Bus Stop

Hello World, Gobble, gobble! I know it seems impossible to believe (and of course, everyone knows how much I do so hate to be an alarmist) but the plain fact of the matter is that next week is Thanksgiving already - and we can't even blame it on the holiday being early this year. Thanksgiving is not technically a movable feast, since it's always on the 4th Thursday in November. But since the month starts on a different day of the week every year, the holiday can fall anywhere from the 22nd at its earliest, to the 28th at its latest, and any day in between. This time around, it's on the 26th, and anyone who isn't ready to prance with the bird by then had better tie on their running shoes, and turkey trot their way onto the fast track, and I don't mind saying, on the double. Let's face it, those sweet potatoes are not going to just go ahead and candy themselves, after all, and the mini marshmallows, even more so. That reminds me of a recent post on Facebook, which pointed out yesterday that it's only 35 days until Christmas, and I think we can all agree that's a piece of information that might have been better off not being shared with an unwary public, but there you have it. As they say on television, that's a bell you can't un-ring. Of course, we all know that the holly-jolly, merry-bright decorations have long since been in the stores since just about back-to-school, so it's not like the holiday is just sneaking up on us now or anything. In fact, we saw our first illuminated Christmas tree on the lawn of Concordia College in Bronxville last week, and I noticed that the nearby municipalities all had their yuletide lights and wreaths hanging from the street lights since last month already. Between Halloween and Christmas, poor Thanksgiving really doesn't stand a chance. Although it's also true that every facet of social media lately has been all abuzz over the backlash from Black Friday going so completely overboard nowadays (big-box stores opening on Thanksgiving, or at midnight on Friday to get a jump on their outrageous bargains) so that many stores now have decided to pull the plug, buck the tide, and embrace a return to sanity in the marketplace, where customers and employees can relax and enjoy time with their family and friends, rather than slugging it out with strangers at the mall. Heck, people can just stay at home and fight if they want to, there's no sense in getting up in the middle of the night and driving all the way to Wal*Mart for a tussle over the latest toys and gadgets. Besides, the President's economic advisers would much prefer that you buy a new house, or a more expensive healthcare plan instead, and you don't need special Black Friday deals for that. So save the fisticuffs for when you really need them - and when the time comes for grouchy Christians who give up chocolate for Lent, I've got a punch with someone's name on it, believe me. Meanwhile in sports, it would be an understatement to say that it has not been red-letter days on the local sports scene, and not only have the local teams not gotten off to a blue-ribbon start, but rather more of a waving the white flag sort of season so far, alas. The workmanlike Jets are actually doing the best of the bunch, although their 5-4 record is only good enough for 3rd place in the AFC East, where the Patriots are running away with things. The woeful Giants are 5-5 (and even managed to help the dratted Pats stay undefeated, thanks ever so much not) although actually leading their division with that record, so that tells you something right there. On the hardwood, the surprising Knicks at 6-6 have already exceeded expectations of their supposed ineptitude, and playing .500 ball looks pretty good at this point. The even more surprising Nets have stumbled badly out of the gate to a pitiful 2-9 start, but it's early days yet, and plenty of time left to right the ship and sail right back into contention where they belong. Most surprising of all are the hard-charging Rangers, who have been on a 14-2 tear, including 9 straight wins, one shy of the franchise record set 75 years ago - by the club that went on to win the Stanley Cup in 1940. They've opened up a 7 point lead over the teams behind them, and although June seems like a long way off, they've already played almost 25% of the season already. It's all too true that Thanksgiving and Christmas are still ahead of us, and as much as I hate to say it, June will be here before we know it, and way before we're ready for it, that's for sure. Suntan lotion, anyone? Also on the local scene, even the most unobservant person couldn't help but notice that blatant, flat-out ineptitude is not limited to professional athletes, not by a long shot and then some, I can assure you. There was a recent front page story in the Life & Style section of our newspaper (their motto: "Where Fact-Checking Goes to Die") about a new book that was published posthumously from author Ivan Doig, after a storied career with several popular novels. His final work got a big play in the newspaper, featuring a large picture of the book cover right next to the article, presumably so we would know what to look for, if we went searching for it at our neighborhood book shop. Unfortunately, that would only work for anyone who didn't also read the affiliated article, because while the picture of the book very clearly says "Last Bus to Wisdom," the paragraph right next to it inexplicably identifies the piece as "Last Bus to Freedom" instead. That groaning sound you hear is generations of editors, spinning in their graves, gnashing their teeth, and pulling out whatever remains of their moth-eaten hair at this point - and decrying so-called journalists who don't see the most egregious discrepancies right in front of their own noses. Honestly, you can't make this stuff up. In fact, it reminds me of nothing so much as when high-priced meteorologists on television, with the most advanced technology at their very fingertips, will assure their viewers with solemn insistence that it is raining, when all they would have to do is look out a window to see that the sun is shining, despite their ponderous pronouncements to the contrary. In a perfect world, the spirits of the maligned cultural standards would rise up as one, and cram all of these offenders of common sense onto their very own bus out of town - and it wouldn't be the last bus to Paradise, I can promise you that. Elle