Hey:
So there are some weeks where I go to start writing this and I have nothing. I try to keep the dad bragging here to a bare minimum, the news is either nothing or nothing new, nothing worth writing about in sports and just a general lack of useable material. That happened last week as I got ready to write there was just nothing that got my writing juices flowing, I scoured the web for things and came up with a couple of topics to discuss. But that was really pulling victory from the jaws of defeat.
This week, we will not have that issue..
THE ORANGE MENACE (PART I)
For those of us who were asking, "What's Next?, we got the answer on Wednesday.
Wildfire's throughout Quebec and Ontario caused most of New York state and for that matter the Northeastern United States to be blanketed in an orange smoky haze on Wednesday afternoon. This was what it looked like on Wednesday as I was leaving my office....
The picture doesn't do it justice. You also had the smell. Last fall, Tara and I went to one of her co-workers houses and they had a real wood burning fire pit. That what this was like, except 100 times stronger and there was no escape from it. It was hard to breathe. The governor said we should all stay inside if we could and (I could hear folks freaking out right then) wear a mask. I found myself in the peculiar position of wearing a mask outside and taking it off when I got inside, rather than the other way around during the worst days of the pandemic.
Instinctively, I turned the clock radio I had onto Q104.3 at 3 PM, for Ken Dashow's 3 @ 3. He picks three songs that either have something in common or represent some sort of current event. When I know what the topic is going to be, I try to instead predict what songs he's going to play. I thought maybe Purple Haze by Jimi Hendrix (even though it was mainly an Orange haze), Smoke on the Water by Deep Purple (I included the Homer Simpson version above) and since this all started by our neighbors up north, I thought maybe Blame Canada from the South Park Soundtrack would have been apropos.*
But that wasn't in the Q104 rotation, so they went with the aforementioned Deep Purple, Pink Floyd's Breathe (In the Air) off Dark Side of the Moon, and Genesis' Land of Confusion, my 8th grade song which contains the lyric-But I can see the fire still alight/They're burning into the night.
I wrote last week about the blessings and curses of social media. Well, that was on display here as well. There were a number of funny posts on Facebook, I had one friend who compared the pictures to Luke Skywalker's home planet Tatooine, (where most were comparing it to Mars).
Twitter on the other hand, had either people who were blaming this on climate change, or people making fun of those blaming it on climate change. Twitter never lets you down, does it? It's the Wal-Mart of social media.
Of course climate change played a part in this, you want to debate the degree to which is did, that's your prerogative. This was the worst air quality reading around here since they started recording those statistics.
The good news is that it seems like the worst of this is over for now. The weather on Saturday was really nice. The scary thing is that it can happen again and at this rate probably sooner than later. Indeed, on CBS Sunday Morning, Dr Vijay Limaye. Sr scientist and environmental epidemiologist at the NRCD, said “We may look back on this fondly in the future”
Scary
THE ORANGE MENACE (PART II)
On Thursday evening, just as we were starting to be able to breathe again, the news began to break that former President Donald Trump was being indicted on the Mar-a-Lago Documents case. I watched some of the coverage on CNN, till Tara cried uncle and a rerun of Ghosts came on.
The indictment was unsealed on Friday and Special Council Jack Smith spoke Friday afternoon.
Captain Orange is accused of violating 7 federal laws, but there are actually 37 counts against him. 31 of those counts have to do with willful retention of national defense information, a violation of the Espionage Act. There are three counts of withholding or concealing documents in a federal investigation. There are two counts of giving false statements regarding the turning over of the documents. And finally, one count of conspiracy to obstruct justice. That last count (if I'm understanding correctly) is what has gotten Waltine Nauta in trouble.
Now, Jack Smith in his statement to the media on Friday, was very careful to say (and I'm glad he did) that in this country, you are still innocent until proven guilty. Indictments aren't convictions.
Having said that, it's really hard to read this indictment, see the photos and even to hear Trump in his own words and not think he's guilty as sin. They have him on tape saying he had a military document that "as president I could have declassified, but I didn't." How anyone can hear that and then say he's being railroaded somehow is beyond me.
And then there were the pictures. My personal favorite was the one of the boxes of secret documents piled into a bathroom. Hey, who doesn't like to read on the toilet? Back in the day before smartphones I used to have Sports Illustrated between the toilet and the sink. Some of the best reading I've ever done was while going on the potty.
And now at Mar-A-Lago, you can read plans for bombing Iran, or where we have our strategic weapons stashed right there as you are making your contributions to society.
Light Bathroom Reading
I'll give Captain Orange this, history books will have volumes on all the laws this guy has broken, whether or not he gets convicted. He is scheduled to appear in a Miami courthouse at 3 PM on Tuesday. Tune in earlier so you can watch him get limo'ed to the courthouse.
SPORTS: SOMEBODY GET THIS MAN A 10 GALLON HAT...
Jacob deGrom who hasn't pitched since April 30, announced this week that he will have to undergo Tommy John surgery. As pissed as I was when I felt like he hi-tailed it out of NY, as much as I have been rooting against him since he's pitched for the Rangers, I did feel bad for him when I saw him addressing the media after the news came down. That's just a heartbreak.
I don't feel bad for the Rangers. Like I said when they signed him, this was a clear case of what Bill Madden refers to as the "one dumb owner" rule. A 5 year deal for a guy who has as much arm trouble as deGrom has had was just moronic. And I think even Steve Cohen for all the $$$ he's been tossing around, was smart enough to not want to give him 5 years. He may have given him the $137.5 over a shorter period of time. But nobody was going 5 years for that. Except the Rangers apparently.
And now for two years of that 5 year deal deGrom will be doing what he has done a lot of lately...not pitching.
In 2018 and 2019 and in the beginning of 2021, he was something to behold wasn't he? His starts were must watch TV, even when the Mets were awful in 2018 and somewhat better in 2019. I was at one of his last starts in 2021 and even in that game he was unbelievable. It's a sin that he has had all the trouble he's had.
I'm not glad he's having arm trouble. But I am happy my team isn't paying for it. That I will admit.
The Mets have other issues anyway, their own high priced starters are (for now) healthy, but not pitching well. And now Pete Alonso is out for a couple of weeks after getting hit by a pitch from Braves pitcher Charlie Morton. That's another reason I don't gloat over injuries.
The Mets dropped two out of three to the much improved but still not great Pirates after being swept by both the Blue Jays and Braves. Getting late awfully early.
Stay Safe (I almost had to bring back Wear a Mask)
and Have a Great Week
*several of my friends posted Blame Canada on their FB wall
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