The Gemini in me is coming out again and I decided to change things up, as I usually do once-a-year. I’m putting my daily Tomversation cartoon on hold for awhile and Ollie and Jacomo will be back for a run.
My brain needs a rest from the daily Tomversation. Coming up with ideas is not easy, but Ollie and Jacomo seem to write themselves. It doesn’t seem like much of an effort with them.
Time to pull out my Jacomo, “I Live for Summer” t-shirt again, I guess. I’ll wear it around NYC this summer – getting free advertising on the subway and stuff.
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We had a Waymo car visit our cul-de-sac the other day. They have been all over Miami, but this one came to our own neighborhood.
So many of us happened to be out on the street at that time too. It was early morning and I was out talking to our condo maintenance man. An elderly neighbor was waiting for an Uber, I helped her get to the sidewalk to wait.
A bunch of workers were on the street – they have been here for many months putting new drainage pipes in and raising sidewalks and the streets themselves. They were putting blacktop down, finally after all this time – the final stages to the long job.
A police officer wea present, they always are when work crews are present.
We also had a bunch of guys putting new pavers down on our property, so they were present, and so were some of our neighbors from next door.
We were all there, about 20 people, all doing our own thing. But when the Waymo came up the street, we all stopped and watched quietly in unison.
The street was blocked at the corner because the steamroller and other equipment were putting down the blacktop, so you could not drive by. There were barricades and a big sign saying “Street Closed” And there was the Waymo. Just staring at us all, wanting to cross the “Street Closed” sign and all the big orange barricades. We all stared back.
The Waymo stared us down for a long time and then slowly turned around. It took a bunch of maneuvers to get it turned around, but it started heading back up the road, from where it came.
One of the workers joked with my older neighbor saying that she should not get into the driverless car for her doctor’s appointment. But luckily, that was not her Uber. Her Uber was trying to get to her on the one-way street where the Waymo had turned around and was heading.
It was almost like a cowboy gunfight standoff. Both the Waymo my neighbor’s Uber just sat there staring at each other. There was nowhere to go.
The Waymo was not going to budge and finally the other car, the Uber, turned into a driveway and allowed the Waymo to pass by.
The Waymo won that fight.
We all laughed and turned back to whatever it was we were all doing. It was a funny way to start a Friday morning.
Till next time . . .
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This cartoon idea just popped into my head when I read a headline on Reddit that said, “Are we giving our children too many tablets?”
Of course they meant ipads and such, but I twisted it around in my mind and I saw this.
I didn’t know which type of tablet would be funny that children take – Tylenol? Flintstone vitamins? I let the cartoon sit for a day or so, which I do with many of them – making drawing changes and many times I make text changes.
Then I heard Jean Smart being interviewed on tv about her show “Hacks,” and she mentioned taking Ativan, as a joke about something.
I didn’t know what Ativan was, but it sounded funny, so I looked it up and I thought, “This will work.”
This cartoon is something I think about. Farro.
Every time people mention Farro, they call it the “ancient grain,” from the time of the pyramids. But so what? Does that make it special?
When you think about it, people did not live long lives back then, it’s not like farro was the magic ingredient that kept people alive and healthy. But maybe it did at a time when lifetimes were not very long – maybe it extended life to the ripe old age of 30.
I heard about farro years ago, Martha Stewart was using it on one of her shows and she of course said it was “an ancient grain.” And now it seems to be popping up all over.
I always picture it as being grown along the Nile River, during the time when the river flooded and enhanced the land and the grains being grown there.
The first time I had it was in a salad at Panera Bread. It’s sort of a mixture between quinoa and barley. I had barley in a soup yesterday.
Till next time . . .
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This recent “Moderately Confused” cartoon by Jeff Stahler had me laughing because it really hit home.
Most of Jeff’s cartoons hit home and make me think because he seems to think like me. So many times I’ll see one of his cartoons and think, “I think that!” or “That happened to me!”
With this bird cartoon, it reminded me of a neighbor, who the other day said to me, “Do you hear those loud birds in the middle of the night? I can’t sleep!”
It’s more like 6 am or so when loud birds start tweeting outside our windows every morning. I am up early, but they still annoy me. They sound like they are right in the house.
I knew exactly what my neighbor meant, and so did Jeff Stahler!
I sent this cartoon to my neighbor. He’s out of town and he replied, “Thank God I am out of town. I can sleep now!”
We have a rooster down the block who crows a lot, but he is not as loud as these birds. I think they are black crows. And peacocks roam the streets – if you ever heard them screech, you would remember that.
Speaking of birds. Lately I’ve been visited by a dove. Almost daily. He/she is quiet, and doesn’t tweet or anything, but I am visited for a few minutes daily.
I believe doves are someone trying to send a message. Maybe I’m crazy, but I believe that.
This guy, or girl, has been visiting me all week.
For a long time, a dove would be overhead on a telephone line whenever I would go to a friend’s house. One time I had a white dove outside my window for literally 12 hours. He didn’t move. I thought he was stuck to the railing!
When my father passed away, I said, “Dad, if you can hear me, can you come visit as a dove with Mom and Joey (my brother who had passed). And I don’t remember if it was the same day or the next, but three doves appeared on my balcony railing.
At first I saw only two, who were together, then off to the side, there was a third dove. It was them!
This is the father I saw in NYC last summer
Last July, I saw a white feather on the sidewalk in New York City. I remember it was on Lexington Avenue, near 44th Street. They say a white feather is a sign from above. I have only see the one white feather. But I’ am always seeing doves.
Till next time . . .
Subscribe via email to my blog and cartoons here – the cartoons will arrive each Friday plus occasional short blog posts are sent during the week.
I saw this old 1954 cartoon by A.E. Beard recently, and I didn’t get it at first, then I realized – that’s one of my past neighbors. Every time it was time to paint the building, he would say, “Why do we need to paint the building? The only people who will see it are the people in the water.”
We live on the bay, so he meant the people out in their boats, boards and kayaks would see the building and we wouldn’t since we are looking out at them, not at the building.
I explained to him it was to protect the building, not to show it off, although I guess it should look nice by being painted ever few years.
I think we have the building painted every seven years. We had it done recently.
My neighbor passed away last year, so he had no say in the job being done. We are also changing all the pavers out in the parking area, which he has been opposed to since I have known him. For over 20 years he stopped that job. Now it will be done. Some areas are sinking. It needs to be done!
We have had a lot of work done around here recently – lots of workers around. The painters were here for a couple of months, they even washed my car for me a few times. Before that, we had structural work done, due to the 40 year recertification rule, a Florida thing – they were here before the painters for a couple of months.
And now, for many months, the streets are being “repaired.” They are putting new drainage pipes in the streets, raising the streets and raising the sidewalks. Our cul-de-sac has been taken over since November and it is supposed to go on until June!
There is all sorts of big construction equipment blocking our paths daily. It’s a chore going in and out. But the workers try to be accommodating.
One of my neighbors said I was in and out too much. He said, “Why don’t you try and stay home during the day, like I do.” I should have told him I have things to do and people to see, but I just ignored him.
A funny thing about the whole street job is that I was gone a few weeks in the summer, and one of my neighbors was gone for almost two months. We both thought we were beating the system, by being gone while all the work was being done. Unfortunately, they started the job months later.
I do have to say that the guys doing the construction work about the building, the painters and these guys working on the streets are and were all polite and friendly. Overly friendly.
Just the other day, a cement truck sat by for a half hour or so just waiting to get by, while a neighbor down the street had his car washing company block the road with his big trailer set-up. I honked and made the car washers move. The cement truck guys just sat and waited patiently.
Till next time . . .
Subscribe via email to my blog and cartoons here – the cartoons will arrive each Friday plus occasional short blog posts are sent during the week.
There’s a section of Coral Gables that is the worst. For driving.
There’s a stretch of road, about a mile long, that has torn-up streets and potholes every few feet. No exaggeration.
As I drive down this street – Sunset Drive – I dodge the pitfalls. But the other day, I hit a huge pothole as I was driving home from Whole Foods and my tire exploded! Literally.
I believe the damage to the streets is done by construction equipment – dump trucks, cement trucks and more. The street is not some back alley, it’s lined with multi-million dollar mansions and houses, but it’s under constant renovation and construction. I’m really not sure how these well healed residents don’t complain to the city leaders, who seem to not give a damn.
They don’t have to redo the whole street, but someone to fill in potholes on a fulltime basis would be nice. The total Miami-Dade County is full of potholes, but this one street is one of the worst.
Luckily cars now have no-flat tires. They are airless tires. They eliminate punctures unless your tire explodes, like mine did. But the good part is that I was able to drive on it. You can drive up to about 50 miles on no-flat tires.
There are no spares and no jacks in the car. The first time I had a flat, I went into the trunk to look for the spare, and there was none. The space in the trunk is still there, but it’s empty! I freaked out at first, thinking they left the spare and jack out when I purchased the car! Then I learned about no-flat tires.
The tire gage will go down to zero, to alert you something is up. But the bumpy ride and explosion sound alerted me.
I ended up bring my car to get a new tire, and I was able to drive there without being towed. And that’s the end of that adventure. I won’t be taking Sunset Drive to Whole Foods anymore. I’ll take an alternate route. One that is outside Coral Gables and pothole-free.
I’m laughing about writing about potholes. I remember way back, when I wrote the daily news of our village, I would write about potholes sometimes and people outside the village thought I was crazy writing about a pothole, but it was a big thing, literally and figuratively, for the village. I guess not so much for much larger Coral Gables.
Anyway, $330.00 later, I am back on the road – only not that road, I actually took an alternate route to Whole Foods yesterday.
Till next time . . .
Subscribe via email to my blog and cartoons here – the cartoons will arrive each Friday plus occasional short blog posts are sent during the week.
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