Let's Not Meet By Accident

Hello World,      And so here it is, the middle of October already, and at this rate, it won't be long before it's Christmas, and the whole year will be over before it's even started yet, by golly. Around here, the weather finally turned cold, at long last, and which pretty much came as a surprise to all of us. Not the least of which was all of the bugs still hanging on the outside of stuff - and I don't mind saying, if I had a special winter-time system to get the lowest fares down south, you can believe that I'd be doing a land-office business in travel arrangements right about now, that's for sure. Also going on now, the baseball playoffs are at the point of having a mere 4 teams left, 2 in the American League (Boston and Houston) and 2 in the National League (Los Angeles and Milwaukee) before they finally get down to the World Series on Tuesday. Last year's darling, the Houston Astros, are still in the thick of their series with the Red Sox, so there could be a potential repeat in the playoff picture, especially if the Dodgers beat the Brewers to advance. I guess we'll see what we see. Or as baseball legend Leo Durocher once famously observed, "If I were playing baseball and my mother were rounding third with the run that was going to beat us, I'd trip her up. Oh, I'd pick her up and brush her off, an say, 'Sorry, Mom', - but Mother doesn't make it to third."     Meanwhile in Yonkers, they always want people to know what's going on there, whether they are the longest-standing resident native, or just some schmo who's passing through on the local roads. They very helpfully hang up large and colorful banners on walls, trees, fences, poles, and whatever else is along the roads, to quickly give everyone all the poop as far as "what-when-where" for their festivals, parades, or any other gatherings going on in The City of Gracious Living, as they call it. This is how I know that they had what they referred to as their "Columbus Day Parade" on Sunday, September 30th, right through the middle of town, and I'm sure, a fine time was had by all. On the other hand, I can't help but think that this would have come as a big surprise to Mrs. Columbus, all these centuries ago, since it was almost 2 weeks earlier than his actual birth day, no matter how you slice it. For some reason, that also reminds me that it was also Yonkers on the front page of our local newspaper this week with the arresting headline: [[ Garbage Cans Removed to Reduce Litter ]] I have no reason to doubt that in Yonkers city government, the politicians may actually believe that this idea works, but for all of the rest of us out in the real world, I can promise you that it does not.     In any case, I will not complain about any place with its very own 6 nicknames. Apparently, Yonkers is variously known as:     The Central City     The City of Gracious Living     The City of Seven Hills     City With Vision     The Sixth Borough     The Terrace City Far be it from me to add the garbage cans in there anywhere.     For anyone who believed that things were going much too smoothly around here, and required a heaping helping of chaos, your wishes have been answered.  I was driving home from work last week the same as I do every weekday, in broad daylight, no sort of weather to deal with, or even bad traffic or anything, when suddenly out of the blue - BAM! - here I am, up on the curb, and wondering what went wrong. Apparently I must have nodded off when I was supposed to be driving, ran over the very low curb, up on the parking, and smack into a telephone pole that was located right there in a perfect spot for me to slam right into it. In retrospect, this was a much better scenario than falling asleep at the wheel and driving off into the middle of the road, or a busy intersection, and smashing into cars coming at me from the other direction, and without even thinking about it, I can already say, thanks so much not. Since I was already up on the curb, I stayed where I was and called Bill, who hurried over to rescue me, with something cool to drink and plenty of "cheer-you-uppo" to help me feel better while we waited for the tow truck. It was a sad day for the poor Aveo, all along the passenger side, the side-view mirror broken off, the front fender all scraped, and even the poor wheel off the axle. The airbag had deployed (and a good thing, too!) and I had dark purple bruises all along my arms and chest, that probably would have seemed funny if they didn't hurt so much. It was a pretty discouraging time all around, and we were none too popular on Webster Avenue either, I can tell you that, especially when the flat bed showed up for the car, and carted it off. We did ask the collision place to fix the damage, but they weren't falling for that, and gave it back to us a few days later in the same non-driveable condition. As for myself, I'm going to the doctor next week to hopefully get some extra-special super-duper stay-awake pills to keep me much less of a hazard on the roads, and then come up with a different vehicle to replace the poor unlucky Aveo. At this point, I wouldn't say no to a Sherman tank, thank you very much. Elle