Don't worry, about a thing. Just avoid the bad hand sanitizers.

It's hard now to recall the exact timeline for the end of before time. 

When did we start panicking about hand sanitizer? When did we start haunting Etsy to find masks? What was the last time we went out to dinner? When were the t.p. shortages? When did paper towels disappear from the shelves? Etc. 

I'm pretty sure face mask meshugas was early April. That the last supper out was in early March. And that hand sanitizer was the first harbinger of what was to come. So I'll peg it to February. 

In drips and drabs, in onesies and twosies, I ended up with plenty of hand sanitizer. Some is CVS brand. Some is Purell. I have a couple of small bottles of Meyer's that I got at the hardware store. A few larger bottles - one from my sister Trish, one from my friend Joe, one I found on my own. 

For Easter - when we thought we were going to be getting together for dinner to celebrate a religious holiday, even though we're all atheists; but, family - I had ordered a bunch of cute little birdie hand sanitizers. Three little birds! Don't worry, about a thing. 'Cause every little thing's, gonna be alright. 

We never got together for family Easter, but I've seen everyone since, and they've all gotten their party favor. (Nice touch: in the bottom, there are little wipes. Not so nice: disappointingly, the aqua ones were sold out, so I had to settle for white and gray.)

During the period when I was accumulating all these hand sanitizers, two things were happening.

First, I was a whirlwind sanitizer. Just not so much with hand sanitizers. 

No Clorox wipes? No problem. I made my own daily mix of bleach and water to spray on my doorknobs, kitchen counters, faucets. (You need to make it daily or thereabouts, because bleach loses its effectiveness fast.)

When I got back from a walk - even if I didn't touch a thing while I was out - I soaked my keys in isopropyl alcohol.

I use alcohol wipes to wipe down my glasses, my phone, and the ID I carried in my pocket. (For whatever reason, alcohol wipes, which never seemed to fall out of supply.)

And although I didn't go anywhere, I didn't go anywhere without a bottle of hand sanitizer in my pocket.

But, the second thing is this: As it turns out that, because I don't go anywhere, I don't really use much hand sanitizer.

I wash my hands a lot, surgical scrub to Happy Birthday or Thunder Road, using whatever liquid hand soap I have around. And I have quite a supply.

When I'm in a store, and there's a sanitizer dispenser, I'll take a squirt. But mostly, I don't use hand sanitizer. And I really don't need it. 

I suppose that if I ever do get out of the house for something other than a grocery or drugstore run, if I ever need to use a public restroom, I'll be happy to have my supply. But right about now, that supply I do have is looking almost lifetime.

Since most of what I have is Purell or Purell wannabe from CVS, I'm not worried about whether it's any good.

But the FDA is doing some worrying for all of us, and they've identified 135 versions of hand sanitizer that are no good, and they're urging us hand sanitizing types to avoid them.

...because they lack a sufficient level of alcohol to kill germs or because they contain dangerous and potentially deadly levels of wood alcohol...Many of the products’ labels say they contain ethanol (also known as ethyl alcohol) but FDA tests show that they contain methanol, or wood alcohol...

Methanol can be toxic when absorbed through the skin, the agency said in an advisory, and can cause blindness. It can be lethal if ingested. (Source: WaPo)

What doesn't make you stronger can kill you?

Anyway, because some of the products are improperly labeled, it's tough for consumers to figure out which ones to avoid. And it's especially worrisome that they've been sold at reputable stores, like BJ's, Costco and Walmart. For the most part, the pisspoor hand sanitizers are being produced by those that are new to the game. They're first time sanitizers that have "failed to ensure rigorous product quality."

A handful of people have died, and dozens hospitalized, from ingesting hand sanitizer that contains methanol. No, they're not all following the Prime Directive issued from the Oval Office. Some of those who've died are alcoholics. Which doesn't make it a good thing, just a more understandable one. (This reminds me of a guy my husband and I saw lying in a gutter in South Boston on the day of the St. Patrick's Day parade. This was way back, before liquor stores were open on Sundays. Anyway, the poor bastard was there, clutching a bottle of Listerine. Which reminded us of the scene in the movie Everything You Wanted to Know About Sex in which a shepherd, distraught over his unrequited love for one of his charges, ends up in the gutter guzzling from a bottle of Woolite.) And if someone's gone blind, or been killed, thanks to mislabeled hand sanitizer, I'm thinking law suit time. 

The FDA also advises Americans to be wary of products that claim to be “FDA-approved,” as none exist, or say they provide protection for “up to 24 hours.”

Got it!

Meanwhile, I'm good at the moment. If you want to see the list of the must avoids, here  you go.  

That schwein is a real lausbube

Let's ignore for a sec all the dead, the dying, and the really, really sick. And their loved ones. Because, of course, what people who've caught the bad version of COVID are going through is a lot worse than the rest of us not being able to do "stuff". And let's ignore for a sec all the economic damage that's been wrought, all these lost jobs, all those out-of-business companies.

Admittedly, those are pretty big things to ignore.

But still, there's no ignoring that here are a lot of things that we're missing out of - all pretty much filed under normalcy - thanks to the disastrous national non-response to the pandemic.

And it rankles even more because the countries that actually did something about the pandemic are a little closer to getting back to normalcy than we are.

Like the volks in Germany who are able to get out there and go skinny dipping. And the volks who just hang out at the skinny dipping beaches and get to witness some truly out-there fun.

In case you missed it, a German fellow:

... was sunbathing naked at the Teufelssee in west Berlin, a popular and perfectly legal practice in the German capital as part of what is known as FKK, or Freikörperkultur (free body culture). (Source: The Guardian) Not that I miss nude sunbathing. I don't, so I don't. But if I were a naturist, living in Berlin, it would be kind of tempting to let it all hang out on the shores of Lake Devil.

The wild boar, sightings of which have become increasingly common, had apparently spotted a pizza being eaten by other bathers. It seized a yellow bag containing the man’s laptop, probably believing it to contain food, and was chased by the man into the undergrowth.

As my late, liebchen mutter might say, Ach du lieber strohsack. (Which translates to "oh you dear mattress." Or straw sack. Perhaps you had to be there.)

I love the onlookers, a combo of nude and unnude, just kind of sitting there, looking on. No one seems unduly alarmed by a big old boar charging by. Maybe she didn't seem all that threatening, given that she had a couple of piglets in tow. Or maybe it was the bag she was making off with.

As for laptop at the beach? While nude? I wonder if this is the Berliner version of working from home without having any pants on.

The guy giving chase clapped his hands, then - having chased the boar into the forest abutting the lake - found a stick that he hit the ground with. This startled the boar into dropping the laptop, which the naturist was then able to recover.

I will note that the woman who took the pictures just didn't go ahead and post them on Facebook in hopes of going viral at someone else's expense. No, Adele Landauer, not wanting to embarrass the somewhat zaftig schwein-chaser, actually asked if it was okay:

“I showed the man the photos, he laughed heartily and gave me permission to make them public.”

Hard to imagine either end of that happening in the States.

Other than the envy that the Germans can live their best lives, clothed or nude, while we're stuck at home wearing our masks, pretty much everything about this story makes me smile. The pot-belly middle-aged guy who's not embarrassed to be seen in public looking like that. The kindly photographer. The audience rooting the man in hot pursuit on. (He got quite an ovation when he caught up with his laptop.)

And, of course, the schwein herself. She's what my mother might have called a lausbube - a little rascal.

I do wonder what the guy would have done if the boar had gotten away with his laptop. Especially if it had been a work device. Imagine explaining to your boss, "Well, I was nude bathing at Lake Devil, and a wild boar - thinking it was pizza - grabbed the bag holding my laptop." Talk about the dog ate my lunch.

Anyway, not that this story is exactly normalcy, but we're missing out on so much normalcy this summer, it's good to have a fun story to read.

------------------------------------------------------------
Danke to my sister Kath who first spotted this pig tale.

Oh How Well the Mighty Have Fallen

In my much, much younger days, I was a close observer of the rise of the televangelist. Jimmy Swaggart. Jimmy and Tammy Faye Bakker (rhymes with faker). Oral Roberts. Pat Robertson. Robert Schuller. As cradle Catholic atheists, my husband and I were completely fascinated by these pious frauds, with their phony smiles, their crocodile tears, their outstretched hands. Always the outstretched hands.

Sometimes we'd turn on the spooky George Vandeman, a Seventh Day Adventists who preached the gospel of vegetarianism. (His descriptions of the slaughter of animals, especially - as I recall from a distance of over 40 years - calves for veal were quite something. Old George almost but not quite turned us off of meat. All these years later I still pause at veal on the menu, and generally skip to chicken.)

Anyway, on Sunday mornings, we'd often catch a couple of acts.

Our favorites soon emerged: Leroy Jenkins and Jerry Falwell.

Leroy Jenkins was a faith healer who was something of an Elvis lookalike, and his shows always featured him singing a few gospel tunes, Elvis-style. And, of course, selling his "miracle water" drawn from his well in Delaware, Ohio, and at one point found to contain coliform bacteria. (What doesn't cure you will kill you?) He was such an obvious conman, but a fascinating one. 

Jim and I once scheduled a weekend in New York to coincide with a Jenkins' revival meeting at Madison Square Garden that featured an appearance of none other than Dale Evans, cowgirl wife of Roy Rogers. The main draw was Jenkins' "healing" powers. Oh, boy. What we thought would be amusing to watch turned out to be astoundingly depressing. The shills and those looking for a cure who were mobile and had no obvious sign of affliction were seated in a roped off area - the only area Jenkins got anywhere near to. He'd pull folks out of this section, lay hands on, shout "be thou made whole" and, voila, a miracle! 

Those in real need of a miracle were ignored, even though they were threaded throughout the audience, the people with then waving their arms and hollering, trying to get Jenkins attention, trying to get closer to the man, only to be pushed back by security thugs. A woman near us was standing in the aisles, her blind husband hanging on to her, while she desperately called Jenkins' name.

We didn't last long after that. 

(By no means alone among the Elmer Gantry crowd, Jenkins did some time in prison for fraud. He had several marriages, and the last one was a lulu. In 2001 he married an elderly woman - widowed just three weeks prior to the blessed nuptials - who had recently won $6M in the Ohio lottery. The marriage (not surprisingly) was annulled.)

And then there was Jerry Falwell, smug and overstuffed. Moral Majoritarian. Soul winner. (His term.) Founder of Liberty Baptist College.

When I first knew of Jerry Falwell, the school was just being founded as Liberty Baptist College, and was pretty rinky-dink. Now it's all grown up and now it's Liberty University, a school that's highly regarded in conservative circles. Falwell the elder was definitely on to something. Today, LU has 100,000 students (albeit the vast majority of them are online - pre-COVID online).

It almost goes without saying that, when Falwell came to Boston, Jim and I went to hear him speak. Very right wing - twice, I began typing "white wing" - and suffocating. But interesting. One of the giveaways was something called the Bicentennial Bible. (Actually, you had to make a small pledge to get one, so we put down a pledge in the name of a friend, which was the kind of thing I thought was funny back then. It remained funny for a couple of years - at least to us - as they kept sending notices to him asking for the money.) 

I can't remember all the details of the Bicentennial Bible, but it was a pretty extreme combo of religion and American history. Not quite as bad as having the Founding Fathers, in knee britches and powdered wigs, at the Last Supper. But almost.

Whatever else Falwell believed, he was a solid believer in nepotism. He bequeathed the pulpit at his mega-church to one son, and to his namesake - Jerry Falwell, Jr. - he left the presidency of Liberty University.

Unlike his father - however repugnant I found Jerry Sr. personally, he did appear to be a pillar of rectitude - Jerry Jr. is a bit of a libertine, leading a life that doesn't quite jibe with the Liberty University rep. Among the scandals he's been involved with are noise about him engaging in inappropriate sexual banter, sharing shall we say unwholesome pics of his wife, nightclubbing in Florida, and something to do with him, his wife, and a pool boy. 

There's also a rumor that he was blackmailed into lending his name to the Trump campaign in 2016. With Falwell's backing, permission was more or less given to evangelists to vote for man with such a disreputable past and with zero to do with (and zero understanding of) Christianity. This was supposedly in exchange for Trump's then-fixer, Michael Cohen, making some bad news about Junior disappear.

To me, Jerry Falwell Jr. is a creepy, hypocritical sleaze, inauthentic. A conman. 

But with his latest hi-jinks, the con is up at least for now, as he's has been forced out of his post as Liberty University's president. 

The wrongful act straw that broke the Liberty U back was a picture he posted on social media. The picture, taken on a yacht, showed him with a drink - he claims it was "black water" meant to look like a rum coke - in hand, and his arm around a younger woman who is not his wife. Bad enough. But in the picture, both he and his gal-pal have their pants unzipped and partially pulled down (below the belly button). It's not a dick pic, but it does show the top of his underwear. (Looks to be a brief not boxer kind of guy. He may even wear hip huggers.)

Not the sort of picture you want going out on social media when you head up an ultra-conservative institution that has strict dress codes and forbids things like drinking, dancing, and kissing. There was a quasi-apology, excuse-a-rama from Falwell. The picture was taken out of context. (The context: costume party making fun of some Canadian TV show about trailer trash.) The woman was his wife's assistant. It was all in fun. He's sorry he embarrassed the young woman. Yadayadayada. 

Not good enough for the University's board of trustees, and Jerry Junior was forced to go on indefinite leave. (Interesting that Oral Roberts had anointed his son Richard to succeed him as president of the eponymous Oral Roberts University. Richard was forced out due to allegations of financial improprieties.)

Oh, I'm sure Jerry Falwell Jr. will take a bit of time off - maybe hang out with the pool boy on that yacht - and then come back a new man. Contrite, right with the Lord. Etc. Maybe he'll wind up somewhere doing time in what we can only hope and pray are the waning days of the Trump administration.

Jerry Falwell Senior must be rolling over in his grave...

There's a pandemic on, so I thought I'd do a bit of my bit

I just hopped off of Etsy, where I ordered a few more facemasks for myself. I figure the wearin' o' the mask will continue well into next year, and by then my store of masks will be looking pretty shabby. I go out for a walk every day, so I'm going through seven masks a week that I have to hand launder. The same drag we used to experience back in the day when we all wore pantyhose.

There are, of course, something like 42 billion facemask choices out there, but I decided to focus my search on masks for holidays. Coming my way will be a couple of Halloween masks (for covid, not trick or treat costumes) and a few Christmas ones. Come October, I'll have a candy corn mask and a spider web one. In December, I'll be sporting my new snowflake and holly masks, and this retro look one that's particularly cute:

Then there's the nice summery-looking mask I saw on a store window on Charles Street. I may stop by later today to pick it up.

I have a few fancy (i.e., not black or white) masks already - a Red Sox mask and a couple (butterflies, plaid) that my sister Trish made for me when we were just starting to mask up, and we were all beginning to panic. That was in the just after before time, and I was ratcheting back and forth between an old bandanna and something I managed to craft up for myself using a linen napkin and rubber bands.

Mostly this summer I've been wearing white cotton masks that look kind of like the bras I wore in high school. Before that, I was mostly doing the black mask thing. I've also got a couple of gaiters, and a package of disposable masks. 

There's a pandemic on, don't you know, and I'm doing my bit for the common health and the economy by making sure I've got enough masks.

Admittedly, before I hopped on Etsy just now, I already had a decent number. But I've been getting sick and tired of the same old, same old, mask-wise, and I'll be happy to refresh my stockpile. Plus spread a bit of holiday comfort and joy, come the fall, come the winter. 

Mask production, as it turns out, is one of the few economic bright spots of the pandemic economy.

There's a company in Chelsea, just outside of Boston, that was making those canvas-over-steel-frame carts used for storage in warehouses and on factory floors, and for shuttling things around on trade-show floors (which is where I've used them). Business slowing down, Steele Canvas retooled and began producing face masks. Because of this, they've been able to keep their entire staff on. They've even brought on a few new employees. Their masks are sold by Crate and Barrel, among others. 

Steele Canvas is not alone.

With about half of U.S. states now requiring that masks be worn in public and most large retailers and grocery stores mandating them in their stores, masks are not just helping keep coronavirus at bay — they are providing a financial lifeline to many small businesses that might otherwise be looking into the abyss.

Companies are stitching them on repurposed manufacturing lines in New England and 3-D-printing them at workshops in California. Hundreds of Etsy entrepreneurs have stopped sewing bags and table linens and switched to full-time mask production. (Source: WaPo)

Etsy is, not surprisingly, a treasure trove, a garden of earthly delights, for mask seekers. 

When I was in mask panic mode in late March/early April - before masks were recommended, let alone required, but when the handwriting was on the wall and it said MASKS! - Etsy was everyone's go-to, but most of the masks on offer were utilitarian. Now there is seemingly infinite choice. (I've already gone back to look at the Christmas masks and - damn - except for the 1960's retro mask, I could have done better.)

You name it, you can probably find the mask of your dreams out there. Penguins (generic)? Check! Penguins (Pittsburgh)? Check! Hydrangeas? Check! Hot dogs? Check! Superman? Check! Super Mario? Check!

Okay. There's not one for everything imaginable. I came up short on Casablanca. But if you're a Sopranos fan, and you're willing to wear a mask with a cartoon of a naked woman on it - make that near-naked: she's wearing pasties - you can order the Bada Bing!

One vendor is even selling masks that she dyes with home-grown lavender and indigo.  

The WaPo article also talked about Ministry of Supply, a way-cool techie clothing company that's based in Boston. I've walked by their store on Newbury Street hundreds of times, but I've never been in. Too techie. Too millennial. Too skinny girl. But they do sell hi-tech masks. I was thinking of dropping in and buying one, but I checked online and their masks go for $50/per. 

Hmmm. I can get a handful of Etsy masks for that amount. Maybe I'll go back and look for something Thanksgiving-related.

I'm guessing we'll be wearing masks well into 2021, if not well beyond. 

So, masks.

And buying those facemasks, I'm at least doing a bit of my bit to save the people, save myself, and save the economy. Looking so forward to my new stock of Etsy masks arriving. 

75 Years Later

Sometimes I just don't get why atom bombs - and later nuclear weapons - were considered worse than conventional means of warfare.

Yes, tens of thousands of (largely civilian) Japanese civilians died as the result of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. 

But thousands of civilians were killed in the Dresden fire bombing six months earlier. Even more died during the course of the Blitz. It's estimated that nearly 4 million civilians in China were killed by Japanese operations during World War II. Overall, 80 million souls were killed during that war, 50 million+ were civilians. 

War is always hell. Twentieth century war was even heller due in no small part to the ability to use bombs to kill masses of people without having to look them in the eye. They're all weapons of mass destruction.

But the A-Bomb...

All those people killed in a fell swoop. Their cities leveled. Survivors suffering hideous aftermath effects from radiation exposure. A weapon of truly massive destruction.

I'm on the side of believing that the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki hastened the end of the war, and prevented a tremendous number of American casualties. (One of them could have been my father. He was in the Navy, and if the war had lasted long enough, his understanding was that he would have deployed to the Pacific. As things turned out, he ended out the war at Navy Pier in Chicago, doing Navy paperwork and dating my mother.)

Most believe that, without the demonstration of Allied power and will, the Japanese people would have suicidally fought to a very bitter end. Throughout my childhood, there were occasional stories of Japanese soldiers surfacing in the Pacific 10, 15, 20 years after the war had ended. Even well into the 1970's. There was even a story of two soldiers emerging from the jungle in 2005, 60 years after the war had ended. Surrender unthinkable, they'd soldiered-on in solitary non-battle on remote Pacific islands, eventually emerging, shaggy and a bit crazy. 

It was reasonable to fear that the Japanese military would never give up, and that they'd drag the cultish elements of the population down with them.

Still, the stories of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are horrific, the images haunting. Even after these 75 years. (Hiroshima was August 6th, Nagasaki, August 9th.) 

The stuff of history.

Little Boy. Fat Man. 

The bombs had names. Amusing ones. 

The plane used to bomb Hiroshima, had a name, too. Pretty and feminine, Enola Gay. Named for the pilot's mother. Awww...

I had to look up the other plane. Bockscar. (Bock's Car.) Named for the plane's original pilot. Witty. A play on his name, a play on train names (Box Car).

The Hiroshima bombing took place 75 years ago today. Nagasaki, 75 years ago this coming Sunday.

We haven't learned much. War is still hell. 

But I'll say this about those bombings: except for testing, no one's set off a nuclear bomb since...

 

Don't let no pandemic stop ya! As planned, The Wild Ones are coming to Sturgis, SD. (And Laconia, NH.)

If you're not doing anything, this weekend, it's not too late for you to hop on your bike and gun down I-90 for 30 hours or so - a straight shot - until you get to Sturgis, South Dakota. Where, from August 7th through the 16th, the 80th annual Sturgis Motorcycle Rally is being held. Pandemic, be damned!

While they're not expecting the 750,000 souls who vroomed into town in 2015 for the 75th anniversary event - and I've forgotten: is 75th anniversary leather, rubber, or tailpipe? - they are anticipating a quarter of a million attendees.

The city of Sturgis had considered canceling the Rally, but they figured that the riders would show up anyway. So they voted to hold it in hopes that they could at least keep some control. A couple of events have been canceled, including the opening ceremony when, I believe, everyone rides into town (which must be something to behold, if not to actually have to listen to), and a B1 bomber flyover. 

The city will be taking precautions, setting up dispensers for hand-washing, and will be scouring the downtown each evening. (The Rally website itself has little by way of COVID info, other than a link to the South Dakota state tracker, so attendees can figure out just what they're riding into.)

But it looks like most of the show will go on. Including the entertainment, from groups like Hairball, Saliva, and Flaw. 

Not that I would ever in a billion years have been drawn to an event that involved 250,000 bikers sharing porta-potties, but I'm sure for those who go every year it's an absolute blast. Hairball! Saliva! Flaw! 

And it would have been truly awful for the small businesses of Sturgis who count on the Rally for a good portion of their income to have the week canceled. Still, the idea of 250,000 folks converging on this small town - most of who I suspect (with my coastal elite snobbery) think masks are for pansies - and then shooting back home to all 50 states... Ugh... All those leather-clad disease vectors, heading down the highway, lookin' for adventure.

Closer to home, Laconia, NH will also be hosting their annual Motorcyle Week from August 22nd through August 30th. It's even older than Sturgis. This year will be it's 97th edition. 

It doesn't seem like it would have been his thing, but I'm wondering whether my father ever went up their in the 1930's when he was a young single guy with an Indian Motorcyle.

He's not in this picture, but motorcycling racing wouldn't have been outside of his wheelhouse at all. Too bad there's no one left to ask!

Anyway, this year's Laconia was postponed to an August date, but it's going happen. (Didn't get a list of all the bands that are coming, other than Bad Marriage...) There are, of course, COVID caveats in place:

“The emphasis on this year’s Laconia Motorcycle Week will be on safety,” says Deputy Director, Jennifer Anderson. “While we recognize that New Hampshire is faring remarkably better than most in this pandemic, many riders will be coming from out of state and we want to ensure the public we are taking every precaution to protect their safety, such as promoting the use of face masks when not riding, regular sanitization of public surfaces through sanitization experts, Nano Coating Technologies, LLC (NCT NH), and purposely planning for a toned down version of our rally to minimize large gatherings. Expect lots of fun, food and, of course, riding but in a safe environment.”

"A toned down version" of a motorcycle rally is likely to still be fairly raucous. And keep in mind that New Hampshire is the Live Free or Die state. Hope a lot of the bikers don't decide to head into Boston unmasked, unhelmeted, on their way home. 

And whether they're heading to Sturgis or Laconia, I hope they remember that final lyric of Steppenwolf's Born to be Wild. 

Like a true nature's child
We were born, born to be wild
We can climb so high
I never wanna die

Me neither. At least not now and from COVID that rides into town on the back of a Harley. 

Anyway, with America's failure to suck it at all up and do what's needed to do to flatten the curve, it's no wonder that, pandemic-wise, we've achieved third world status. 

I, for one, am looking forward to hearing his side of the story

On my daily walks, I'm seeing regular signs that there are plenty of small, local businesses that are going out of. The nice little candy and nut store. The restaurant I didn't go to that often, but liked when I did. Etc. And that's just the ones that are in storefronts that are in walking distance of my home. I can only imagine what's happening beyond my walking distance, let alone with the non-storefront businesses. Sure, things will pick up. Eventually. And businesses (even if they're different ones entirely) will come back to fill in the blanks. Eventually. But mostly it's pretty devastating to see. And no doubt devastating to experience for the folks who own(ed) these businesses. 

Enraging, too. Especially when we know that the botched national response to the pandemic has created so much of the devastation. And especially since we've gotten confirmation that what we thought had happened with respect to the non-national response was not a figment of a collective blue state conspiracy theory. That, in fact, the major reason there was no national strategy to combat the pandemic was a calculation that only blue states would be hit, so there was no political benefit to be had from coming up with a strategy. And no political loss. (Win-Win in Drumpf terms.) In fact, the political benefit that Kushner & Co. were counting on was that they could blame Democratic blue state governors for whatever awfulness took place in their state. Swell!

What's also enraging is when I read about rotters who conned money out of the Paycheck Protection Program without protecting anyone's paycheck but their own.

Case in point is a Florida man:

David Tyler Hines, 29, not only filed fraudulent PPP applications, but also spent the money on a $318,497.53 Lamborghini Huracán EVO and other "luxury and personal items," including nearly $5,000 at Saks Fifth Ave, more than $11,000 at two Miami-area hotels and a $8,530 purchase at Graff Diamonds, investigators say.

"There does not appear to be any business purpose for most, if not all, of these expenses," the criminal complaint reads. (Source: CNN)

Hines was the beneficiary of $4M in PPP loans - he'd been looking fr $13.5M - low interest and forgivable. That is, forgivable if Hines was actually paying employees. 

"Those purported employees either did not exist or earned a fraction of what Hines claimed," US Postal Inspector Bryan Masmela wrote in the complaint.

He did disburse $30K of his PPP funds to "Mom", and another $19K to himself. Plus spent money on dating sites, and for food delivery. 

Is a payment to Mom forgivable? Not that you can't have a family member in your business, but what was Mom doing to earn a payment of $15K on May 13th, and another $15k on May 27th?

 

And, of course, that Lamborghini was no way going to be forgivable, unless Hines could convince someone that he needed a company car.

How this bum and his four moving-related "businesses" passed the screen is beyond me. 

According to the Justice Department, investigators did not find any operating websites for any of the four companies. The complaint noted that Promaster and We-Pack Moving were both listed as F-rated businesses by the Better Business Bureau. (Source: Heavy)

Hines, not surprisingly, sees things differently. And he's rather prudently using some of his PPP to lawyer up. (Although, seriously, if you were accused of fraud, would you hire a lawyer named Chad???)

"David is a legitimate business owner who, like millions of Americans, suffered financially during the pandemic," Hines attorney Chad Piotrowski told CNN in a statement. "While the allegations appear very serious, especially in light of the pandemic, David is anxious to tell his side of the story when the time comes." (Source: CNN)

And I for one am looking forward to hearing this legitimate business owner's side.

Meanwhile, I don't suppose anyone will be surprised to learn that, a week before Hines was busted for PPP fraud, he got a $100 ticket in Miami for not wearing a mask...

Workin' in a coal mine. Goin' down, down, down.

Between song and film, there's always been a ton - make that 16 tons - of romanticism around coal mining. Sure, plenty of the content is around disaster (How Green Was My Valley) and/or violence (The Molly Maguires). But, oh those songs: Coal Miner's Daughter, 16 Tons, Schooldays Over, and Workin' in a Coal Mine, Going Down, Down, Down). 

Sure, there's You Are My Sunshine, Here Comes the Sun, and Good Day Sunshine (among 62 billion songs about the sun), and They Call the Wind Mariah, but I don't believe that quite the same cultural markers will grow up around solar panels or wind turbines (let alone fracking).

But the rich cultural and economic history and mythology surrounding coal mining doesn't make up by just how god-awful coal is both for the environment and for the health and well-being of miners (even if it did make for a relatively decent living for those okay with the trade-off between black lung/cave ins and a paycheck). 

The reality is that the coal industry, like the song says, is going down, down, down. 

The United States mined 706 million tons of coal in 2019 — the lowest total since 1978.

That's a 7 percent drop from the previous year, continuing a decade-long decline in overall output since the coal-mining sector's peak production in 2008.

Wyoming, the top coal-producing state, saw a 9 percent drop in 2019. Arizona stopped mining coal altogether after the Navajo Generating Station, the largest coal-fired facility in the western United States, and the adjacent mine both closed. (Source: Washington Post)

And this year -  between the Corona Depression and the acceleration of the market forces that, despite Trump's fool's gold promises to keep it alive, and his roll-back of EPA regulations (clean air? who needs it?), have been driving the coal industry into the ground for years now - promises to be even worse.

The country is projected this year to get more power from renewable energy than from coal for the first time, according to the Energy Information Administration. 

Here's hoping the, coal-wise, 2020 lives up to this promise. (At least there's one benefit to a recession.)

Good riddance. 

Coal is not entirely going away. Not just yet, anyway.

Despite the decline domestically, coal is still the leading fuel for power generation worldwide.

Which is why, even without a pandemic, you see all those pictures of folks in Beijing wearing masks as they bicycle around in the city's fetid brown air.  

Few would argue that coal is anything other than tremendously bad for the environment and we need to keep moving all of our power plants off of it, and find alternative fuels for steel making. I'd say that at this point in time, the only thing coal is good for is making a snowman. And, yes, I am old enough to have lived in a home fueled by cold, and to have made plenty of snowmen that used coal for face and buttons. 

Of course, I never produced a snowman quite this good looking. Sure, my mother might have spotted us an old rag to use for a scarf, but one of my father's old hats? Forget about that.

And, of course, given the state o' the environment, it's not clear that we'll ever again have enough snow to roll out a respectable snowman...

Sigh.

Kellogg's Rice Krispies: Snap, Crackle and Gag

It's not as if I don't like Rice Krispies. 

I do.

There's not a box in my cupboard, mind you, but once in a while, when I'm at one of those hotel/motel dealies that come with breakfast, and Rice Krispies are an option, I'm not above pouring some milk into the box and leaning my ear in to hear the sweet sounds of snap, crackle and pop. As an aural remembrance of things past, it's almost as good as holding a conch shell up to your ear and listening to the ocean.

And my mother made a very tasty Rice Krispies-based cookie that involved dates (and walnuts?). They were quite good, and if my thinking that my sister Trish resurrected this recipe within the last few years is a false memory, well, it's not too late for Trish to dig up the recipe and make us some.

Admittedly, I'm not partial to the classic Rice Krispies Treats made with the cereal and Marshmallow Fluff. I think they're more suitable for construction projects than they are for eating. But to each their own. 

I would, however, eat nothing but those yucky non-treats for the rest of my life before I'd snack down on one of these foul little items:

No, your eyes are not deceiving you. 

That's a Rice Krispies Treat combined with bits of hot dog and smeared with mustard, ketchup, and relish. 

Yuck, yuck, a thousand times yuck.

As with Rice Krispies, it's not as if I don't like hot dogs. I do. They absolutely have their times and places. And those times and places are a) when I'm at Fenway Park for a ballgame, b) when I'm walking along the Esplanade on the Charles River and the little snack bar is open for business, and c) at a cookout. Alas, Fenway is closed to us fans, and the snack bar isn't opening this season, and there are no cookouts on my horizon, so this may will be a hot dog-less year for me. 

But while I always ate hot dogs, even as a kid I was violently opposed to hot dogs sliced up and added to anything. Hot dogs and beans churned my stomach. Sometimes my mother cut up a couple of hot dogs and threw them into the slime that was and is Franco-American Spaghetti. The horror!

For a German girl married to an Irishman, my mother made excellent spaghetti sauce, but sometimes for lunch she opened up a can of Franco-American for us. It bore absolutely no resemblance to real spaghetti, but I loved it. I didn't mind the kind with the mini-meatballs added in, but when my mother decided to up the protein ante and slice in a couple of hot dogs... One roiling kid stomach, coming right up!

No doubt the Rice Krispies Treat hot dogged up is the product of pandemic boredom. Still, this one's a monstrosity too far.

I will forgive my sister Trish for sending this one - which she saw on Twitter, but which came via the Nerdist (ur source: the Vulgar Chef) - if she promises to make some of those Rice Krispies date cookies. What they lack in snap, crackle and pop they more than make up for in yum.

Now THAT's a kitchen!

I have a reasonably nice kitchen. Nothing too elaborate. No chef's dream. No 6-burner gas stove. No double ovens. No eat-in (unless I'm standing over the sink.) It's a city, galley kitchen. But it's very nice (albeit a tiny bit messy: I'm too lazy to "stage" it for a photo op), and it suits me just fine.

As with most of my home, it's highly personal. The dutch oven on the stove top, the dishtowel hanging to the right on the oven: gifts from my sister Kath. The tiles over the stove were a 60th birthday gift from some friends. The blue bowls on the window sill came from my sister Trish. The dishtowel to the left: my niece Molly brought it back for me from her semester abroad in Ireland. You can't see what's hanging to the left on the wall there, but it's a cool photo of the Fenway Park bleachers, given to me by my niece Caroline. Also out of sight, over the sink hangs a goofy framed embroidered dishtowel I made when I was a crafty seven year old.

Other than the dishtowel, nothing too weird. Your standard gray and white kitchen with some pops of color, as they say on HGTV. I think it will age okay.

On the other hand, there are kitchen designs that don't age well at all:

My sister Kath and her husband are looking at property in Phoenix and this one crossed their path. The place is spectacularly located, with fabulous views, but the entire thing is covered on the inside with some rather hideous wallpaper. Certainly over the top by today's standards and aesthetics. But having a wallpapered ceiling? In the kitchen? Yuck, yuck, a thousand times yuck.

But the best kitchen I've seen lately has to be this kitchen of the future that popped up in my Twitter feed. (I think it was from historian Michael Beschloss, who regularly tweets out archived photos from the Library of Congress.)

This is a late 1950's kitchen of the future - the RCA Whirlpool Miracle Kitchen that was one of three exhibit kitchens that were at the scene of the famous Nixon-Khrushchev debate about the merits of American capitalism vs. Soviet communism. Advantage: American housewives. Da!

RCA Whirlpool was definitely anticipating the robotic future. 

"In this kitchen you can bake a cake in three minutes, and in this kitchen the dishes are scraped, washed and dried electronically. They even put themselves away. Even the floor is cleaned electronically. So welcome to this wonderful new world of push-button cooking, cleaning and homemaking." (Source: Indyweek article by Tom Maxwell, whose father was one of the Miracle Kitchen designers)

That thing that looks like a cool little mid-century modern TV is the command center, from which the housewife of the future can control everything from her nicely manicured fingertips.

Being able to have everything done for you automatically apparently gave the housewife of the future plenty of time to line up her pantry items - I see that there's little scratch cooking or baking going on at her house - on the slant. I may take this approach up.

Even though I don't have a command center in my kitchen, I think I'll keep mine over this futurized version. But I'd take the Miracle Kitchen over the Tucson wallpaper-ama any old day. Even if I had to sit around it in an aqua colored, polished cotton dress. (Which, I will note, would nicely match my kitchen color scheme.)

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If you have a bit of time, I highly recommend this video in which the spokesmodel walks you through all the goodies that the Miracle Kitchen - including a feature that anticipates checking out who's at the door via Ring-like technology, and an early version of Roomba - will have to offer. Whirlpool sure missed a market opportunity by not pursuing products like these, that's for sure.

Good news for digital nomads

I'm mostly retired now, but for the last 15+ years of my actual career, I was a freelancer. During my freelancing prime, I was a stay-at-homer, blissfully unaware that I could have been a digital nomad - at least during the later years when good enough Internet connectivity was widespread enough to enable la vie nomade. 

I actually don't think I'd have made a very good nomad worker. Oh, I could have happily plunked down in Paris or Ireland for a month or two at a time while working, but I never would have been all that happy upping stakes every so often. Not to mention that it's decades too late for me to want to live out of a backpack. Been there, done that. But when I been there, done that, I was in my early 20's. Once you're in your early 70's, you're a bit more attached to your stuff, a little less willing to get by on a couple of changes of clothing. (Although since I've been sheltering in place, I've had to force myself not to live in the same old, same old, week in, week out.)

But if I were to decide on a late career/late in life move to nomadism, the US response to the coronavirus pandemic has made us something of a pariah nation. And most of the places (i.e., Canada, countries in Europe) where I'd want to go aren't letting Americans in. Being toxic and scorned is nothing new for us, but now we're infecting people. Swell! Talk about the ugly American!

Fortunately, there's some good news here for those who want to work abroad. 

Come August 1st, Estonia is instituting a digital nomad visa that "will allow foreigners to stay in Estonia for up to a year." Americans still can't go to Estonia as tourists, but we are included in that foreigner bucket. 

“We saw that there was kind of a lack of opportunities for [digital nomads], so we wanted Estonia to solve the problem,” Ott Vatter, the managing director of e-Residency, told The Washington Post. “Estonia aims to be the hub for these kinds of new entrepreneurs that we see trending globally."  (Source: Wapo)

You need to be able to demonstrate that you're remotely grossing 3,000 Euros per month,  but that's not an especially steep hill to climb. 

Estonia is actually a place I wouldn't mind going. It wasn't exactly on my bucket list, mostly because I don't have one. (Other than seeing Trump out of the White House.) But I would be interested in seeing the Baltics. So if I were a digital nomad, Estonia would be a consideration.

Barbados is also welcoming outsiders, including Americans, with something called the "Barbados Welcome Stamp."  This program lets those who can demonstrate that they have $50K in annual income to come hang out there for up to a year, visa-free. Applying costs $2K ($3K for families), and there are pandemic-related protocols to follow. But if sunny skies and mild temps are your thing - they're not really mine - this would be a good port o' nomadic call. Plus Barbados, unlike other spots in the Caribbean, isn't prone to hurricanes. 

If you're indifferent to sunny skies and mild temps, Georgia is offering digital nomads a welcome. No, not that Georgia. Seriously, who wants to nomad to a state where the governor seems to be actively trying to kill its citizens. No, we're talking former member of USSR. Birthplace of Josef Stalin. A different sort of Georgia. But they'll be providing safe harbor to remote workers, even, it seems, Americans.

“Georgia has the image of an epidemiologically safe country in the world and we want to use this opportunity," the country’s minister of economy, Natia Turnava, said in a statement. “We are talking about opening the border in a way to protect the health of our citizens, but, on the other hand, to bring to Georgia citizens of all countries who can work remotely.”

As with the other countries, you must be able to prove that you're remotely employed, and isolate yourself for 14 days when you get there, as the Georgians don't want folks coming from epidemiologically unsafe countries like ours. 

Finally, Jamaica, mon, is saying let's get together and feel all right. And you don't even have to be digital nomad to dive in. They're letting in regular old travelers from the U.S., with pre-trip travel authorization, to pay a touristic visit. 

However, the entry requirements vary depending on their home state... At this time, visitors from Florida, Arizona, Texas and New York are classified as high-risk states by the Jamaican government and are required to provide a proof of negative covid-19 PCR tests from an accredited lab to receive a travel authorization.

Everyone can apply for a 30-day visitor visa, but longer stays are available to digital nomads. One heart, one love coming at us from the Jamaicans. 

Not that we don't deserve it, but it's kind of nice to know that we're not considered pariahs everywhere - especially if you're a digital nomad looking for a place to hang out during the pandemic. 

Cherry ice cream? I believe you mean Cherry Garcia.

Last Sunday, July 19th, was National Ice Cream Day. I missed it. But as July is National Ice Cream Month, I can get in under the line and celebrate this near perfect food.

Not that I need a day or a month to celebrate ice cream. I pretty much live the ice cream life. 

In my book, a day without ice cream is a day without sunshine. Let me amend that. I don't mind an occasional day without sunshine. It's plenty sunny and 90 sweaty degrees out today, and I'm sitting here fantasizing about a nice blizzard. So a day without ice cream (or frozen yogurt) is far worse than a day without ice cream.

For me these days, mostly it's not ice cream ice cream. It's fro-you. But I have a (small) bowl of it pretty much every night. Generally, it will be (small) bowl of Gifford's of Maine Black Raspberry Chocolate Chip, which is quite nice - no skimping on the chocolate chips. I also like Gifford's Moose Tracks fro-yo. 

If I decide to up the calorie ante, I'll have a pint of Talenti gelato in the fridge. Pistachio. Coffee Chocolate Chip. Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup. The only problem with Talenti is the effort it takes to get the cap off. Seriously, you can google this problem and get all sorts of advice - none all that good - on how to unscrew the lids. There have been evenings when I've wished I had a chainsaw - or at min a hacksaw - to get that damned lid off. Absolute murder.

When I'm at an ice cream shop, I'll vary things up. Sometimes Coffee Cookies & Cream. Sometimes Butter Pecan. Sometimes Maple Walnut. Once in a blue moon - and only if that blue moon is in the dead of summer - I'll go for Strawberry or Peach. On the Cape, I'll opt for Ryder Beach Rubble or Cranberry Bog. If I'm at Friendly's, finishing my Big Beef lunch off with one of their Happy Ending Sundaes - and, yes, that is the name they go by - my preference is Hot Fudge on Coffee. 

I'm not all that partial to Mint Chocolate Chip, and I really cannot abide the thought of Bubble Gum, but, in truth, I'm down with most ice cream flavors. 

But if I had to pick a favorite-favorite, I'd have to go with Ben & Jerry's Cherry Garcia. It comes in both ice cream and fro-yo, and while there's always plenty of Ben & Jerry's in the freezer of my go-to grocer, you can't always find Cherry Garcia ice cream. Even rarer is the fro-yo version.

I don't think I'm alone here in my affection for Cherry Garcia, and I'm interpreting the report that something called "Cherry" is the favorite ice cream of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to mean Cherry Garcia. I suppose it could mean Cherry Vanilla, which is also quite tasty, but I'm going with Cherry Garcia, which greatly improves on regular old Cherry Vanilla by adding little slabs of chocolate. The best. The very best. Even if you're not a fan of the Grateful Dead.

Overall, the favorite U.S. flavor is Cookies & Cream, a reasonably good choice. Which is more than you can say for some of the state flavorites.

Arizona and Illinois share a preference for Mango. Really? Mango? Not a fan. Still better than Nevada's Cotton Candy. (Gag.)

And, sure, I'd accept a cone if it were the last ice cream on the face of the earth, but - good golly, Miss Molly - do California's really eat a lot of Tutti Frutti?

A number of states bland out with Vanilla, including Maine and New Hampshire. But what are we to make of Connecticut's pigging out on Beer ice cream. Beer? Huh?

Oregon, Washington and Utah spoon up something called Coconut Milk. DC has some rather upscale taste. They're fav is Stracciatella.

I had to look up Michigan's Superman, a ghastly swirl of red, blue, and yellow. Nor was I familiar with Virginia's Tiger Tail. Certainly, an improvement on Superman, but my personal ice cream jury's is kind of out on the thought of orange ice cream swirled with black licorice. 

Now, Teaberry ice cream - which is popular in Pennsylvania - might be okay in small doses if it tastes like Teaberry gum.

Still, I'll take Cherry Garcia which, of course, I am now craving. There's none in my freezer, and there's no guarantee that if I braved the dual elements of heat and humidity currently visiting themselves upon my city, there's no guarantee that the closest grocer would have any. 

Bringing to mind a ditty that my father used to sing to us when we were having a scorcher. 

When it's too hot for comfort, And you can't get no ice cream cones,

T'aint no sin, to take off your skin, and dance around in your bones. 

Not familiar with this ditty? Here you go.  

Guess I'll have a (small) bowl of Blackberry Chocolate Chip fro-yo to celebrate National Ice Cream Month. 

Maybe it's just me, but I thought ego and vision are what founders get to have?

Tatte Bakery is a nice little local chain. There's one just around the corner, and I'm probably in there every month or two for something.

It's a very pleasant spot, albeit high on the preciousness scale:

...with an aesthetic that makes Instagrammers swoon: black-and-white floor tiles with cheeky inspirational quotes, woven Parisian bistro chairs, piles of flaky pastries, and shakshuka skillets studded with silky poached eggs. (Source: Boston Globe)

I don't know about those silky poached eggs (nor do I know what a shakshuka skillet is), but I can vouch for their wonderful pastries. One of my favorite tatte-y things is the nice little bags of nice little cookies that make an excellent host(ess) gifteen if one is invited to lunch, as one was on occasion in the before time. And while it's often crowded with tourists - or was before the Covid Era when there was such a thing - and stroller moms, "my" local Tatte's is a pleasant enough place to stop for a cup or tea with a friend.

They also have good sandwiches. The one with roasted cauliflower is to die for.

It's also a sandwich that is to wait for.

And that's my gripe with Tatte. They seem incapable of parallel processing. Or at least stare down their noses at the thought of "fast food". If you order something, be prepared to wait. And wait. And wait. All part of the Tatte zeitgeist, I guess.

Unfortunately, something's been brewing at Tatte other than tea, and founder Tzurit Or has been forced out.

Over the past several weeks, current, former, and furloughed Tatte staff have begun speaking out against Or’s leadership, saying she created a culture at the cafes that has enabled “discriminatory hiring practices and maltreatment of Black and Brown employees in entry-level positions,” according to an open letter published by the group last week...

The news comes as complaints have emerged about the management of the cafes, including allegations that Or or her managers have made discriminatory comments about the race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or physical attributes of staffers, and that Or made hiring and promotion decisions based in part on how well workers fit in with the “Tatte aesthetic.” 

I don't know anything about what it's like to work there, and the culture may well be vile for some, especially for minorities. Much as I like their aesthetic, I must admit that the Tatte aesthetic represents something of peak well-to-do whiteness. But some of the complaints mentioned in the article seemed, well, unreasonable.

Some employees took offense that "Or decided to board up her storefronts as protests around the George Floyd killing surged throughout the city."

The looting and property destruction ended up taking place just one night, but on that night, the destruction was pretty extensive in parts of the city. My immediate neighborhood was only lightly impacted - tagging, smashed windows - but damage elsewhere was pretty awful. After that first night, however, a lot of the businesses on Charles Street (my immediate 'hood) boarded up. Because that's what you do if you want to protect your business from damage.

Then there was the (white) fellow who was gifted with six months worth of diapers for his newborn baby "but felt those acts of kindness were held out in exchange for expectations of loyalty or long hours." Maybe, maybe not. But, umm, isn't this how working works? When the boss does something nice for you, don't you usually feel a bit more inclined to go the extra mile for them?

But to me the oddest grip was this:

Employees described a workplace that was driven largely by Or’s vision — and her ego. 

It sounds as if Or and Tatte are trying to do the right thing in terms of listening to what their employees are experiencing, but, jeez louise. I don't know a ton about being an entrepreneur, and maybe it's just me, but isn't one of the bennies of being a founder that you get to shape the company you've founded to make it in line with your vision, and as an expression of your ego?

Take me in to the ball game

Well, Tuesday I got to do what I haven't done in a while, which is watch a baseball game from Fenway Park.

It was pre-season, but baseball's baseball.

And it was plenty odd.

Except for a couple of photographers, there was no one in the stands. Even when it's 40 degrees out and drizzling, there are always at least a few diehards in the bleachers, and for a good long while, most games at "America's Most Beloved Ballpark" (while Fenway is beloved by me, I always wonder who decided this) have been sellouts or nearly so.

It was good to have a game to watch. A nice reminder of before time.

The game featured the usual announcers - Dave O'Brien, Jerry Remy, and Dennis Eckersley - and, in fact, doubled up on the color guys so we got both RemDawg and Eck. It was good to hear their voices, especially Eckersley, with his colorful nonsense. Mitch Moreland hit a home run, which the Eck called "a 3-run Johnson". (Eck has a lot of original coinages, but my favorite Eckisode was a malapropism. He was talking about pitcher Justin Masterson and he called him "Justin Masturbation.")

I liked the fact that they had fake crowd noise. It's not clear whether the players are down with it, but the announcers liked it, too. Even if they don't pipe it into the park, I hope they keep using it for the televised games. (While they're at it, why not add in some organ music?) I can get past the empty stands, but it would be way too eerie trying to watch a game with no crowd noise. It was done pretty well, by the way. Mostly the general buzz you hear in background, but revved up when the Sox did something good. It worked for me!

But, as my sister Trish observed during our running game-time text commentary, they might want to stir some boos into the mix.

Because the game we watched was definitely boo-worthy.

The Red Sox took an early 5-0 lead, but the Blue Jays chipped away at it. In the 9th, they tied the game - then went ahead by two runs. Our boys never recovered. At least the game didn't go into extra innings, so there's that.

There were some things to cheer about. That 3-run Johnson, and another dinger from J.D. Martinez. A kid from Worcester - John Andreoli - was in the game, and they did a shout out to The Woo and St. John's High (alma mater of both of my brothers).

Overall, however, it was a classic Red Sox suck-fest. Nothing I haven't seen during my long, long, long history as a Red Sox fan. (First memory: trying to pick a player off the screen - likely at my father's directive - of the family's black and white Philco. This was 1952. I was two.) While I have certainly enjoyed the embarrassment of riches which has been the 21st century Red Sox - four World Series Championships: who'da thunk it? - I am never surprised when they falter.

Last season was a debacle. Why should this year's edition be any better?

Especially with the departure of Mookie Betts to the L.A. Dodgers, second only to the Yankees as the team I love to hate. It is rumored that Mookie is about to sign a colossus of a contract with L.A. When he should have been staying put, here in Boston. Bad deal. A stab in Boston fandom's heart. It pains me that Mookie will now likely enter the Hall of Fame as a Dodger, not a Red Sox. Boo! Even if I don't live to see it.

And speaking of colossal contracts, as I texted Trish during the game "What's up with Pedroia?"

Pedroia is one of my favorite players, but we haven't seen much of him in the last four years. So I looked it up.

Although not in the same league as the contract Mookie will sign, Pedroia, who is still injured, will have collected a hefty $56 million since 2018, during which time he played in nine - count 'em, nine - games. Nice non-work it you can get it. And a good example of just how insane baseball financials are.

Tonight the "real" COVID of a season kicks off. The Sox play the O's, and I'll be sitting there, watching. Root, root, rooting for the Red Sox. If they don't win it won't surprise me. I am, after all, a true Red Sox fan (and my father's daughter).

Whatever this truncated and weird little season brings, I'm happy that the game is back on.

Well, there's no tunnel, but maybe there's a light at end of the bridge

A couple of months ago, I zoomed with a former colleague. When we spoke - in the throes of the Massachusetts lockdown, when things appeared especially grim - he was mulling whether to cancel his family's two-week reservation for a house on Nantucket. Yes, it would be a change of scenery, but what it nothing was open? Yes, as his kids are getting older, it might be one of the last opportunities for a family vacation, but what if the ferries weren't running? Yes, he, his wife (a nurse) and kids are all healthy and following COVID-avoidance best practices, but what if someone gets really sick when they're out there in the medically challenged wilds of Nantucket.

We haven't chatted since, but I hope that he and the fam are there now.

Whether this one family went through with their rental or not, when the pandemic struck - and Massachusetts got hit hard and early - a lot of folks did cancel their reservations.

But as dire as things looked a while back, the Cape and Islands have been inching back towards some semblance of normalcy. Sun, sand, surf, lobster rolls, ice cream cones. Fried clams - with bellies, not those faux and treacherous clam strips you find in less fortunate parts of the country. Quaint little Cape Cod weathered-shingle houses. Outdoor showers. (The very best way to bathe.) Rose-covered trellises. Tee-shirts and floaties. Hydrangeas. Even mini-golf! Sharks, too, are being spotted offshore all over the place.

The pandemic has brought a boom for short-term rentals on Cape Cod and the Islands as vacationers rush to book a cure for their cabin fever. In an unexpected twist for homeowners and agents who had braced for a bust, summer 2020 is turning out to be even stronger than previous years that did not have public health concerns or a recession hanging over the rental market.

According to WeNeedAVacation.com, a local website that markets short-term rentals on the Cape and Islands, total bookings so far are 24 percent above last year. Vacancy rates are at or below 5 percent for most of the summer, well below levels of last summer.

Julie Jason, co-owner of Waterfront Rentals in West Yarmouth, said half of the 160 rental contracts her agency lined up earlier this year were canceled at one point; now, nearly every single week is booked again.

“The market right now, it just exploded,” Jason said. “I’ve been doing this for over 20 years, and I’ve never experienced the volume of inquiries and bookings for such a short period of time.” (Source: Boston Globe)

Hotels are not faring quite as well. Occupancy rates are okay, but the price for rooms is down. Unlike short-term rental costs, which have held up pretty well. 

In a home of your own, however short term, you can socially distance. It's easier to do take-out when you're not spreading your bucket of fried clams out on a hotel room bed. Etc.

Some of the folks renting are traditional vacationers; others are work-from-homers with cabin fever who're eager to look at a new set of walls, as long as the Wi-Fi is good.

I'm happy that the Cape may be able to salvage their season. Other than the insane traffic getting over the Sagamore or the Bourne Bridge during prime time, and the stop and go on Route 6, it's a great getaway. 

As the Patti Page song goes, "If you spend an evening, then you'll want to stay..."

Yep!

Unzipped

I became car-free in the fall of 2007. I was pretty fond of my little buggy, a bright-blue New Beetle, but I've never for one second regretted the decision to go wheel-less. After all, I live in a city. Downtown. Mostly I can walk to things. Not that I'd take it these days, but there's ample public transportation. Although at the time I dumped my Beetle I was making trips to suburban clients with relative frequency, I really didn't need a car. 

It was easier to dump my car because there was Zipcar to fill the gap. Zipcar. Right on my doorstep.

So I joined. And immediately became a big fan, happy to promote this wonderful service to anyone who'd listen.

Want a car for a couple of hours? Just go online and find one nearby. Pick it up, using the no-human-contact-smartcard system, take off, and return it whenever you're done to a dedicated parking place you don't have to spend 45 minutes driving around looking for.

Once in a while, there was a screw up - the car I reserved wasn't there waiting for me - but Zipcar was, for the most part, an excellent idea, well-executed. 

I used Zipcar to go to Home Depot. To pick up my Christmas tree. To pick up my niece at school before she got her license.

Zipcar took me to meetings with clients, to baby showers, to birthday parties, to wakes. 

If I needed a car for a longer journey, or for overnight, I rented from Avis. But most of my car needs were satisfied by Zipcar. 

The biggest pain in the arse was when I was only going a few miles, but had to fill up the tank because the jerk who had it before me had left it at a teaspoon of gas over 1/4. (You're supposed to fill 'er up when you hit that mark.) Filling that tank was a pain because there aren't a ton of gas stations in the downtown Boston area. None near any of the places that housed Zipcars I used. So filling the tank often required extending my reservation by a half hour. Good Zipper that I was, whenever I had extra time on my reservation, and was near a gas station, I always tried to top off the tank for the next person. 

And then one day, when I was returning my Zip to its parking slot in the Boston Common Garage, a young woman who was also returning her Zip asked me if I'd heard of Uber.

No I had not.

She showed me the app on her phone, and I filed the info away for future reference.

Fast forward a few months, and I needed to get to jury service at an inconveniently located - as most of them are - Boston courthouse. I had no idea how long I'd be there, and checking out a Zipcar for an entire day would be expensive and probabl unnecessary, as the likelihood that I'd actually get stuck on a jury was low. So I downloaded Uber and away I went.

Suddenly, I was an Uber-er, not a Zipper. 

I Ubered to clients, to Home Depot, to birthday parties and baby showers, to visit friends. Even, yes, to a couple of wakes. For a while, I saw an acupuncturist in Cambridge. I Ubered there, then took a long, pleasant walk to the T for a T ride home.

Mostly I took the train (Trish) or T (Kath) when I went to see my sisters, but I started to Uber home from Kath's rather than have my brother-in-law drag out to drive me home after dinner. And if it was cold and dark, and I didn't want to wait in a cold, dark train station and then take a cold, dark walk home from North Station, I began taking an occasional Uber home from a visit to my sister in Salem. Sometimes I Ubered to Salem, too. When my cousin's husband was hospitalized in Worcester earlier this year - in the before time - I Ubered out there a couple of times. I knew it was worth it, and that getting a ride would be easy enough because I'd also Ubered out there for Christmas dinner.

Whatever the cost, however often I found myself Ubering, it was worth it. Even if I spent $100 a month - and that was my sweet spot, more or less - it was still a whole helluva lot cheaper than car ownership in Boston. 

Zipcar became a thing of the past. 

The last time I reserved a Zip was in December. There was a screw up. The car and location I had reserved was no longer available. I was directed to a parking lot that's a bit further away, and a lot more difficult to maneuver around in. (It's a funky, Art Deco parking lot from the 1920's, but was designed for flivvers, not Pierce Arrows or Duesenbergs.) I trotted over to get the car, but it was one of those new-fangled ones with the tricky way to turn it on, to shift, to steer, to do everything. Change for the sake of change. I realized right off that I wasn't going to be comfortable driving it, so I canceled my reservation. 

Although I'm still a member, that's been pretty much it for me and Zip.

If and when I go anyplace again, it will likely be via Uber.

Sometimes I think I'll miss Zipcar. Then again, maybe not.

Zipcar, it seems, has been falling down, with felling blows delivered by the disrupters at Uber and Lyft. But some of the downfall is self-inflicted. A company where the brand promise was great customer service - a instilling a feeling of (almost) community - is no longer keeping its customers as satisfied as it once did.

CNN recently contacted over a dozen Zippers:

They said that the car-sharing service's quality had deteriorated in recent months, and that some cars are especially dirty, or not even available when members arrive for reserved rentals, a trend they say has worsened since the pandemic. Zipcar apologized for the shortcomings in a statement to CNN Business and said it's taking steps to improve the service.

Some customers have had to scramble to get alternative transportation and were left in what they felt were unsafe situations, such as being stranded far from home without a way to get around...

And when things go wrong, customers interviewed by CNN Business say they rarely can get in touch with Zipcar customer support, even after waiting hours on the phone. Some longtime customers who once viewed Zipcar as so reliable and efficient that it could be a stand-in for owning a car, now say they want to cancel their membership, but haven't been able to because they find Zipcar is so hard to reach. Zipcar says users can request to cancel their memberships online, but customers told CNN Business they were unable to do so on the website, and had to call Zipcar's customer support line. (Source: CNN)

Zipcar (owned by Avis since 2013) has had a hefty layoff this year - said to be more than 20% of its staff. It could be worse: Avis overall has pink slipped or furloughed 70% of its employees in the wake of the pandemic. But a 20% decrease in staff could explain the dirty cars, the reservation screw ups, and the hours it's taking customers to get through the support. (Over the years, I've had to call Zipcar support on a number of occasions, and it was always prompt and first rate.)

Zipcar has responded to the wave of service complaints by promising to increase the number of service agents, but for some members, it might be too little, too late.

"It was working for 10 years — brilliantly in my opinion," said Zipcar customer Judi Rowland. "Basically I loved them until I hated them."

I'm not quite ready to totally cut things off with Zipcar. My membership's paid up for the remainder of the year, so the money's been spent. But as I approach the first anniversary of my last trying (and not succeeding) to use their service, I just may cancel. I'll feel badly. For years, Zipcar was there when I needed them. Plus they're a local company. But life, and transportation, goes on.

Me? Unzipped? Object in the mirror may be closer than it appears.