Signs of the Times

The following sign appears on the N.J. Turnpike and Garden State Parkway:
-"Put down the phone - and drive!"
-"I have more than one club in my bag!" Gov. Chris Christie.
-"So he went for the low hanging fruit!" Anonymous re Chuck Hagel's departure.
-Bogart's Casablanca piano went for $3.4 million at auction while Saks Manhattan flagship store is appraised for $3.7 Billion. But Bunny Mellon's estate items only returned $218 Million. It seems everyone wanted a slice of the MELLON.
tjs

Griping over Groping

Last week I read where a dockworker in Brooklyn was awarded $65M in a suit against his employer who he claimed had groped him on the job and when he complained he was banned from working on the Red Hook piers. Over the years I cannot ever remember such a situation. While I don't recall them groping they were not embarrassed to "reach" when a few bottles of scotch appeared or if a banana boat was working and they found a few stalks "aPEELing". If you saw "On the Waterfront" you know how cargo was handled or mishandled back in the 1950s. Many longshoremen wore those old WWI overcoats with extra pockets. One such fellow tied a pig of lead around his neck and tried to get past the gangway watchman as his face began to flush and he turned around and went back down the hatch to return his burden. You might say he was groped by a lead pig but he didn't gripe.
tjs

CM

The Google scorekeeper reminds me that this is my 900th posting - and I have nothing to say. So it's time for a "short paws" as we head to Cape May for Thanksgiving with family and friends. I hope your own celebration is as warm and thankful and that you may get the wishbone - and that the gravy is tender. Let's get together again in early December.
tjs

...Nor heat nor gloom of night.

The above is a segment of the Postman's creed.  When I was a senior in high school the vocational director enabled me to obtain temporary work in the General Post Office  in Philadelphia during the Christmas holidays. This required me taking three subway/trolleys to and from and an hour sitting on the bench before we "temps" were put on the time clock and stood behind stacks of mail to be sorted by street and letter carrier's route. If you were lucky you may have found a stand to lean against. The mail was mostly Xmas cards with much illegible handwriting which slowed down the sorting. Philadelphia was laid out in a grid form and I did learn many of the streets but the following night I would be working on a different neighborhood. Breaks were brief and they deliberately kept the rest rooms cold to discourage loitering. A week of this was back-breaking and monotonous but I was seventeen and it was Christmas.
tjs

Neither snow nor rain....

The above is the beginning of the Postman's creed or motto. The USPS has announced that they will be delivering packages seven days per week during the holidays so don't be afraid to send mine on a Sunday. There is a strain of this service running thru my family as my father worked in the Post Office for forty-six years starting in 1910 as a twenty year old mail sorter. He became good at it and prided himself on the fewest errors. There were no ZIP codes then. He also felt that the Postal Inspectors would occasionally send a fat envelope thru his stack to test his honesty which offended him. Back then a government job with a Federal pension was a plum and he was rewarded later in life. Tomorrow, I will relate my own experiences sorting mail.
tjs

The Poets Society

Michael Beschloss' column Sunday recalled that Richard Nixon was an ardent football fan from his days as a third string guard on the Whittier College football team who were called "Poets" in honor of John Greenleaf Whittier. When he reached Washington he became friendly with George Allen then the Redskins coach. Nixon would design football plays - one of which was a trick play called a "flanker reverse" which found its way into the Redskins playbook and when called lost thirteen yards. So much for "tricky Dick's" hobby. Considering the current protests of the Redskins name perhaps they could be called Poets with the coach reading Shakespeare in the locker room.  It might make for fewer concussions.
tjs

Cue the Grammarian

"SO's your old man!" was a youthful rejoinder in the days of innocence. But Business Insider says that everyone is using "SO" to begin a sentence, particularly before a question. Silicon Valley programmers use it before an answer. Now I understand what "SO SO" infers and I get SO and SO, but that single SO hangs out nakedly reaching for a dangling participle. Even Gail Collins opened a sentence with SO. (period). You know that YOU KNOW is used as punctuation and LIKE is overused SO that I disLIKE it. SO, what do you think?
tjs

Antigua

N.Y. Times travel section recently featured this lovely British flavored island -Antigua. The last time I visited there was to join the schooner TIKI for a down island cruise. The headboat charter business was flagging and Capt. Ted Charles called me in New York and said 'You're in the shipping business and I am thinking of carrying cargo down island on TIKI - how much should I charge?" Finally, to establish his reputation, he induced a broker to entrust him with 200 cases of rum and when I arrived he was stowing the spirits below deck in the staterooms. I could hear the cargo creaking in the next room. I had to leave him in Martinique as a prospective buyer came aboard who I hoped would save TIKI from her otherwise fate.
tjs

Where to, Mum?

The N.Y. Times did an extensive article on the London taxi cab, that ubiquitous vehicle with the ample leg room and the color black which would have pleased Henry Ford. There are 25,000 roads in Greater London, some carry overs from Roman times. Prospective taxi drivers have to take stringent oral tests on their knowledge of streets, buildings, parks and the quickest route between points. To pass can take a four year effort and applicants can be seen cycling around at night making mental notes. But you can usually be assured that your driver will speak English and know the way. And no more farthings and shillings to deal with but the blokes still drive on the left so be alert when stepping off the curb.
tjs

Yesterday's reading

Yesterday I acknowledged to being an octogenarian in good standing but I would rather be sitting. Tuesday's reading was apropos to my situation. It was St. Paul's letter to Titus :"....That older men should be temperate, dignified, self controlled, sound in faith, love and endurance." But I must confess to having problems with that endurance!
tjs
P.S. - Thanks to all of you for your birthday greetings - the week was full of surprises.

Another Year

As a dedicated Scorpio I have to admit that today is the anniversary of my birth - once known as Armistice Day with a school holiday. My motto this year is "Four score and five and still alive!" One of the down sides of aging is your peers keep disaPEERing plus I can't identify all the Rap performers in the crossword puzzles. I also thought if I turned 85 I could be 58 again but that was a bad year so close to U.S. Lines declaring Chapter 11 bankruptcy and depositing me on the unemployment line. So I will stick with the Julian calendar and see what 2015 has in store. Thanks for all your good wishes and thanks to all the Medical Professionals who accept Medicare.
tjs

Guy Fawkes Day

While our attention was diverted last week by election results, we failed to mention Guy Fawkes Day on November 5th. He was a seventeenth century "protester" in a group trying to unseat the King of England and legend has it that Guy was the "guy" guarding the explosives under the parliament building. So that his harlequin image has become a symbol of "protest" and was adopted by the Occupy Wall Street protesters recently. But with apologies to my friends in the Lone Star State, this image has an uncanny resemblance to the junior Senator from Texas - himself a protester of record.
tjs

Truth is stranger than fiction

It is plainly evident that the Democrats took a real pasting in Tuesday's elections. The New York Congressman entrusted with seeing that that would not happen is taking a lot of heat. Of the fourteen seats lost three were in his own state. He had trouble recruiting suitable candidates to run and could not even defeat an indicted incumbent in Staten Island.
But during the campaign he did have time to write 40,000 words on his next novel. So while his attention was riveted on fiction, the truth bit him in the hindquarters.
tjs

My Sweet Tooth

Woe is me! The cannoli factory in Mount Vernon, N.Y. caught fire and burned to the ground. This pastry producer served a fifteen state market and it appears there will be a shortage of these sweets for the holidays. Followers of Seinfeld will recall that George curried favor with his fictional boss, George Steinbrenner by supplying him with cannolis. And remember that line in the "Godfather" where the hit-man said "Leave the gun but take the cannolis!" You could tell from his waistline where his priorities were.
tjs
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/bronx/holy-cannoli-bronx-pastry-shop-treats-factory-blaze-article-1.1999274

No Surprises!

Our motto at U.S.Lines was "No Surprises!" although in a labor intensive business with the vagaries of weather we had surprises every day. And after four score and five years on the planet, I still am surprised as I was reading my favorite paper's travel section last Sunday. The headline read "36 hours in Hanoi"! Now Jane Fonda spent more than that and John McCain certainly a lot longer, but it wouldn't be my first choice to spend a weekend. Some memories last longer than others.
tjs
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/02/travel/things-to-do-in-36-hours-in-hanoi.html

A Matter of Taste IV

Every election day I like to repeat this classic tale of why certain Democrats are missing at the polls. This story not to be confused with the fellow from down state Illinois who said that when he died he wanted to be buried in Cook County so he could continue to vote. Due to its age you may have to find it on my Facebook page or Google The Eagle Blue Chronicles under teejaysmith.blogspot.com and call up "A matter of Taste" originally posted 6/14/11.
tjs