Good Thursday morning.
I realize that we’re almost at the end of October and Halloween is less than a week away, yet I’ve barely written a word about the impending holiday. Maybe that’s because it really hasn’t been that big of a deal for me for…well, let’s just say a long time so I don’t date myself too terribly much.
When I first started dating Steve, his son was still in elementary school, which meant that Halloween was something of a THING. Like most boys his age, Jake wanted the most ghoulish and/or terrifying and/or cool costume possible. This led to a series of what were to me unidentifiable characters from various scary movies and video games.
His elementary school had an annual Halloween parade, during which all the kids marched up and down the halls, resplendent in their costumes. So I got my fill of cute princesses and animals along with ninjas and super heroes, firefighters, cops, etc.
There was one year, though, that Jake was really into Star Wars and decided to dress up as Darth Vader, which was absolutely hilarious because he was about three feet and change tall at the time. He was basically a big Darth Vader head on legs.
This did give us a chance, however, to do the family theme thing. I was Leia – with a double hair bun wig and the whole nine yards (thank you, The Costumer) – and Steve was Han Solo (or maybe Luke? Hard to tell the difference, really). We surprised Jake when he showed up to trick or treat, and it was really fun, though awfully cold.
At the time, we lived next door to a suburban neighborhood full of cul-de-sacs that gets absolutely slammed every Halloween. Part of the allure – aside from the fact that there’s no thru traffic – is the house inhabited by (I think) some gentlemen with a theater background and go all out with movie-level decorations.
I was – and remain – shocked at the fact that some parents basically drive their kids to this neighborhood, let them out of the car, and depart – or maybe park a few blocks away – allowing their progeny to run from house to house unattended.
Who DOES that? It’s especially mind boggling in this age of trunk-or-treating and other highly orchestrated and controlled events designed to prevent kids from engaging unsupervised with strangers.
Anyway. This was all a while ago now. Jake is a teenager and not terribly interested in Halloween, as far as I can tell. And we live at the end of a dead-end street that has no lights. No trick-or-treater in their right mind is bothering with this neighborhood. There’s just no bang for the buck.
We learned this the hard way when we moved in last year shortly before Halloween and invested in massive bag of Hershey’s miniatures. We didn’t get a single trick-or-treater, not one. And some of that candy is still around somewhere, I think.
I might be holding on to it as a hedge, because there was one year in the old house where I didn’t buy anything and ended up giving kinds a mixture of Kind Bars and off-brand protein bars that I dug out of the cabinets. I was ridiculed by my husband, but the kids didn’t seem to mind. Luckily, we were neither egged nor T-Ped.
This sort of rambling walk down memory lane wasn’t what I had planned for today. I was going to write about everyone’s favorite and holiday-appropriate orange gourd in honor of National Pumpkin Day and lament about the fact that pumpkin seems to have infiltrated EVERYTHING – from candles, body wash, and room spray to cookies, pies, and pasta.
Then again, no less an authority than The New York Times says that eating pumpkin is good for you – a great source of fiber, in fact, which we all could stand to eat a little more of here in the U.S. So, who am I to judge?
I’ll do better at staying on topic tomorrow. Clearly, after five years off the air, I’m out of practice.
SEVENTY-TWO DEGREES! Need I say more? Just a fantastic forecast for today, though it could be a little sunnier, if I had anything to say about it. But let’s not look a gift horse in the mouth. Soon enough we will be lamenting an endless string of cold and gray days, so soak it up while you can.
In the headlines…
After three weeks without a speaker, the House voted to elect Rep. Mike Johnson of Louisiana. He secured the gavel without losing any GOP votes. The final tally was 220 votes for Johnson and 209 for House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.
The new speaker has been in Congress since 2017 and has no experience in the House leadership. He laid out a plan for passing a series of government spending bills earlier in the week that attracted support from some of McCarthy’s detractors.
It’s a stunning rise for the conservative Donald Trump ally and low-ranking member of the GOP leadership team who is now second in line to the presidency.
Johnson, who is now second in line for the presidency, hosts a podcast with his wife called “Truth be Told with Mike & Kelly Johnson.” Its introduction includes words of praise from Trump calling him “a great guy.”
President Joe Biden, weighing in for the first time on the new GOP House speaker, brushed aside concerns that the Louisiana lawmaker would try to overturn the 2024 election as he did in 2020.
Biden cast doubt on the official death toll coming out of Gaza from a Hamas-run organization and acknowledged that the deaths of civilians are part of the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas.
Biden spoke out against retaliatory attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank in the aftermath of the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel.
“It has to stop. They have to be held accountable. It has to stop now,” Biden said at the start of a news conference with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who was being honored with a state visit to Washington.
There are signs that preparations are under way for an anticipated summit between Xi Jinping and Biden next month, analysts say, with more official exchanges between the two sides.
A consensus-based conservation strategy proposed by Colorado River states would likely ensure that the system’s reservoirs are stable over the next three years, according to the Department of the Interior.
A Manhattan judge yesterday ordered Trump to the witness stand, questioned him personally, found that his answers were not believable and fined him $10,000.
Trump stormed out of his $250 million New York fraud trial shortly after a judge fined him for violating his gag order and then rejected a defense attorney’s bid for a verdict in the former president’s favor.
In an all-day cross-examination of Michael Cohen, the former attorney went toe-to-toe with Trump attorney Alina Habba. Fielding questions from Habba, Cohen admitted in open court for the first time that he pleaded guilty to crimes he didn’t commit.
Rep. Jamaal Bowman is facing a misdemeanor charge for pulling a fire alarm in a Capitol office building last month during negotiations to avoid a government shutdown that led to a delayed vote.
Bowman has been summoned to appear in DC Superior Court 9:30 a.m. today, where the congressman is expected to plead guilty. He will also be booked, fingerprinted and processed on the misdemeanor charge.
Bowman has agreed to pay the maximum fine of $1,000 for one misdemeanor count of falsely pulling a fire alarm — a charge that carries a maximum penalty of six months in jail. He will also provide a formal apology to Capitol Police.
Bowman’s office said he made an agreement with the D.C. Attorney General’s Office that would lead to the charge being withdrawn in three months on the condition that he pay the fine and submit the apology letter.
At least 20 people are believed to be dead and dozens more are injured after two shootings at a bowling alley and a restaurant in Lewiston, Maine.
Robert Card, 40, of Bowdoin, a certified firearms instructor and a member of the US Army Reserve, is a person of interest and should be considered armed and dangerous, Maine Department of Public Safety Commissioner Mike Sauschuck said.
The city of Lewiston said that all municipal buildings are closed today as the hunt for a shooter who caused multiple casualties in the city Wednesday evening continues, the city government said.
The United Automobile Workers and Ford Motor have reached a tentative agreement on a new four-year labor contract, the union announced, nearly six weeks after the union began a growing wave of walkouts against the three Detroit automakers.
The agreement includes 25% in base wage increases through April 2028 and will raise the top wage, now $32.32 an hour by over 30% to more than $40 an hour, and raise the starting wage by 68%, to over $28 an hour over the life of the contract, the UAW said.
Shawn Fain, the union president, said in a livestream on Facebook that the accord would be submitted to the U.A.W. council that oversees relations with Ford at a meeting in Detroit on Sunday.
Ford CEO Jim Farley issued a statement saying he is pleased to have reached a tentative agreement and eager to get 20,000 Ford employees back to work at factories in Michigan and Illinois.
Nearly half a billion dollars in assistance to rehabilitate and replace bridges and culverts will soon be available to local governments across New York, Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office announced.
Hochul’s office won’t say who pledged to pay for the governor’s recent visit to Israel, an arrangement the state’s ethics board has not yet approved, despite her trip to the Middle East last week.
The state of New York has a new C-suite position: chief customer experience officer.
State education leaders say school districts in small cities have been at a fiscal disadvantage for decades, and they’re unified in pushing New York voters to approve a change to the state Constitution this Election Day that would increase their debt limit.
New York’s highest court narrowly ruled that law enforcement can search the state’s DNA database to find familial matches to DNA that they have collected in criminal investigations.
New York City officials have discussed distributing tents to newly arriving migrants and creating encampments in parks and other outdoor spaces, according to people familiar with deliberations among Mayor Eric Adams and his top advisers.
Only two houses of worship have sheltered migrants as part of a city-run program launched five months ago — even though up to 50 faith institutions were set to quickly join the effort, a senior Adams administration official acknowledged this week.
Students at CUNY, Columbia University, NYU and several other New York City colleges walked out of their classes yesterday — a demonstration in support of Palestinians as tensions in New York City over the Israel-Hamas war continue to mount.
Over the past two weeks, American public school districts have wrestled with the dilemma of how — and whether — to respond to the Hamas attack on Israel and the subsequent Israeli bombardment of Gaza, which together have killed thousands of civilians.
El Museo del Barrio, a Manhattan museum dedicated to Puerto Rican and Latin American art, decided not to display an artwork it had commissioned for its annual Día de los Muertos celebrations this month after the artists included a Palestinian flag in it.
New Jersey’s attempt to block new tolls to enter Manhattan risks the funding to improve the subway and bus network, New York transit officials said.
MTA head Janno Lieber wouldn’t name specific projects that might be delayed if congestion pricing doesn’t take effect as planned, but warned it could include “ADA [accessible] stations, re-signaling [of subway] lines, zero-emissions buses,” and repair work.
The City of Albany quietly recorded its 17th homicide of the year last week.
General Electric Co. says it will spin off its GE Vernova energy unit into a standalone public company during the second quarter of 2024.
Seven former female inmates who were held in custody at jails in Albany and Rensselaer counties filed lawsuits alleging they were victims of repeated sexual abuse at the hands of multiple former employees of each county’s sheriff’s offices.
Jurors will resume deliberations this morning in the murder trial of a Duanesburg restaurant cook charged with fatally stabbing his wife and 5-year-old son and wounding his 2-year-old son at their home nearly two years ago.
Next month’s Capital Region Black Expo will showcase tech workshops, fun competitions, Caribbean and soul food and organizations linking underrepresented communities to job opportunities.
King Tut, a longtime police horse known for his patrol from Caroline Street to the track in Saratoga Springs, has died, city police announced.
This is one of the saddest and most confusing stories about getting old that I’ve read for some time.
