Rant entry, have a great Presidents’ Day, and I will speak to you again tomorrow …

And let’s keep former President Carter in our thoughts; he surely needs all the help he can get right now.

Rant #3,076: Talk Talk

Now, Tim McCarver is gone.

I am sure a lot of you don’t know who he was, but if you give me a few minutes, you will find out who he was right here.

He came to national consciousness as one of the best catchers of his generation. He played across four decades (1959-1980) for several teams, primarily the St. Louis Cardinals and the Philadelphia Phillies.

While he was just a cut below being a Hall of Famer as a player, he sure caught plenty of them, including Bob Gibson and Steve Carlton during their most dominating seasons, some of the most dominating seasons a pitcher has ever had in baseball history.

Although he had a great 21-year Major League Baseball playing career, he is perhaps best known as a local and national baseball broadcaster for several teams and networks, including the Mets, the Yankees and the Giants, as well as for Fox Sports.

He cut his teeth as a broadcaster with the Mets, who he spent 16 seasons with, continued that honing of his craft with the Yankees, who he spent three seasons with, and that set him up for the national stage, where he called two dozen World Series and countless other games.

He finished up doing both Fox games and Giants games, retiring about a year ago after COVID convinced him that the time had come to hang up his microphone.

He was the first baseball analyst—or at least was said to be the first baseball analyst—to openly criticize players and teams while on the air, even if he was calling games for the local team and criticizing them on local broadcasts.

He had a wealth of knowledge, and often said that his 21 years as a catcher gave him the perfect perch to describe the nuances of the game to fans, and do it on his own erms.

To say that he was well liked by everyone—teams and players and fans—would be an absolute lie.

He was respected, like John Madden was in football, but not universally loved, as Madden was in football.

He had one famous skirmish with Deion Sanders, the a two-sport football and baseball star who he criticized for playing both sports on the same day, walking out on the Braves in the middle of a playoff game.

McCarver got in over his head in knocking Sanders, stating that the Braves should look into legal proceedings to stop this from happening.

Sanders did not take kindly to that and later on, dumped water all over McCarver while he was being interviewed by the broadcaster … not once, but several times.

Ted Williams, maybe the greatest all-around hitter baseball has ever seen, took him apart after a broadcast, and forced a meeting where he told McCarver everything he knew about hitting, a situation where McCarver said he “just had to take it” because it was coming from Williams, the last player to hit .400 during a season and a Hall of Famer …

Which McCarver became as a broadcaster some years later.

And not all fans liked him either.

I was one of them.

I felt he over-criticized teams and players too much, but I also think that he gave fans an inside peak at what made a baseball team run, but never told viewers the whole story.

He seemed to give us what he thought we could handle, and then pull back a bit, so as not to break into the game’s “inner spectrum” fully.

He was brash, too opinionated for my taste, talked way too much, had an ego the size of the Grand Canyon, and said things that got under players’ skins.

But he has many disciples in the booth, and you can hear them today on just about any baseball broadcast.

And he did know what he was talking about, and he kind of made you know that.

During the 2001 World Series, he correctly predicted the outcome of the deciding game down to the final pitch, that from the Yankees’ Mariano Rivera to the Diamondbacks’ Luis Gonzalez, who had a broken bat hit that won the Series for the team from Arizona.

Rivera through a cutter, and he correctly predicted that the left-handed hitting Gonzalez would be able to handle it, even if he barely hit it, which he did, and the rest is history.

I will give him credit.

McCarver knew the game probably better than anyone, but his style rubbed me the wrong way, almost like, “I know the game better than you and don’t you forget it.”

And I think he rubbed many players the same way with this attitude … but you can’t knock the 40 years he spent in the booth, couple with his 21 years on the field.

He and Vin Scully had widely different styles, but they were arguably the two most famous baseball broadcasters in the history of the game, along with Mel Allen and Red Barber, who also had different styles, and yes, except for Scully, they all often rubbed people the wrong way.

So here is a toast to Tim McCarver, an excellent player and perhaps even a better broadcaster, a guy I never really was attuned to, but who I respected greatly for his more than 60 years of baseball acumen.

R.I.P.

Have a great weekend, and I will speak to you again on Monday.

Rant #3,075: Sexy, Sexy. Sexy

We lost another big star yesterday.

Raquel Welch, the last of the pure sex symbols, passed away at age 82 after what was termed a short illness.

I had to laugh yesterday when I went through the announcements of her demise, and on one news show, the reporter actually said, “She was the first sex symbol.”

I kid you not, he actually said that.

I don’t know how old this guy was, but you can reach way back to Mae West and through many others, including Marilyn Monroe—the ultimate sex symbol—but Welch was not the first sex symbol, as this fool said, but she was actually the last one.

To me, the term “sex symbol” is defined as a Hollywood personality who gives off an air of sexuality without ever giving into it fully.

What I mean by that is that many of today’s actresses go whole hog on their own sexuality seemingly on a daily basis—look at Elizabeth Hurley, who poses in every form imaginable and is ubiquitous on social media showing off her body every which way, seemingly at a whim.

And then you have many other actresses, who strip down to nothing, put their photos up on the Internet, and tell all of us even though they are naked as the day they were born, we shouldn’t look, it is their way of showing their personal independence.

And they get away with this nonsense because in the MeToo era, they can.

Welch, like Monroe, exuded sensuality and sexuality, but never really shoved it in our faces like the current crop of actresses that are so preoccupied with their bodies.

Welch and Monroe really wanted to be taken seriously as actresses, and while I don’t think either one really got what they wanted, they did it by being themselves and being glamorous at the same time.

Welch was really the actual remnant of the fallout of the blonde wave of the 1950s, when Monroe, Jayne Mansfield, Mamie Van Doren and dozens of other bosomy blondes became the rage in Hollywood.

But Welch obviously was quite different than those blondes, in both her look and her background.

When diversity was just a word, and not a movement as it is today, Welch was the polar opposite of these bleach blondes.

She was of Bolivian descent—although in truth, that was hidden for quite a long time--and she was a brunette.

She was statuesque and buxom and had all the essentials to be that era’s sex symbol, but the path to that was not an easy one.

She was just another tall actress, but then her first husband suggested some “cosmetic” changes, and well, the rest is history.

Welch first jumped into television, with guest roles on shows like “Bewitched,” and he made a few appearances in some horrible movies of the time—something she did really for the rest of her career.

But when she made “One Million Years B.C.,” even though it was another horrible movie, she forever solidified herself as our reigning sex symbol.

Running around in a flimsy loincloth and barely covered top, she took over the then-vacant sex symbol mantel, and ran with it for the rest of her life.

And the poster of her gallivanting around like this adorned millions of young boys’ bedroom walls, predating the Farah Fawcett poster by several years.

If you look at her movie career, she made only one really good movie, and that was “Fantastic Voyage,” where her sexuality was totally downplayed and the then-revolutionary special effects were on maximum display as opposed to her assets.

But after “One Million Years B.C., she became a ubiquitous 1960s and 1970s personality, seemingly showing up at every red carpet event in gowns that showed nearly everything, but not everything, if you know what I mean.

Although she was in Playboy Magazine many times, her appearances were never fully unclothed, which really solidified herself as a true sex symbol, again, just showing enough to get people interested, but never showing it all.

Later in her career, she did win some acclaim as an actress, winning a Golden Globe for her appearance in “The Three Musketeers,” and even later in her career, she won several awards for her Hispanic heritage.

But like Marilyn Monroe, I do think her goal to be thought of as an actress rather than as a sex symbol was never fulfilled, and she went to her grave as our last and final sex symbol.

Here is what I had to say, in edited form, about Raquel Welch back in Rant #798, September 5 2012:

“I have never been a big fan of hers, but she is what she is--the last real, old fashioned, honest to goodness sex symbol that Hollywood produced.

She made one good movie--"Fantastic Voyage"--where her sexiness was downplayed.

And she made numerous horrid films--including "Kansas City Bomber"--where her sexiness was completely overplayed.

She was no Marilyn Monroe, not even a Jayne Mansfield.

But in the 1960s and early 1970s, the name "Raquel" almost became a code word for sex.

Heck, even Russ Meyer had a film named "Harry, Cherry and Raquel."

So, her legacy is intact.”

R.I.P.

Rant #3,074: Up, Up and Away

“It is balloon … !”

That was a cry heard on the old “F Troop” TV show from way back when, but now, that cry has become the national obsession, as in—

“What is that thing floating in the air?”

Ever since we discovered that China has been looking at us through surveillance balloons for at least the past few years, and we actually shot one of their balloons down, all of us seem to be looking to the sky, and seeing if we can see one of these balloons hovering above us.

The U.S. has shot down at least three other balloons, but these other ones don’t appear to be anywhere near as complex—and evil—as the one Chinese one we shot down …

And then we heard that these balloons have been hovering about since at least the Trump Administration was in power, and maybe even before that.

The White House says that they are surveillance balloons, not extraterrestrial or UFOs in nature—

And then the Chinese said that our government also sends over such balloons to spy on them.

Our government, under great pressure to do something once the first balloon was sighted, shoot down these balloons in desolate areas or over water so as not to have the falling debris hit anyone on the ground.

Now, I am not an aviation expert at all, but shouldn’t we have technology to capture these things intact, so not only don’t we have to shoot them down, but we gather the entire mechanism, so we can gain knowledge of exactly what these balloons are doing, rather try to put together the puzzle in pieces?

Perhaps we can’t do that just yet, but it was a thought that ran through my head and is probably something that ran through your heads too.

Years ago—and I mean, it must have been at least 35 to 40 years ago—I was coming home from somewhere very early in the morning, like at 2 a.m. or 3 a.m.

I was not far away from home, but as I was driving on one of the connecting blocks to where I live, I saw something in the sky.

It was cylindrical, and went from side to side in my view from the car, with precision and ease.

I got home and pretty much went to bed with the thought that I had seen something weird in the sky, but then I read in the local newspaper that I wasn’t the only one to see this thing, and people made calls in the middle of the night to the police about it, saying that they saw a UFO.

A police spokesman later said that it was a weather balloon, and nothing more than that, but if you think that I and the others who called the police actually believed that explanation, I have the proverbial bridge to sell you.

But now I wonder: was it a UFO … or was some country spying on us through the air?

I know, it is all kind of weird, but I know what I saw, and I have my doubts that it was a weather balloon.

But it truly begs the question: how long has this type of aerial spying actually been going on, and have all of those “UFO” sightings that are made each and every year actually sightings of spy aircraft—or even aircraft that our country is launching and testing in our own skies?

Who really knows, and the people who actually do know aren’t going to tell us about it anyway.

But wouldn’t it be interesting if those UFOs and flying saucers and all of that other stuff have actually been aerial spying devices all along?

That kind of puts the pin to the bubble of those who believe that we aren’t the only “beings” in the universe, and that others have come to visit us through the years.

It also kind of puts a little bug in our head, doesn’t it?

Those little green Martians that we theorize have been here and back in their flying saucers are nothing more than spy devices from other countries, or even from the good old U.S. of A.

It is almost kind of disappointing, isn’t it?

But whatever it is, I hope our government takes a little more caution with these things, because who really knows what damage they can do related to intelligence and thus, to our nation.

Little green men?

Sorry, the country maybe doesn’t believe that hooey anymore.

Find out what these things really are and take care of them, and let’s not let them wander our airspace like we did with that one last week.

It is all kind of funny, but when you really look at it, it is problem far from being simply one full of hot air.

Rant #3,073: Heart

Happy Valentine’s Day to everyone!

And yes, that is with an apostrophe “s,” although myself and many other people leave off the apostrophe, but the apostrophe must be included, because it makes “Valentine” a possessive.

Now, to show you how special the day is, and how smart you were to read this Blog entry today, where else will you read the world “apostrophe” three times in one sentence?

Yes, that does make the day special in my eyes.

In my house, we exchange cards, and that is about it … although this year, I did buy my wife some clothing, but we decided to put it on her store card, so I haven’t paid for it just yet, as I will give her the money for the gift when the bill comes in.

So goes Valentine’s Day in my house.

Here is what I said about this special day exactly 10 years ago in Rant #905, February 14, 2013, in edited form. It pretty much still holds true.

“This is a holiday that we don't get a day off from work for, but if we don't handle it the right way, we could be on a vacation for a long, long time.

Women tell their husbands that they don't want anything, but if you don't get them anything, you are on their sh-- list for at least the time being.

Greeting card companies make the most of this day. It is one of their biggest holidays of the year, and when looking for a card, you have so many choices: traditional cards, religious ones (this is, after all, SAINT Valentine's Day), musical ones, large ones, small ones ... you name it, they have it.

Anyway, some people give their loves flowers, others give candy, and others give a lot of other gifts, like jewelry.

Me, I have gone the flowers route a few times, and it is really a nice thing to give on the holiday.

This year, I just kept it small. I bought the requisite cards, and I got my wife something small but nice.

My wife stays away from the sweets, so candy is out, but I got her something nice.

I just expect a card from her, and that is fine with me.

I always thought of Valentine's Day as the day the man buys the woman something, not really the other way around, so a card is just fine.

So to all the men that read this blog, you better go out and get something for your loved one, because if you don't, you will regret it.

You don't need to go crazy, just buy her something nice.”

And I forgot to mention earlier that to make the day even nicer for me, my computer went on without a blip today.

It just went on like it is supposed to do, without a hitch and without the major problems I had with it yesterday.

So I guess that was my Valentine’s Day gift from my computer to me … or at least I like to think of it as that.

So whatever you do, have a great Valentine’s Day!

And remember the old axiom if you are dithering on what to do on this special day:

“A happy wife is a happy life.”

That can be amended to “A happy partner is a happy life” too, so just keep that in mind if you aren’t married.

The same rules apply either way.

Don’t let the day pass you without doing something for your loved one.

This day only happens once a year, even though you should show your love every day of the year; you don’t need a day to demonstrate this, but the card and gift companies make their money on this day, so we have to have a single day to memorialize our love for another person to fill their coffers.

That is the way of the world, I guess—certain entities feel we need special days and special months to tie a bow on certain things that should be demonstrated throughout the year.

Whatever the case, once again, have a happy Valentine’s Day, and many, many more!

Rant #3,072: One Way Or Another

Sorry for the delay of this Rant.

My computer continues to give me problems, and today it gave me plenty of problems.

It would not start up, but finally, after several tries, it did, so even though many days it boots up on the first try, today was not one of those days.

I have been struggling with this problem for more than six months, so at this point, I know that it is not going to get any better, and today, without a doubt, proved that belief.

But here I am, the computer is finally working, and what am I going to write about today?

I had a pretty dull weekend, which was really good for me, as it allowed me to relax after a somewhat busy week last week.

And the “busy-nesss” continues today, as I have to take my mother to one of her doctors and I have to take my son to the dentist.

So again, what am I going to write about today?

This weekend, I watched a TV sitcom that I had not seen or thught about in probably more than 50 years, but when I heard its opening, it sparked a memory in me, one that I had pretty much totally forgotten about, from my very early childhood days.

“Don’t turn that dial!” …. “BLON …. DIE!”

The Decades TV network once again had its binge weekend, but this binge was “Blondie,” and “Blondie” all of the time.

The station showed several movies bases on the Chic Young comic strip—there were 20 such movies in all, making it, along with James Bond, the movie franchise with the most sequels, with the Blondie films spanning from the late 1930s to 1950, with each movie starring Penny Singleton as Blondie Bumstead and Arthur Lake as her dithering but loveable husband, Dagwood Bumstead.

But few remember that there were two TV series that were also based on the comic strip.

Let’s go with the most recent first. The one from 1969 tried to adapt Blondie to the then-current norms and trends, and starred Patricia Hardy as Blondie and Will Hutchins as Dagwood.

It fell flat on its face and didn’t even last a half season, with legend having it that the personnel affiliated with the show were told that the show had been canned right in the middle of shooting one of the 15 episodes that were filmed for the series.

But the earlier TV version—from 1957—was the one that was shown in its entirety this weekend on Decades, the show which had a very interesting cast, including Pamela Britton as Blondie and Arthur Lake once again as Dagwood.

I had totally forgotten about this show when I finally sat down to watch it, but that opening hit me between the eyes, and in reruns, this show was probably one of the first TV shows I ever watched as a kid, joining “The People’s Choice” with Jackie Cooper—and the talking dog—and “The Adventures of Superman” as the three shows I now remember that started my love of television—along with “American Bandstand,” which my mother has said time and time again was the show that I used to jump up and down in the crib to.

Anyway, the “Blondie” show ran only about two-thirds of a single season—26 episodes, as opposed to the 38 that a full season ran in those days—and I must have seen it in reruns a year or two after the show originally ran, when I was about one or two years old—and yes, I distinctly remember watching it.

And you can see why as a little kid I enjoyed this show so much.

It was wall to wall slapstick, with Lake being the focus of the show, fumbling and bumbling around just about every circumstance, while still finding the time to love his wife and children.

The show was funny as could be, very contrived but it generated a lot of laughs for me.

And the cast was very, very interesting, apart from the show itself.

Perhaps the most interesting one was Lake, but we will get to him in a moment.

Britton, as Blondie, had that real 1950s look as an actress, but her most famous role was not this one, but the one where she played the overly ditzy and overly nosy neighbor Mrs. Brown on “My Favorite Martian.” But Britton was actually quite an accomplished stage and screen actress before she ended up as a TV staple.

The young actress that played their daughter Cookie was Ann Barnes, who followed up this show with a long string of ingénue roles on sitcoms like “Leave It To Beaver” and “My Three Sons.” She kind of faded into obscurity until she died in 2005, when her death made national headlines, as she was found dead in her home, and had been in this state for possibly weeks or months without anyone knowing that she was gone.

Simon “Stuffy” Singer played son Alexander (known as the character “Baby Dumpling” in some of the early movies), but his real claim to fame is that he was a superior athlete as an adult, competing in everything from baseball to handball on a competitive level, the latter or which he had an incredible career as a professional player, winning numerous championships and being inducted into the Handball Hall of Fame. All the while, he did many voiceovers in cartoons, and voiced in both TV and the movies, including in the classic cartoon movie “Peter Pan.”

And then we finally come to Arthur Lake, who basically WAS Dagwood Bumstead from the time he played the role for the first time in the late 1930s until his death in the late 1980s—he became to that character what Alan Hale became to “The Skipper” on “Gilligan’s Island”—he became the character in real life. Even after he was done with the Blondie series of TV shows and movies, Lake often appeared at events as Dagwood, posing with those outlandish “Dagwood Sandwiches” that were seemingly a mile high.

On another side, Lake was a suspect in the “Black Dahlia” murder case, the still unsolved murder of a young woman in Los Angeles in the 1940s. He was questioned at least partly because the woman worked at the Hollywood Canteen that he frequented, and he was also a friend of William Randolph Hearst and Marion Davies, of whom he married their illegitimate daughter. About the Black Dahlia case, Lake knew the girl well from the canteen, he was questioned, but any case against him was dropped when no evidence of any wrongdoing was found.

And then the supporting cast … Harold Peary as the gnarly next door neighbor, was actually better known for his radio role as the “Great Gildersleeve,” and Elvia Allman as Dagwood’s boss’ wife appeared in numerous situation comedies during this period, including as the candy boss in that classic episode of “I Love Lucy.”

There were other supporting cast members, and each had an interesting back story, but along with the regular cast, this show just didn’t cut the mustard, and was canned after just about two-thirds of a season.

Whatever the case, I personally enjoyed this trip back to another time and my very early life, and I recorded some of the shows to watch later on.

And the “Blondie” comic strip continues on in local newspapers, the name was appropriated for the Hall of Fame rock band, and the movies can still be seen each weekend on various cable channels and is available on the Internet … so if you want Blondie, you can get Blondie, anytime.

“BLON …. DIE!”

Rant #3,071: Promises, Promises

Well, we lost a great one yesterday when Burt Bacharach passed away at age 94.

Bacharach was the much more visible of the songwriting duo of Bacharach—the tunesmith—and Hal David—the lyricist—and they dominated the 1960s and into at least the early 1970s with their pop concoctions that somehow drew you in even if you didn’t want to be drawn into the sheer sugar of their music.

They wrote what I consider the first “ear candy” songs, tunes that got into your head and which you couldn’t get out of your head, no matter how hard you tried.

Take this one song of theirs in particular—“Promises, Promises”—from the Broadway show of the same name.

I wrote about this song way back in Rant #512, May 27, 2011. Here is what I had to say about that song, but it could have really been said about any song in the Bacharach/David catalog of hits:

“Did you ever have a song that you can’t get out of your head?

A song that you don’t necessarily like, but it sticks in your brain like peanut butter sticks to bread?

I have been going through this the past few weeks with a song from my childhood that I had pretty much forgotten about, until hearing it on the radio a few weeks ago.

And since hearing it, I can't get it out of my head.

The song is “Promises, Promises” from the 1968 Broadway show of the same name, a production which was written by Neil Simon. It’s from the only Broadway show that Burt Bacharach and Hal David ever wrote the score for. Although I never saw the show, it is supposedly based on the 1960 film “The Apartment,”

The song’s most popular version was by Dionne Warwick, who had a top 20 hit with it when the show was on Broadway. It has also been sung by many others, including Jerry Orbach, in the original Broadway show, Tony Roberts, in the London cast, and most recently, Sean Hayes in the 2010 Broadway revival.

Anyway, I just can’t get this tune out of my noggin, and I don’t know why.”

The Bacharach/David team wrote many songs like that, including the following:

“What’s New Pussycat”

“Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head”

“Anyone Who Had a Heart”

“Alfie”

“I Say a Little Prayer”

“My Little Red Book”

“I Just Don’t Know What To Do With Myself”

“Long Ago Tomorrow”

“The Look of Love”

“Do You Know the Way to San Jose”

And honestly, that is just scratching the surface of their writing … they gave a real bombastic Broadway feel to all of their songs, and the public ate up this pop pabulum as if it were real sugary candy, myself included.

Dionne Warwick certainly was their muse, as they wrote many, many hits for her, but they also wrote hits for the likes of Tom Jones, B.J. Thomas, Herb Alpert, Jackie DeShannon … the list goes on and on and on.

While David was pretty much in the background in this partnership—he was a closeted gay man through most of those years--Bacharach was way out in front, recording his own albums of his own tunes, appearing all over TV and the movies, and living a celebrity lifestyle that made him a ubiquitous presence in the Hollywood gossip pages of the 1960s and early 1970s.

His marriage to Angie Dickinson put him right out in front, and unlike David, he seemed to enjoy the notoriety, although it led to some nasty reporting and an eventual divorce from the actress.

And it also led to a divorce between David and Bacharach, and although the two did continue their careers with other co-writers—Bacharach even teamed up with the likes of Elvis Costello for a period of time—the hits kind of dried up by the 1980s, although Bacharach did have one more absolutely huge hit, a former throwaway that he and Carole Bayer Sager originally wrote for Rod Stewart in 1982.

“That’s What Friends Are For” became a huge hit for Dionne Warwick and some top pop co-singers when it was revived in 1985 as an AIDS benefit anthem, selling millions of copies and generating many more millions to AIDS research.

With the passing of Bacharach, the world has lost one of last of the great pure pop songwriters, a guy who made millions off of pop songs that had hooks at least a mile long, sung by some of the world’s great pop singers.

And you know, now that I think about it, I still can’t get “Promises, Promises out of my head.

Have a great weekend, and I will speak to you again on Monday.

Rant #3,070: No Time

It is Thursday, February 9, and it is just like any other Thursday for me.

I woke up, took a shower, got dressed, brought in the garbage pail, retrieved the newspaper, and sat down and ate breakfast and started to read the newspaper.

I soon have to wake up my son for work, and while he gets ready for his day, I will finish up what I do in the early morning and prepare to take him to work.

After I drive him to work, I go straight to the supermarket, where I buy my groceries for the week. My wife, who is at work herself, gave me the list of what we need and I try to follow it to the letter.

I buy all the groceries we need, and I take them home, put them where they belong, check to see what work has come in for me, and somehow squeeze lunch into this busy day.

After lunch and hopefully after I finish my work, I drive out to pick up my son from work, and then I take him to do his own shopping.

Then we go home, and I look over the mail, for both my family and my mother, who simply cannot do this anymore, and while I do this, my son puts away what he has bought, and I then do any residual work that I did not finish earlier. My wife has arrived home from her work, and she is starting to prepare dinner for the three of us.

We eat dinner, and after having checked up periodically through the day with my mother to see how she is doing, I meet with her again after I eat, and usually spend about 20 minutes to a half hour with her.

After I leave her, I watch a little TV with my wife, and then my son, and then I usually fall asleep watching TV with my son, and I somehow make it to the bed, and I am done for the day.

And then I start it all up again on Friday.

But the last few days have been a bit different for me—not a major difference, but something a wee bit different nonetheless--because for the first time in decades, I have done all of these things without wearing a wristwatch on my left wrist.

This does not seem like a monumental change, but for me, it is.

I have worn a watch since I was about five or six years old. I think I originally did it because I thought it made me feel more mature, older than I was … and you know how kids always want to feel older than they really are.

But then it simply became a necessity.

When I was roaming the grounds of my neighborhood in the sprawling community of Rochdale Village, South Jamaica, Queens,NewYork, you could still go from one end of the community to another without your mother knowing exactly where you were.

But if she was preparing supper for the family—she, my sister and I, and my father would eat later when he came home from work—I had better be where I was supposed to be—at home—at that time, or I would hear about it, and hear about it but good.

And as I grew older, I simply needed to see what time it was as part of my regular progression of the day.

And I have worn a watch on my left wrist for probably nearly 60 years now, and me not being a jewelry person, it is the only such thing I ever wore on my person.

I have had many watches over the years—fun and functional and both at the same time—but when they broke or did not run anymore, I seemed to always have a replacement ready to go.

But in the current time, my watch simply stopped working, and after seeing that it was one of those watches where it would be difficult to get the battery out to change it—if that was the actual problem—I decided to ditch it and get a new watch.

The watch I had I had purchased right at the beginning of the pandemic. Back three years ago, I went to the local Walmart when my then-current watch had also died, and was really lucky.

If you remember,Walmart was one of the few stores open during those early days, and myself and maybe 20 other people—total, including workers--were in the store.

I went through watch after watch—looking for one that had a backlight and also was waterproof—and after going through about 100 watches, I found one—only one—that fit that criteria, and that was the one that I had on my wrist when it died last week.

So I went back to Walmart, thinking I would be so lucky this time, but lo and behold, their watch section had diminished by about half from three years ago, and nothing fit my needs.

I went to Target, and the once bustling watch department was no more. They had few men’ watches scattered about, but they were cheap and did not meet my needs, so I still had no watch.

(I have heard that wristwatches have become almost passé because everyone has a cellphone, and can look up the time using that device, or if people have a watch, it is a smart watch, hooked up to the Internet and able to do so many other things than tell time, but guess I am old fashioned, and all I want is a traditional wristwatch.)

I decided to order a watch online, and I found the perfect one on Amazon, under the male watches banner, one that fit all my parameters.

I ordered it, received it in the mail a day and a half later, but to my astonishment, it was a male watch all right—one for a little boy. It was so small that I could barely see its face, and I could barely get it on my wrist.

So, still no watch.

Totally frustrated, I went to the Kohl’s site, found another watch that I felt was way overpriced but met my needs, and I ordered it—but I received a message back telling me that while my order would be filled, that I should expect delays, and that the watch would come to me not in a week or so, but most probably by the end of the month.

So here I am, without a watch for some time now, and the white spot on my wrist—where all the watches covered up my skin from the sun for decades—is beginning to get a little darker without a watch over it.

Sure, this is not a big problem, but I keep on looking at my now bare wrist for the time, and all I see is skin.

What time is it?

Rant #3,069: No

“Dear NBA Commissioner Adam Silver:

Enough is enough.

I know that you are a busy man, but did you notice that Kyrie Irving deleted his Instagram post where he apologized for putting up a link to a film that featured one anti-Semitic trope after another?

Remember, earlier this season, Irving put up this link, and then pretty much refused to show any remorse for doing so?

His team at the time, the Brooklyn Nets—playing in the New York City borough with one of the largest Jewish populations not only in the country, but in the world—suspended him, forced him to take classes to understand the Jewish experience, and fined him … but he still never apologized.

Then he finally put up this message, and this instance was pretty much put in the rear-view mirror.

NBA players generally backed Irving during this entire period, not saying one world about how hurtful his post was, and denying his anti-Semitism.

Well, what do you say now after his press conference introducing him to his new team, the Dallas Mavericks?

Not only did he reveal that he had deleted that post—brushing it off by saying that he often deleted such posts—but he also stated that he felt “disrespected” in Brooklyn, with his talent never appreciated.

First of all, you, Mr. Silver, as a Jewish human being yourself, should have seen how gimpy his apology was.

It was obviously written and/or orchestrated by his agent and/or his employer, and all he had to do was post it—and not believe a world in it at all—just to move on from this incident that the player caused himself with his original post.

Second, not only was his “apology” gimpy, but the NBA’s reaction to it wasn’t really was quite questionable, but was as lame as his apology was.

Irving should have been suspended for the rest of the year, or at least for more than the eight-game suspension that he was given.

In a league that wholeheartedly supports the Black Lives Matter organization, if the shoe were on the other foot, and a white player put up a similar link to a film showing blacks in such a bad light, you just know that there would have been more of an uproar than that surrounded Irving’s post.

More importantly, you should have enacted a league-wide edict that every player in the league had to take sensitivity training when it came to their relationship with the Jewish population—a population that has supported the NBA since Day One.

In fact, if it weren’t for Jews, there would be no NBA.

As I think you know, the majority of players in the early days of the league, more than 70 years ago, were Jewish, and to this day, a good percentage of the league’s owners are Jewish—and Irving’s new team is, in fact, owned by a Jew, Mark Cuban.

And YOU are Jewish.

You would think that there would have been more of a punishment for Irving, but I guess when you score 27 points a game, little things like anti-Semitism don’t really matter.

Irving is far from the only current NBA and former NBA player who has demonstrated anti-Semitism, including everyone from Stephen Jackson to Dwyane Wade to Kevin Durant to Allan Iverson to Meyers Leonard … sure, the intent of each one of these incidents perhaps was different, but in a league that stands up for the “downtrodden”—blacks, women, the LGBTQ community—the silence on the Kyrie Irving matter was deafening.

And how could it be that there was just one voice in the wilderness to point out how deafening this silence really was?

Only one former player, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, saw the indignation of the NBA’s silence over the Kyrie Irving situation, saying that it does not run true in a league that supports Black Lives Matter so strongly.

Does the silence stem from the view of many blacks—including NBA players, the majority of whom are black—that Jews are simply a fringe element of the white race, and thus, they don’t deserve their sympathy because wile Jews are actually part of the “problem,” because they are white people?

I just don’t know, but I want to conclude this message to you in a way that perhaps you will understand.

I have been going to NBA games since my father took me to the old Madison Square Garden to see an NBA doubleheader—remember those?—way back in 1965. There were few people in attendance, but I had the time of my life at my first NBA game.

I have continued to attend NBA games to the present time, and I followed up my father taking me to games by taking my own son to games both at MSG, Barclays Center and at other arenas in the country.

As the Kyrie Irving incident unfolded, and I saw the lack of response from the NBA and its players to this oblivious instance of anti-Semitism, I declared that I would never go to an NBA game again.

I have been going to games for roughly more than a half century, but I cannot support a league that does not support me, as a Jewish American.

And now, with Irving’s deletion of his supposedly apologetic post, I clearly see that the NBA doesn’t care about me, my son, my deceased father and every other Jewish fan that it has had since 1948.

You have lost me, lost my money, and lost my interest.

I would be happy to discuss this with you at greater length at your convenience."

Rant #3,068: Bits and Pieces

In an unprecedented move for the Ranting and Raving Blog, for the first time in 3,068 posts, we are going to have a “Bits and Pieces” entry two days in a row.

This never happened before, and may never happen again, so bask in its glow while you can.

There are a few more stories that do not deserve full entry observation that I wanted to talk about yesterday, but could not fit in to yesterday’s piece, so they moved over to today.

It is something very unusual, but without further ado, here goes nothing—

Dead Woman Sent to Funeral Home, But Isn’t Dead: This may go down as one of the stranger stories of the year, but it did happen.

The other day, a supposedly dead 82 year auld woman who was in a Long Island nursing home was sent to a nearby funeral home to be burred, but upon further examination, it was found that she was alive and breathing.

The questions are many: why was she thought to be dead?; did a doctor thoroughly examine her and declare her to be deceased; and what exactly happened to awaken her from her stupor and return her to the living?

Look, she probably isn’t well, but I am sure that these are questions that her family is asking both the nursing home and the funeral home, and it was announced yesterday that the district attorney will be getting involved, too.

And was she ever pronounced officially and unequivocally dead by a doctor? I am sure that doctor will be questioned, and he or she better have some good answers, or I am sure he or she will lose their medical license for awhile.

On the TV news last night, one doctor having nothing to directly do with this case was interviewed, and talked about one of the possible reasons that the woman came to life again.

It might be this reason or it might not, but it appears to be plausible—although even if this did happen, there are questions about whether the doctor who supposedly declared her dead—if one actually did—did what he or she did with a thorough examination.

It seems that there are rare instances where a person could be dead for a very short period of time, but then the brain somehow reinvigorates itself, and when that happens, the entire body reinvigorates itself, including initiating blood flow and lung capacity once again, which means the heart starts pumping after it had stopped.

This does happen—the brain can lay dormant in certain cases, and perhaps was started up again by a variety of circumstances, even in the ambulance or whatever vehicle was used to transport the body to the funeral home—but it is a rare occurrence.

So whatever happened to revive this woman to some state of being alive, it happened, and can you imagine the shock of the funeral home employee who discovered that this dead body was actually alive?

School Bus Stop Sign Stops Traffic Until Drivers Get Wise: This is something that happened to me on Friday, and in my more than 48 years of being a legal driver, I can’t ever remember it happening to me before this particular incident.

As I was driving my son to work on Friday, I noticed a yellow school bus pulled over to the side of the road with its flashers and Stop sign out, meaning that all traffic on both sides of the road had to stop until the bus was done letting off its passenger(s) and the flashers and Stop sign retracted.

That is the procedure in New York State, and I have to say that I have followed this rule to the letter since it was put in place several years ago.

Anyway, as I approached the stopped school bus and stopped my car—and saw in front of me that other cars simply went through the flashers and Stop sign and were on their way as they broke the state law—I also saw that I wasn’t the only one following the law, as the car in the right lane also stopped as did cars on the other side of the road.

I was the first car in the left lane, so everyone stopped behind me, and all of us were waiting for the flashers and Stop sign to recede so we could be on our way.

This usually takes maybe a minute or a minute and a half to do, but I—and drivers on the other side of the street—discovered that for some reason, this retraction was taking longer than anticipated.

On the other side of the street, after about three minutes, cars started to move again, but since I was the first car in the left lane, I wanted to make sure that everything was safe to move on.

After about five minutes of sitting there, I inched up a little bit past the Stop sign, and although I admittedly did not get out of my car to get a better view, I noticed that from may standpoint, there was no one in the bus, even though the flashers and Stop sign were still on.

Whoever was driving the bus had pulled over for whatever reason, but did not shut off the flashers and Stop sign for whatever reason, so even though we all stopped as we should have been, I discovered that there really wasn’t any reason to do so.

I waved everyone on, and we all drove past the stopped bus.

Now I know that some of these buses also have cameras, and if this is one of them, the camera will show that I—and about 30 or 40 cars behind me in both lanes—went past the flashers and the Stop sign on the bus.

But this time it was warranted, since we sat there following the rules for at least five minutes, and I hope that I do not get a ticket for going past this bus.

If I do get a ticket, this is one to fight, but on the other hand, the only proof I have that there was no one on the bus at the time was my own eyesight.

In fact, the bus driver should be the one fined, for not retracting the flashers and Stop sign—and thus, holding up traffic on both sides of a busy roadway—when he wasn’t even in the vehicle.

Let’s see what happens, but whatever the case, I know I did the right thing.

It Was Three Degrees, and Now, It is 53 Degrees … and Counting: The weather is just so strange in my neck of the woods.

On Saturday, when I woke up at about 6 a.m. it was all of three degrees on the thermometer, and after a scant snowfall last week, I thought that we had finally hit winter after an extremely mild stretch that had it feeling like spring through December and January and into early February.

But then, the next day, the temperature had catapulted to a balmy 43 degrees, and yesterday, it was 53 degrees, with the next week and a half forecast to be in the upper 40s and into the 50s.

This has been one of the mildest winners on record in my neck of the woods, and believe me, I am not complaining, as other areas have really been hit with horrid weather.

But it is funny; when will it finally be winter over here?

Let me quote the singing group that has an appropriate name in lieu of what I just spoke about—The Three Degrees—when I bring up one of their biggest hits in my question to Mother Nature about the lack of winter we have had thus far:

“When Will I See You Again?”

That is it for me today.

I can retire “Bits and Pieces” for another day after doing an uncharacteristic back-to-back.

Speak to you again tomorrow … but no more “Bits and Pieces” for now.

Rant #3,067: Bits and Pieces

Yes, it is time for another “Bits and Pieces” Blog post.

There are a few things that I want to talk about, but none of them deserve a full column’s view, so this format is better for me to voice my thoughts on a couple of issues.

So let’s begin the week with “Bits and Pieces.”

Here goes—

U.S. Shoots Down Chinese Spy Balloon: Does anyone really understand why this took so long to do, given the supposed facts that have been reported?

This spy balloon entered our environs last week, and had been buzzing around the midsection of our country for several days when finally, its mission was aborted when we shot the thing down.

I have several questions that have yet to be answered by anyone in our government:

How did this spy balloon enter our air space undetected?

Why was it allowed to continue on its course,, much of it over military installations, for as long as it did?

What data did it collect while it was flying around, and has whatever it collected been relayed back to China before it was finally obliterated?

Heck, the President of the United States doesn’t even have these answers and is bewildered as the rest of us are, as he had asked that the balloon be shot down days ago, and then was told that it couldn’t be shot down over land, as the debris could fall to the ground and put civilians in peril.

If you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you … or at least stock in a balloon company.

So we let this thing wander around our air space for a couple of days, gather whatever information it was sent here to gain, and then, after several days, we blow it out of the air?

Wouldn’t it have been a better plan if we got this thing out of the air before it was able to gather any information?

Again, I don’t think even the President understood all of this, and we are led to believe that he had had enough, and finally gave the word as our commander in chief that when the balloon was over water it would be removed, and that is exactly what happened.

We have people looking for the debris, but what damage has already been wrought by this thing which China called an “errant weather balloon” ,,, yes, one that was errant for thousands and thousands of miles and just happened to wander into our air space.

I think Americans need to not only question the Chinese for their tactics but question our own government about what the real reason is that it took so long to shoot this thing down from the sky.

Kyrie Irving Leaves Nets For Mavericks in a Trade He Demanded To Be Made: Late Friday afternoon, the basketball cancer known as Kyrie Irving demanded a trade from the Brooklyn Nets—who have coddled him through non-compliance with coronavirus shot indifference, anti-Semitic behavior and a whole lot of other bizarre instances—and they sent him to the Dallas Mavericks.

I wish the Mavs good luck, because they are going to really, really need it.

This basketball cancer—who has burned bridges in Cleveland, Boston and now Brooklyn—has more baggage than a busy train porter, and while he also has a world of talent, he is his own worst enemy, and he doesn’t really understand that what he says and does is so unprofessional and quite frankly, strange.

Kyrie Irving may now play for Dallas, but in actuality, he is an entity playing for himself.

He has no clue what being a team player is and leaves every organization he has been with in tatters because of his own crazy behavior.

The Nets might not be better on the court with this trade—which will certainly lead to Kevin Durant wondering what he got himself into in Brooklyn—but off the court, they have improved their situation 1 million percent by getting rid of this wart.

Another One of My Friends Enters “The Old Fogey Club”: I went to a 65th birthday party for a dear friend yesterday, and it was a really fun time for all, in particular this friend, who now joins me in this aforementioned “club.”

Baby boomers—once the young guns who were going to change the world and actually did do just that in many, many ways—are now the oldsters, and many of us are 65 years of age and beyond that number in 2023.

It is not easy being a member of this club, in particular when the news media looks at people over 50 years of age as being ancient.

But as Baby Boomers continue to mature, they will have to deal with us in one way or the other, but it remains a difficult task to realize that those of a certain age are now looked at as being old and decrepit.

My friend will be fine. He still has his job as a teacher, and he can pretty much write his own ticket as to how long he wants to continue to do this—he earned that right years ago.

But some of us “Old Fogeys” also earned that right, and also earned it years ago, but will not ever be able to exercise whatever benefits that right gives you, and those are the people that need the most help, because society isn’t going to bend over backwards to help such people.

And that is a real shame, because those people still have so much to offer the world … but go explain that to people who are in decision-making positions who are about half your age, if even that.

And that is the real “Old Fogey Club,” those of us who have been put into unnecessary and unwarranted shackles by people who claim to understand and to respect us, but prove that talk is cheap by stereotyping us as being on our death beds and won’t give us a break.

Shame on them all.

So that is the end of this installment of “Bits and Pieces.”

And this “Old Fogey” will speak to you again on Tuesday.