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From Boston to New York City

I was in Boston for four days, but I didn’t have internet, so I couldn’t post anything here.

I was in a nice big hotel, but some things, like the internet were not good. Neither was the tv. When I checked in, they said I didn’t have a reservation, it was canceled! I didn’t cancel it and neither did Hotels.com, so what was up with that? They lady at the front desk told me not to worry, she would take care of it and she reinstated my reservation, but it appeared to be more than what I was paying with Hotels.com. I wasn’t gonna argue, so I just accepted it, stewed for days, and decided to dispute it after I got home, but when I checked out this morning, the bill was actually hundreds of dollars cheaper than originally set with Hotels.com!

As the saying goes, 90% of what we worry about, never comes to pass. So I checked out happy.

I took the train down to New York. It’s been cold today in Boston and New York. I noticed in Boston that almost everyone wears masks out of doors, I figured out that it keeps you very warm, and that must be the case, although in New York, people don’t seem to wear masks outside. They are strict with vaccine checks at indoor restaurants though. And of course, in Florida, anything goes, or basically, nothing goes – no rules, just rights.

I was just at a Starbucks in NYC and the girl was mopping the floor and then she made my coffee. I didn’t drink it.

In Boston, every single Starbucks made the best cafe mocha that I’ve ever had. Everywhere else it varies, but in Boston, every location made it delicious and perfect and a way I never had before – almost like a hot chocolate with some coffee added. Delicious.

I’m going to Wicked today – for the fifth time! I’ve been twice already in NY, once in Miami and once in Ft. Lauderdale. One of my friends bought the tickets and I agreed to go. It’s worth seeing again.

Getting rid of my old car

I’m heading up north on Friday – Boston and New York and it’s been an issue trying to get rid of my old car.

It’s amazing how I said so many years ago that I would keep the car until I ran it into the ground and that seems to be the case. The car really doesn’t seem to be worth much.

I have kept up maintenance all these years – I’ve always been good about that. But for some reason, it’s all falling apart. The roof leaks (it’s a convertible), the electrical system is shot, the car shakes, which may have to do with the electrical system and quite a few other things. But until last week, it all was perfect, or so I thought.

I have the car at the service station, and they ended buying the car for peanuts. It burns me up that I have spent thousands of dollars there over the years – thousands of dollars some years alone, and they wanted to nickel and dime me over the price of the car. But I needed to get rid of it and the burden, before I leave town tomorrow.

Friends wanted to buy it and I was ready to just give it away, but I didn’t want to sell it or give it away to anyone I know. I don’t trust it and I didn’t want to sell or give away a problem car to someone where they will always have problems with it. My good gesture will end up bad.

I agreed to sell the car to Carvana and they were to come out yesterday to pick up the car and pay me, but they sent me an email canceling the whole thing because Carmax, the almighty Carmax, says the odometer does not match what I told Carvana it was, even though I had it verified and I sent a photo of the current odometer. How Carmax is accurate and I, the person in possession of the car, is not, I don’t know.

I finally decided to donate the car to a local charity. But I needed them to pick up the car by today. I never heard back from them to arrange the pick up. I gave them all the info over the phone and I then just waited, but I was getting antsy, so I sold the car to the service station instead, just to be done with it. And for the past few days I have picked up every strange phone number that called – all robocalls, but thinking that one might be the charity. None were.

As for my trip – I’m taking one of my usual Thanksgiving trips where I start off in Boston and then take the train down to New York. I wrote about one of the train trips in 2017 called “A delightful train ride,” where I overheard a couple of older ladies and their conversation the whole train trip – they sat behind me on the train. You can read that here.

UPDATE: After I sold the car for next to nothing, I received an email from Carmax. They corrected the error and it’s updated on their website. A day late and thousands of dollars short.

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Telephones in the wind

Saw this on CBS Sunday morning today. I’d like to visit this phone.

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CartoonStock

I’m proud to be a part of CartoonStock, which is a searchable cartoon archive on the internet where editors, and just about anyone, can find cartoons for their publications from newspapers, magazines, newsletters and online publications. At CartoonStock, people are buying the rights to publish the cartoons.

In 2018, CartoonStock was acquired by longtime New Yorker Cartoon Editor and Cartoonbank.com creator Bob Mankoff, and cartoon lover/philanthropist Lawrence Benenson.

Cartoons available were published in The New Yorker, Esquire, The Wall Street Journal, WIRED, National Lampoon, Barron’s, and The American Bystander, as well as online collections from The Weekly Humorist and Narrative Magazine.

“By joining CartoonStock’s talent and technology with our longtime publication connections, we’ve created the platinum level in the cartoon universe, allowing us to showcase distinguished cartoonists alongside upcoming talent with content that is hilarious, insightful, and relevant,” says Bob Mankoff.

There are curated cartoons on various subjects, or you can check out each cartoonist individually and see their work, or you can type in keywords for whatever subject you are looking for and the various cartoons pop up.

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More tourists? No thanks

S o the US is now open to foreign travelers. I’m not gonna lie, I liked it without extra bodies and people.

I’ve only been to NYC since the pandemic started, and that’s a major hub for foreign travel. But the city seemed empty without all those extra people. I know the businesses welcome it, but those of us not in the travel industry are not keen on over-capacity airports and cities.

It reminds me of this guy I had an encounter with about three years ago in NY. He was British.

At one of my favorite hotels, the only complaint are the elevators. They are too slow. And one reason is that guests and the staff push all the buttons whether they are going up or down. So even if a person wants to go down, they push the up button.

One night I got in the elevator to head up to my room and the elevator stopped on another floor as I rode up. A guy gets in. Now after a week or more of this nonsense, I had to say something.

The conversation went like this:

ME: You are going up?

BRITISH TOURIST: No. Down.

ME. Then why did you push the up button?

BRITISH TOURIST: (Looking shocked at accosted by this big mouth American). What?

ME: Why did you push the up button to go down?

BRITISH TOURIST: They told me to.

ME: Who told you to? The front desk?

BRITISH TOURIST: Yes.

ME: Wait. You are telling me that the staff at the front desk told you to push the up button if you want to go down?

BRITISH TOURIST: (looking incredulous)

ME: (staring angrily at him)

BRITISH TOURIST: Look mate. How should I know, I’m from Britain.

ME: Britain? (then I shouted) AND YOU DON’T KNOW HOW TO USE A LIFT??? (I stressed the word LIFT)

His eyes were bugging out now. He jumped back like Charlie Brown at the end of the Christmas episode. And then backed away from this nut (me).

When the elevator got to my floor, all the way at the top, I got out, he called me an a-hole, and he proceeded all the way down to the lobby.

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It’s like I’m from another planet

I bought a new car the other day. I hadn’t had a new car in 16 years! What happened was, I always had cars for a few years, maybe five years the most. At one point I started leasing cars, so I had to turn them in every three years and I would then get a new car. But 16 years ago, I decided to buy a car and keep it until I ran it into the ground. And that finally happened – it is almost run into the ground.

My current car has electrical problems and with the pandemic and all, they can’t get the part or parts they need to repair it. So I panicked and I went and purchased a new car. I did try to rent a car for a week or more but again, due to the pandemic, there are no cars available to rent!

So anyway, I went to the dealership and bought a car. They said they usually have 200 cars on the lot, but now they only had 11 – pandemic again! I had to get a pre-owned car because the wait time for new cars is one year. Seriously.

I got in the car to test drive it and was lost. I couldn’t find the shift, “How do I put it in drive?” I asked. “How do I turn it off?”

It’s been so long with my current, “ancient” car that I was not up on all the new gadgets and blue tooth, etc. The new car almost looks like a cock pit. The staff at the dealership was laughing. What made them laugh more was that I didn’t take the car with me. I said I could come back the next day to pick it up. I didn’t want to wait around for it to be detailed. They couldn’t believe I would buy a car and not drive it out that day.

But that’s me. I like my old stuff. I don’t want a new tv or cell phone or computer or car, unless I am forced to get it. I am a creature of habit, as one guy at the dealership put it. Do I fear change? Maybe. I have friends who are out the first day that a new iphone is available or a new tv. But not me.

Of course I’ve been in many cars that are new and modern, but I guess I’m not paying attention to the dashboard, I’m looking out the window as others drive.

My cousin had called to say hello the other day and we were talking about my new car. He was telling me things like how the key fob works and how the Bluetooth works and things like that. It made me feel like I was a 15 year old kid learning to drive for the first time. Truth be told, my 16 year old car has a key fob and it took about 12 years for me to realize that the locks were not broken on the car, it was the key fob that made them appear to always be unlocked. I just thought I was living on the edge by not having the car locked, when I finally realized it was the fob in my pocket allowing the car to be unlocked.

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Out of chicken

This Bottom Liners cartoon by Eric and Bill Teitelbaum had me laughing because it’s so true.

The other day a friend and I went to Pollo Tropical, a chicken chain here in Miami, and they were out of chicken! They offered us pork instead. We passed.

I was telling my family about this and my nephew said the same thing happened to him at KFC, another chicken place!

This supply chain problem is really starting to affect everything it seems.

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Getting back to normal

I finally decided to get back into shape. For most of my life, I would say since high school, I’ve worked out with weights at the gym and at home, but mostly at the gym. But since the start of the pandemic, I have not been back to the gym and that’s been bothering me.

It closed and never reopened and I can’t find another gym that I like. So I’ve been putting it off.

I tried the workout bands, and those are great, but still, I can see the loss of muscle and weight gain.

My slap in the face, the turning point, happened when I needed to fit into a suit last week. The pants did not fit! I’ve been a 31 inch waist since high school, but I needed a larger size – 33-34, and that didn’t sit well with me. So I decided to get weights and workout at home.

I had put that off because I live in a condo and I wasn’t keen on having the weights drop on the floor, but I think I can manage not to do that. Also, I like going to the gym, I like the whole routine from getting up early in the morning, the socializing and the actual workout. But since my rude awaking last week, I realized I need to workout now.

I went to Dick’s Sporting Goods and looked around, but they didn’t have the sets I wanted, the things I had seen online. I did pick up the weights in the store and try them out and boy, did that feel good, but another rude awakening was that I could only lift half the usual weight!

Luckily muscle has memory and I plan on getting back into shape real fast.

I ended up purchasing adjustable dumb bells online. They have these sets where with the turn of a button, it changes the weights and you just life the bar up which will then consist of the weight you want to lift, so there’s no screwing on different plates to adjust the weights. I’m really looking forward to this.

I was concerned about the delivery driver having to life all that weight, but I guess since they sell it, they must be used to delivering it. So today, my new weight set arrives and I can maybe start to get back to normal!

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They get me!

Bored Panda featured me a couple of weeks ago. I had forgotten that they contacted me about an interview a few weeks back, so it was a pleasant surprise to see this.

The feature came out great and I love what Hidrėlėy, the author, wrote about me, he really gets me:

“This artist creates old-school, one-panel comics. They are filled with absurd humor and unexpected twists, weird characters, and situations that not many of us run into.

“The style that this artist uses is very reminiscent of newspaper comics and there’s something very nostalgic about them. The comics are very simple, but at the same time have quite a lot of detail and expression. The artist enjoys puns and wordplay. He sometimes even includes a little dark humor in his comics.”

Bored Panda has 116 million readers a month and 15 million Facebook followers. Not a bad place to be promoted!

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Saved by an angel?

I’ve been waiting to hear from my Mom, you know, some sort of signal, but nothing yet. When my brother passed we all heard from him the first week, then he disappeared. I had a friend jak, who passed away and for two years, I would feel his presence in the passenger seat of my car. Never in the house, but always in the car. His songs would play on the radio and I just had a sense that he was there next to me as I drove around.

But I think my mom saved me from a bad accident yesterday.

I had a friend visiting for a couple of weeks and yesterday he was headed home. We were out and about all morning and my car was fine, but at 1:30 pm, we jumped in the car so I could take him to the airport and it wouldn’t start. I kept trying and nothing. It wound not turn over. So he ended up taking Uber to the airport.

About an hour later, I was arranging to have the car towed to the service station in the morning and I ran out to get the license number. While I was there, I tried starting the car again and it turned over perfectly! I turned it off, turned it on again and same thing, it started perfectly. I drove it to the service station to have it looked at and Ubered home.

I thought that that was quite strange. Then I thought, what if Mom was protecting my friend and me from a bad accident as we drove to the airport? What if she made the car not work and then it started normally just a short time later?

I have been saved in traffic situations in the past by people from the other side. I just know it. I’ve almost been in accidents where I knew they were going to happen and nothing happened. Not too long after my brother passed, I was almost in an accident. The truck was coming right at me, I steeled myself for a side door impact and nothing happened. It was as if by magic, the oncoming, speeding truck missed me. It was as if it just drove through me and ended up on the other side of my car.

A few years back a friend was telling me about a dream he had where his mother, who had passed, told him she had protected me in an accident. As he described the details, I remembered the incident from about 10 years earlier. He had every single detail right – the color of the car, the type of car, the location, and even that the guy was on a cell phone, which caused him to drive through the red light. A brick phone at that!

At the time I couldn’t explain how my car squeezed into the size of an inch between two cars. Literally, the car had to squeeze that small for me to have survived that accident. I could never wrap my head around it, but I knew at the time it was some sort of divine intervention and when my friend explained it all 10 years later, regarding his late mother’s intervention, it made sense.

I’ve had quite a few incidents like that. Am I a bad driver or is it others? I believe it’s others, but either way, I was saved from terrible accidents by divine intervention and I wonder if that was the case yesterday where my car would not start when needed and then when not needed an hour later, it started without any hesitation.

UPDATE ON THE CAR: The service station called me this morning. There is not a thing wrong with the car. It starts up perfectly. It starts right up. THANKS MOM!

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