Thursday

The Republican Convention closed tonight with Trump's acceptance speech. That's it, the first half of this circus is over. Next week starts the second act and then they will start abusing each other.

Very exhausting the whole thing.

As a matter of fact I got so exhausted from all this political hullabaloo that I decided to take a week off.

Friday morning my wife and I are leaving for week of well deserved vacation in Hawaii. Never been there and I am excitedly looking forward to it.

Until my return have a good Summer!

Wednesday

I have been watching the Republican Convention and I am totally flabbergasted by the way these delegates behave and look.

First of all most of them dress like clowns. Second, they all behave like nuts. I don't know what they smoke but if these are the elites of the party the Party is in big trouble.

I'm sure the Democratic delegates are not any different either.

It seems to me they only go to the convention to have a good time, eat and drink free and have a good time. The fact that they are supposed to elect a presidential nominee is secondary.

No wonder the VIPs don't want to associate with them only when it is absolutely necessary. Otherwise they stay in their separate areas where they do whatever VIPs do. But they certainly do not mingle with that motley crew that composes the national delegates.

Anyway, last night Trump was elected to be the Republican Presidential nominee. We watched it on TV because this is the only interesting part of the entire boring convention scene.

This is where every state and territory gets its two minutes of fame.

Now that he is the nominee the real mudslinging will begin. Also, most of the politicians who were against him will now change their colors and will start to stand behind him. These are the people with real convictions.

Their motto is: bend with the wind.

Tuesday

As not turned outlay smart TV was smart I was the non-smart. This morning the cable company sent out a technician who spent about an hour setting up the TV and other things connected to the new equipment.

I don't want to ruin it because I am superstitious but right now it is working and hopefully it will continue to.

I was the non-smart because I was not able to figure it out but to my excuse there was not a shred of paper or a manual showing how to do the set up.

Something else.

Last night we were watching the Republican Convention. It was fairly entertaining and I think all the participants should be on the America Got Talent show. They might not necessarily win but they would certainly be entertaining.

Since I will be away next week, like in Hawaii for a week, I will not waste my time watching the Democratic Convention which promises to be dull and boring. And I will not waste my time on such a nonsense. Certainly not while we are in Hawaii and there are more interesting things to do there.

Monday

Sometimes life dishes out annoyances that can drive one crazy and at the end it turns out that there was no problem at. If I could see the end I would not be annoyed at all but right now the end is in no sight at all.

Sunday we bought two smart TVs. One we plugged in and it worked like a charm. The other just does not want to start up.

Today we had the cable company replace the cable box thinking that the other one was a non-smart box but we still can not get that damn thing working.

One of the problems is that neither the new TV or the cable box come with any instruction booklets. I guess they think people already know everything so why bother.

A while back I bought a new Apple computer. I thought there would be an instruction manual with it. But no, there was none. However, the manual can be downloaded from the Internet.

How does one download a manual if that damn computer does not work?

I think this is again the chicken or the egg syndrome.

Sunday

Lately we stay up doing things until one or two in the morning. Understandably we do sleep late in the mornings unless there is something pressing going on.

Last week we had a dental appointment for Abigail at the ungodly hour of nine. This coming Monday we are having the same again. On Tuesday I am having a dentist appointment at eight am.

Don't these doctors believe in letting the patients sleep late and stay healthy? I will have a skin procedure done in early August where I must be present at 7:30 in the morning. Make matters worse it is in Manhattan.

I will have to go in on the subway with the working people. Please!

A couple of weeks ago I had my bi-annual physical which included a complete bloodworm. On this past Friday I received a copy of the results from my doctor and I am happy to say that everything was perfect.

My lovely wife takes care of me, watches over me and protects me from everything that can cause harm. She also feeds me vitamins and it seems that all this care work because my results were never ever this good.

Now if I could go to the beach once or twice life would really be perfect.

Saturday

They say that bad things or deaths come in threes. This has not been scientifically proven but it many times happened that way in the past.

Well, it just happened that way in our house. Two television sets and a fairly large paper shredder just all died, mysteriously I might add at the same time.

One TV had a pretty large yellowish strip down the middle of the screen for quite a while, the other TV just begun to be very dark and with today's sophistication "brightness" was not possible to control. The shredder died because of my clumsiness. I was trying to empty it out when I dropped the heavy head and it just broke to pieces.

Today we decided to replace all these items. Final result: bought two new TV sets and a new shredder.

The last was easy to install. Open the box, stand up the machine, plug it in end it works. One, the smaller bedroom TV was just as easy. Place it on top of the cabinet, plug it in and it worked. The second TV is a bastard.

It was placed in its place, plugged in and into other locations and...nothing. The damned thing didn't work. We spent over an hour trying to figure out what was wrong and at the end just gave up. Since this is a "smart TV" we thing it is too smart for the current and fairly old cable box.

Solution is to replace the cable box. Hopefully it will solve our problem and it will not be necessary to call the cable company to send somebody out.

I think this "smart" Tv will be too smart for us, at least for me.

Right now it is 1:30 in the morning and I hope you can appreciate my dedication. After this, shower and sleep! Maybe!

Right now my lovely wife is standing very close to me while I am writing so I'm done.

Friday

Since we spent time on the beach we saw some very interesting happenings in Daytona Beach. At night we noticed a lot of people walking around in the dark with flashlights in their hands. Couldn't figure out what was the reason until somebody local enlightened us.

It seems at this time of the year sea turtles come to shore and lay and bury their eggs in the sand. These people were looking for the eggs. I don't know how they found them if they were buried but they did. I also don't know what they did with them. I'm sure they are not good for scrambled eggs. But maybe turtle eggs are.

Anyway these things are protected and not supposed to be disturbed. We heard that when they hatch there are thousands and thousands of young turtles trying to make it to the ocean and people come out and watch them. Must be interesting.

We don't have anything like this in New York. Anything that tries to make it to the sea is people in cars and nobody really watches them or cared if they make it or not.

Something else.

I noticed a phenomenon while on Daytona Beach that was not noticeable anywhere else.

Old people who were very useful.

At first at the airport the people who pushed wheelchairs on and off the planes to help the handicapped passengers were all older people. At the car rental desks there were not the usual "attractive" bunch but older people.

In town I visited a few large national stores and at the cash registers and the security guards were all without exception older people. When we left Daytona back to New York the airport security people working for the TSA were all upper middle age or higher.

This was very new to me. Living in New York I kind of got used to old people having no purpose in life. There is no place one can go where they can see older people working.

This is another reason I might consider living there. If I ever want to start a new career that is the place.

Thursday

Today is Thursday and I know I kind of disappeared from the scene for a few days. But I do have an explanation that at leas for me sounds very acceptable.

Monday morning my wife and I flew to Daytona Beach, Florida for a few days. We went there to take care of a few things that were absolutely necessary and could not be done through he mail or the Internet.

So, we had a choice of driving down or flying. We choose flying and I was very glad we did. Getting there inn two hours beats driving 17 hours anytime.

We bought a package which included flying and hotel and it worked out just fine. The weather was great meaning extremely hot and humid. We also had time to do some beaching which was great because the hotel was right on the beach.

My wife's daughter lives there so we had plenty of time to be with her, too.

We did our business then we beached then dinner and walked around a lot. Daytona Beach is a very nice seaside community with hotels and condominiums lining the oceanfront. One is larger than the other and each one is tastefully colorful.

I am nuts about palm trees and I was happy because I had the chance to see large and healthy palms. St. Maarten is also palm country but somehow those are all sickly looking now that I can compare them to another location.

The place is nice and quiet. There were many vacationers but the town was not overrun with them. Daytona has a few annual events like the Daytona 500 NASCAR Race, the Harley Davidson gatherings, antique cars show and these bring large crowds to the town.

Last year when we were there was one of the Harley Davidson gatherings and I tell you it was very interesting. It gave lots of life to the town.

I don't know, maybe when I get old I'll retire there. One never knows.

Thursday/Friday

I missed a day but it is excusable since in our household there is never a dull moment. And, time flies like a jet. By the time I realize what time it is it is already late night or rather early in the morning.

The past few days have been spent around Abigail and her well being.

Yesterday after her sleepover in a girlfriend's house we went with her to see an eye doctor and after the eye doctor immediately to the eye glass store to order new glasses.

This morning we had an early appointment with a dentist who looked over Abigail's teeth. The result was there were three baby teeth still stuck inside her mouth that needed to be extracted. To give her credit she behaved very heroically during the entire process.

Her teeth were x-rayed, examined, cleaned and some extracted and during the entire process not a word out of her.

Next week filling some cavities then talking about braces.

I had to go to a dermatologist today because the years of sunbathing created some problems on my gorgeous face and it need to be corrected.

Otherwise we are suffering just like anybody else because of the extreme heat in the city. But like in all previous years we will survive.

Wednesday

For a few days now Abigail was on a campaign trail for her Mom to let her go on a sleepover to girlfriend's house. This girl lives very close to us and the two of them are very good friends. They go to the same school for the past two years and this girl will go to the same school where Abigail will go.

So her campaigning paid off, her Mom let her go.

She called a few times and it seemed they were having a great time until...

Abigail likes to jostle her friends and she is convinced that it is funny. Well, maybe for fourteen year olds it is funny.

Earlier this afternoon she called me because she is convinced that talking to me is easy than talking to her Mom.

It seems that while they were playing the girl's mom she pushed her friend off the be and in the process of fallen her friend fell on her laptop and damaged the screen. I have to add that the computer  is still working.

But Abigail feels very bad about it and she already texted all kinds of apologies. She called me and was trying to work out some deals to get me on her side. I assured her that even though she did wrong we still love her but she should try to behave a little more civilized.

As a final note, the girlfriend's mother said she didn't care if the computer is fixed or not. Obviously it is not such a big deal for the parents.

Tuesday

Today and lately almost every day our world revolves around Abigail. For her school being over is almost like a tragedy. Every day she needs a program and no matter what we suggest it is never the right thing. But whatever her friends propose it is always the right thing.

Today was a first of its kind. We took Abigail to the doctor for her first in recent years checkup. She got a new health insurance coverage and we took advantage of it by taking Abigail there.

The good news was that she did receive clean bill of health. Thursday we are taking her to a dentist and then to an eye doctor also for a routine look see. We are keeping our fingers crossed that nothing wrong will be found.

She is small and thin but strong as an ox and has a tremendous endurance. Doesn't eat much but still the doctor was very satisfied and naturally so were we.

The difference between her and I is that my doctors want to see me every six months while her doctor said once a year is plenty.

Monday

In March of this year I bought a brand new, 2016 Hyundai santa Fe. I had a leased 2014 same model car that was turned in early about seven months ahead of its time.

The dealer assured me that there was no problem because they would pay Hyundai the remaining amount and I will be in the clear with that car. Naturally this was not done out of the goodness of their hearts but it was calculated into the sales price.

Difference between myth and reality is that the money which was over $6000 was never ever paid to Hyundai.

I found it out when I was checking my credit score and was dismayed at the low rating I received.

Reason was that I had an outstanding non payment of over $6000 to Hyundai. You can imagine how upset I was. I immediately called the dealer and talked to the sales person I dealt with. Long story, longer explanation, none of them very believable. But at the end I was assured (again) that all would be taken care of and my credit rating would not suffer.

That was several days ago and the unpaid amount is still there lighting up debtors' sky.

I'm really ticked about this. I wrote a (I think) pretty strong letter to general manager of the dealership about this and demanded that they would rectify the problem including my credit rating.

Being a holiday today the letter is still here but just writing it made me feel already better.

Sunday

Fireworks are not allowed in New York City. Yet, it seems everybody in the suburban communities have them.

It is now the evening of July 3rd and the place sounds like a revolution is going on. There are non stop popping sound in the air. Even though we have clear visibility I can not see any of these fireworks but the sounds are very distinct.

They remind me of Budapest after the 1956 October events when we slept with our windows open and sporadic gunshots were heard throughout the nights. Didn't bother me then and they don't bother me now.

Tomorrow being July 4 will be probably worst. They don't do any harm except when some innocent idiot gets hurt.

Something else.

Tonight we went out with some friends to a Romanian restaurant. I think this was my second excursion to Romanian eating but this time it was by far the best.

I think we were lucky because one of our friend is Romanian, speaks the language and knew everything there was to know about the food. And, she did't let us down.

We started with a mixed plate as appetizer. Whatever this plate had on was great and tasted good. Short of a few small items we polished off everything. This was followed a Romanian soup with meat dumplings in it. We actually split one soup between my wife and I.

The main course for my wife was very well prepared pork cutlet while I finished off a whole fish that was perfectly ad thoroughly fried. We washed all this down with some good Romanian beer.

The dessert was some kind of cake with sour cream and jam on top.

It was a good evening.

And now, good evening!

Saturday

Today is the first day of the Fourth of July long weekend. Since this year it falls on a Monday thus the long weekend.

For people like me it doesn't mean a thing. Except that places are not usually crowded will be extremely crowded this time.

Why it doesn't mean a thing? Because when one does not work every day is like part of a long weekend. We are not planning to do anything special that we could not do during regular weekdays. People are generally lucky because the weather is forecasted to be nice.

Yesterday afternoon there was a tornado watch in my area but thankfully nothing serious happened except torrential rain. We were out driving and I have to admit I didn't see such heavy rain in a very long time. If it were snow we would be still digging out.

The beauty of this rain was that on the way home we had the chance to see a beautiful rainbow.

Friday

One of the biggest and sanctioned scammers are the airlines. They say that they are providing a service but the way I see it we the traveling public is providing the service by keeping them alive.

We are planning to go West sometimes in August and were trying to get the proper airfare. Every time we logged on on any airline to check out the available flights there were different fares listed.

Returning flights leaving back to New York leave around 6 am are the least expensive and as the day goes on so do the price of tickets. It seems they are really using the supply and demand rule.

You want to sleep a little later and not getting up at 2 am than pay for the "privilege" of flying later. I can not believe that it costs more or less for the airlines at what hours they are flying.

This is government sanctioned scam and there is nothing anybody can do about it. Washington is talking but nothing ever happens.

They are saying how expensive it is to travel yet, the airports are crowded and the planes are full. You sure it out!

Thursday

Like everybody else we are also getting our daily dose of scam telephone calls. Some introduce themselves and ask for me by my first name like were old buddies while some try to pronounce my last name with extremely limited success.

Some speak good English while some have limited language ability.

I came to the conclusion that anybody who calls me by my first name and says Mister so and so is not calling from this country but very likely from India. Indians have the tendency to call a person Mr,. Joe or Mr. Joseph. Americans don't do that.

Anyway, I am so sick of these class that more than once when I had a chance to talk to a live person I told them where to go and what to do. Most of the time they hang up half way through my tirade.

Very funnily one day a number kept calling. I finally picked up the phone and answered in a strong and angry voice. The person on the other side hung up. Next time they called again and I answered sounding like a little old lady. Well would you believe, they stayed on the line and started talking until I sent them on their way.

It is terrible that there is nothing we can do about these scam calls. I reported one or two frequent numbers but nothing really happened.

I will think very hard and next time they call I'll ry to scam them.