Rant #2,846: Bang Bang

Hey, it’s finally Friday!
 
One more day to go, and then we go into the weekend.
 
And today, my son and I will be getting our “booster” shots.
 
I put the word “booster” in quotes, because at least for the Pfizer shots, it is not a true booster; it is a third shot.
 
Honestly, I don’t think we need a third shot, I really don’t want a third shot, but we are getting it anyway.
 
“Why?” you might ask.
 
The only reason we are getting the shot is that my family and I are finally, after three years, planning a vacation this year during the summer.
 
It will be a car trip, since we bailed out on our cruise.
 
We will finally be venturing out of New York, going to other places, meeting up with other people, sleeping in hotel rooms along our route.
 
And that is the only reason we are going to get the shots.
 
Things are pretty much relaxed in our neck of the woods, with percentages way down, and we also don’t have to wear masks everywhere anymore.
 
I guess you can say that getting the third shot shows we are being extra careful, since again, it is the first time we will be venturing out of New York, and Long Island, in three years.
 
We don’t want anything to go wrong during the trip, so we will err on the side of caution, if you will, to make sure our trip goes well.
 
I know that millions of people will agree with my stance, while millions of others will disagree with me, and that is fine.
 
I think in the situation we are in, you have to make up your own mind what is right for you, and I did just that.
 
Not everyone is getting the so-called “boosters,” and I understand that entirely.
 
Two shots should be enough, and for me, the third shot will be the end of it for me.
 
Unless there is a valid reason to take another such shot, this will be it for me.
 
For my son, he is an adult, and he will make his own decision.
 
He is the one still working, still dealing with co-workers and others, so getting a shot beyond this shot—which, as you know, is being talked about—will be his decision entirely … or the decision of his employers, who requested that he show proof that he received the first two shots, but not the booster shot.
 
But for me, unless there is a valid reason to get another shot, I am done.
 
That is my decision, and it is also my decision to not tell anyone to get the third shot; that is your decision, too, and I am not going to tout this thing as something that you really should do.
 
And I hope that no one is forced to get the third shots; I do not believe in mandates, I believe in being realistic, and millions of Americans had to or were forced to get the initial two shots for one reason or another.
 
There is no such reason to get the booster shot; I am simply doing it not as a political stance, but because I have personal reasons for getting it.
 
As for the masks, I have been kind of weaning myself off of them for the past few weeks.
 
Some places I don’t wear then anymore—some supermarkets, the post office, a few other places—and some places I still wear the mask—some other supermarkets, some department stores, and in my son's sports activities.
 
Once I get the booster, the mask will come off in more places, until I get to the point where the only places I will wear the mask is where it is required, like doctors’ offices.
 
I think that that is the best way to do it for me … maybe not for you, but for me it is the best way.
 
Again, there is nothing political in what I am saying, these are decisions I have made for myself, not for you and not for anyone else, which, again, is that way it should be.
 
Nobody should be shamed in whatever decision they make. The Florida governor deriding those high school kids for wearing their masks at a press conference held the other day is completely unacceptable behavior by an adult who should know better.
 
So the bottom line is do what you feel is right for you, and I will do what I feel is right for me.
 
I still hold my stance that just about everyone is going to have to get the initial two doses of the shots one way or the other—I am not saying that is right, but I am being a realist—but beyond that, no one should be forced to do anything.
 
You make your own bed, and you will lie in it, for better or worse.
 
I will not be at my usual perch on Monday, as that day is going to be super busy one for me.
 
Not only do I have an early appointment on that day, but I also have a funeral to go to later on in the morning, so I am going to have to take that day off, but I will be back here on Tuesday.
 
Have a great weekend, and I will speak to you again not on Monday, but on Tuesday … with my third shot in my arm and without any major problems with it.

Rant #2,845: Who's Zoomin' Who?

Hey, it’s March 3!
 
Time to get up and check your account to see if your Social Security money is in there yet.
 
Yes, that is what this semi-retired person does each third day of the month, when the government pays me to be retired, or in my case, kind of retired.
 
The money goes in, and then I wait another month for my next payment.
 
It is just such fun to be retired and only have to worry about your money being where it should be!
 
And what makes it even more exciting for me is that this is the final month that I will have my money go into my account with just my taxes taken out—yes, you do pay tax on your Social Security money.
 
Starting next month, and on April Fool’s Day, the first day of April no less, I will be officially on Medicare, and that payment will be taken out of the money I get from the government too!
 
Oh, how happy I am!
 
Well, I am … kinda.
 
Even though I don’t like the money being taken out—which went up about $30 this year, wiping out whatever historic cost of living increase that people on Social Security received—it also means that I can dump the stop-gap insurance that I had to get after my wife retired in November.
 
For roughly five months, I needed health insurance to fill in the gap between the period I was dropped from her insurance after she retired to the time that I could start Medicare, as I was not eligible for Medicare when I retired because I was too young, and I am still too young at age 64.
 
Anyway, due to Obamacare—another story for another time—I had to go through New York State’s “New York State of Health” web site to get this stop-gap insurance for myself, which is exactly what I did, but there were so many variables attached to his insurance that I did not know about even though I did the right thing by getting it.
 
First off, no matter what plan you choose, what they give you is absolutely horrible. Just let me say that God forbid you get really sick using this insurance, you are in major, major trouble. The deductibles are ridiculous, and what they provide is really the most basic of care, and nothing more, so it is about 20 steps down from what I had when I was insured by my wife’s health insurance.
 
Second is that while New York State will help you out in paying for this insurance—the monthly premiums are completely ridiculous—you get hit later on when you do your taxes.
 
This is a little complicated, so let me explain this as best I can.
 
The state takes a lot of information into account when they decide how much they are going to give you as a monthly stipend to help pay for this over-inflated insurance.
 
They take into account such things as family income and where you live as determinants about what they will give you each month, and it can change as your circumstances change, as mine did as we went from 2021 into 2022, as my wife had a salary from her job for most of 2021 but will have no salary for 2022, and thus, our family income diminished, allowing me to have New York State uptick what they were giving me as a stipend, or credit, for my insurance.
 
However, what they don’t tell you is that while New York State recognizes this monthly credit for what it is, a stipend to help you pay for your health insurance, the federal government does not think the same way as the state does, and looks at that stipend as earned income.
 
That’s right, as earned income, and as with any income, you have to pay taxes on that money that New York State gives you to help you to pay for your health insurance!
 
So if you live in New York State and see all those happy people in the New York State of Health commercial with their toothy grins telling you that they pay nothing for their health insurance, I am sure those grins turn to frowns when tax time comes and they learn that yes, they DO pay for this insurance through their federal taxes.
 
And what is worse, nobody tells you this when you apply for your insurance. The accountant my family used was the one who gave us this bad news, and it added onto our federal tax that we had to pay.
 
Besides that, you can't always use your regular doctors with this type of insurance, and not only that, but you have to be on top of the errors that New York State of Health and your new insurance company will inevitably make on your insurance, and you will sit on the phone for hours trying to rectify those mistakes, just like I had to do.
 
So you add everything up, and you will see why I am looking forward to Medicare, which just has to be better than what I have right now.
 
Not only my wife is on Medicare in my family, but my son is, too, because of his disabled status, and at least with my son, I have seen how Medicare works, and at least for him, it has worked out just fine.
 
I can only hope for the same outcome for myself and my wife, but there always seems to be a fly in the ointment to ruin things.
 
But I have to keep a positive attitude—
 
Medicare, here I come—
 
And on April Fool’s Day yet! 

Rant #2,844: Hair

Well, baseball done did it.
 
The sides put the season on hold while they bicker about billions of dollars.
 
Not a smart move for both sides, who in their final statements until they meet again—whenever that is—both finally included the word “fans” in their words that they used to tell reporters where they were in this mess.
 
Somehow, both sides think that the fans will benefit from their bickering, but I must be awful stupid, because I don’t see where the fans are anywhere in their thoughts at all, because if the fans were in their thoughts, this thing would have either been settled or at least negotiations would take place until it was settled.
 
And then to see the supposed baseball commissioner, Rob Manfred, biding his time perfecting his golf swing as if he hadn’t a care in the world …
 
No, the fans are not in his thoughts, they are not in the players’ thoughts, they are only in their own thoughts at this point.
 
So, since the fans are not part of this, I will do my own part in this mess, and that is, I will refuse to write anything more about Major League Baseball from here on in, until there is a settlement or some type of armistice on this nonsense.
 
The end for me. I have better things to write about.
 
Let’s start right now …
 
During this past weekend, when I had time to watch some television, I chanced on the always interesting Decades channel, a retro channel that my service provider recently brought back to our channel selections.
 
They had an interesting weekend set of programs, all revolving around Sally Field, the Oscar-winning actress who pretty much grew up before us on network television and then went onto greater heights as one of our favorite movie stars.
 
Yes, they showed the usual fare you would get with a Sally Field “binge” including “Gidget,” the jumping off point of her career, and her next move, the always fun “The Flying Nun.”
 
Those two shows were to be expected to be included in the binge, but surprise! surprise! her third sitcom before she made the major movie to the movies was also shown, and honestly, I hadn’t seen these shows since they were originally on NBC in 1973 … like most people, I kind of forgot they ever existed.
 
“The Girl With Something Extra” ran for about one season in 1973, and it didn’t do well,, even though besides Field, it had a really good cast with really good hair including John Davidson and Teri Garr—right before she went onto her own movie stardom.
 
But Field was the centerpiece of the show, as a 20-something woman who had extra-sensory perception—yes ESP—and could literally read the minds of close people around her, including her husband.
 
Included in the short binge—just a few hours of shows—was the pilot episode which set up what was thought to be the entire idea for the sitcom—and another episode which I will get to in a moment.
 
In the pilot episode—which was probably the best entry in the show’s about 20-episode run—Sally and John—yes, they used their real first names—met, had a short courtship, and got married, but John only found out while on their wedding night that his wife had ESP and could read every thought he had in his mind … including sexual ones.
 
Yes, this was not “Gidget,” and this was certainly not “The Flying Nun.”
 
You could see how Field was attracted to this show.
 
On “Gidget,” she played a high schooler who was just discovering the opposite sex, and they discovering her, and it was all done in above-board 1960s sitcom parlance where nothing went beyond a kiss and a hug.
 
But even though “The Flying Nun” was a huge success, Field belt strangled by the role, because it was not only a gimmick show, but she was a 20-something who was dressed in nun’s garb, and while there were suggestions of sort of a “third-person romance” between her and Carlos Ramirez, the Puerto Rican playboy played by Alejandro Rey, they couldn’t really act on that, not with Field as a nun.
 
Fast forward to 1973 after Field played on “Alias Smith and Jones” as one of the cast of that Western, but not the star, and you could see where the new “openness" of American TV, spurred on by “All in the Family,” certainly intrigued her when she read the script for this new show.
 
Anyway, moving from teen to nun to non-star of a show back to the star of a show where she played the All-American wife—even with a little bit of a gimmick—probably greatly interested her as a natural progression in heir TV career, but it didn’t interest many others.
 
The show was given the prime time slot after “Sanford and Son” on Friday nights, but it was cancelled because the ratings dip from one show to this show was incredible.
 
It was not a good pairing starting off the night with the wild comedy of Redd Foxx to this show, which was sort of “That Girl”-ish if that show had moved on to another season where Don and Ann actually got married.
 
In fact, in trying to save the show, the producers dropped the ESP angle in later episodes, and went for a strict “young-marrieds-with-great hair” motif as the show progressed into cancellation.
 
The later episodes of the show were pretty lame, and just think … if this show had been successful, Field might not have ever taken the giant step into the movies, so this program, even though it is pretty much forgotten, is a major footnote on her career.
 
And back to the shows … when they abruptly dropped the ESP angle, the shows really weren’t very good, but there was one episode which stands out as sort of a footnote of a footnote of a footnote.
 
In one of the later episodes, Don Knotts guest starred as a bumbling fellow, a guy who had absolutely no confidence in himself, but even with that type of problem, he saves Sally from falling into a ditch that she didn’t see while walking on the street.
 
They strike up a friendship, and one thing leads to another, and Sally and John invite Knotts’ character to a picnic to try to boost his ego with a girl who was, well, let’s say she had a questionable background portrayed on a G-rated show, and the actress portraying that character just happened to be Teri Garr.
 
Anyway, one thing leads to another, and Sally and John find out that Knotts’ character actually has a fiancée that he chickens out on marrying, a pretty blond who is actually very much like the Knotts character with her total lack of confidence.
 
That character is played by Arlene Golonka, who you might remember was a regular on the final years of “The Andy Griffith Show” when Knotts wasn’t there anymore and later was one of the stars of the show spinoff “Mayberry R.F.D.” where Knotts actually made one guest appearance as his old character Barney Fife.
 
Anyway, the two characters finally marry, and so this quasi-“The Andy Griffith Show”/”Mayberry R.F.D.” reunion takes flight on the show that drove Fields into the movie star we all know and love today.
 
I also later found out that many of the episodes of “The Girl With Something Extra” are on YouTube, and they are worth checking out, if for nothing else than to see Field, who is as cute as ever on this show, try to fight herself out of the paper bag of a bad show.
 
She is that good, the show wasn’t, but it was an important rung up the ladder for the actress …
 
And it certainly is better watching this than baseball, which has become a  “Waiting For Godot” thing that I would think that most people are not in the mood for right now.

Rant #2,843: Crying

It is March 1, and it is April Fool’s Day one month early for baseball fans, who woke up today hoping for an end to the baseball lockout, but simply woke up to hear of a new deadline for an agreement—or else.
 
Both sides are as selfish as can be, both sides are crying about the cutting up of a multi-billion-dollar pot, and while they cry over this, people are dying in the Ukraine, we have just been through the worst pandemic in a century, and some people don’t know where to turn for their next meal.
 
How they can look themselves in the mirror each morning and not realize that they live on some other planet with their behavior is beyond my comprehension and what’s worse, the irreparable damage that they are doing to the national pastime with their infantile cries won’t ever go away when they finally work this thing out.
 
People are enraged as it is with the situation we are going through now, so do you think they are going to give a pass to these spoiled brats?
 
What’s worse, I don’t believe either side cares one hoot about the fans—the people that pay their salaries—and thus, both owner and player have forgotten where they were before they were successful, they have completely forgotten where they came from, and I simply do not know how they are going to reconcile to the fans when this thing is over and done with.
 
Look, we fans are often stupid about such things, and many of us will run back to the stadiums as if nothing ever happened, and will spend gobs of money when we are at the games as if we have the same endless barrel of cash as the owners and players do.
 
But then, there are some fans who won’t forget.
 
If you remember the home run barrage of several years ago featuring the likes of Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa and Barry Bonds, that got people into seats after another nasty situation between owners and players.
 
But we found out years later that this was artificially created excitement, when we found out that these and other players were using Performance Enhancing Drugs (PEDs) to make their performance unworldly.
 
So we were taken advantage of then, but I don’t think that we can be taken advantage of now in the same way.
 
People won’t forget this time, and you can’t pull the wool over their eyes like what happened way back when.
 
Fans can be stupid, but not that stupid.
 
And what happens if this thing doesn’t get settled by 5 p.m. today, the new drop-dead date and time set by the owners—led by the worst commissioner since William Eckert, Bob Manfred?
 
What happens to baseball if that deadline is not met?
 
You are looking at games being canceled, and who does that really hurt?
 
Sure, the players would not get paid for these games, but honestly, even though they certainly won't admit it, they have plenty of money to survive such a situation.
 
I remember years ago, during another work stoppage, they actually had a picket line with wealthy players marching on it as if the loss of pay was going to make them homeless, and one player—Lou Whittaker of the Tigers—actually had the nerve to march on the line wearing a full length fur coat, which I am sure probably cost him as much as some pay yearly for their mortgage.
 
The canceling of games hurts the peripheral people who work these games, like the ticket takers, the vendors selling beer in the stands, the people working food service behind the food counters, those types of people—
 
Who depend on this money to pay for rent, pay for school, pay for food … you know, the Average Joes of the world.
 
That is who this whole shebang really is hurting, not the owners and the players.
 
It is hurting the municipalities who house these stadiums, because who is going to come to their stores to shop before and after games that don’t exist?
 
And maybe most importantly, it is hurting the kids who look forward to these games, live and eat and sleep baseball, who look at the players as heroes and could give a hoot about the owners.
 
The thing about kids is that they will find other things to occupy their time, and it won’t be baseball.
 
That is who this is hurting, not the players or the owners who could care less about the little guy in this mess they have created by themselves and for themselves.
 
And again, once this gets settled, I just don’t know how the game is going to win back the fans again.
 
Free admittance? Free food? Free inoculations?
 
I just don’t know, and I just don’t get it at all.
 
And the cherry on top was yesterday as Derek Jeter, an owner and executive with the Marlins, resigned his post and gave up his ownership, pretty much stating that he did not like the direction his team was going in.
 
I think that this is a smokescreen for the real reason he gave it all up.
 
Jeter was a hero to not just Yankee fans, but he was a players’ players widely respected by teammate and adversary alike on the ball field.
 
He was now on the other side of the line as an owner, and he just could not handle the fact that now, he, as a Hall of Fame player, was on the other side, and he simply could not handle that now, he was on the side of the owners, fighting the players tooth and nail for this big ball of wax.
 
So he used an excuse because he, as a former player and current owner, was really stuck in the middle of this thing, certainly at least understanding what the players wanted but now powerless to do anything about it as Manfred led his contingent of owners, which Jeter was part of.
 
Jeter certainly was conflicted, and couldn’t handle it, so he gave it all up.
 
Maybe the fans should follow his lead and give it all up, too.