Ponderous thoughts I was pondering ...

North Main Street in Mansfield, looking north to the apocalypse on Saturday.

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering while scanning the back yard for hints that green grass may be growing again:

** Well, if you picked this week for your vacation, my sympathies to you. As I look out over Fulton Pond (a/k/a, Mansfield's answer to Disney World), I see thick clouds and the concentric-circle patterns of raindrops hitting the water, accompanied by the sound of rolling thunder in the distance. And the forecast has plenty more of this through at least Wednesday.

Saturday afternoon, as I was driving through the center of town, I saw a thoroughly eerie sight -- direct sunlight illuminating the storefronts of North Main Street, but the view ahead was nothing but dark, foreboding black clouds giving the appearance of the middle of the night just a mile or two away. The photo can be seen above.

We haven't had apocalyptic thunderstorms here in Mansfield -- some lightning, some ominous rolls of thunder -- but we have had some good, steady rain. It's been much needed, as a lot of yards prematurely turned into crunchy brown carpets with the consistency of shredded wheat, something you don't expect around here until the dog days of August.

Still, as I mentioned in the opening, I think I see a few green sprigs popping back up again after almost two full days of rain. That's a good sign. Not so good is what happened in nearby Norwood, where they had more than 5 inches of rain in a short time. The basement of sprawling Norwood Hospital is flooded, forcing the evacuation of patients and the cessation of emergency services for the time being.

Thankful for small favors, but we are indeed fortunate that the COVID-19 curve in Massachusetts is pretty flat right now, the result of Bay Staters having enough common sense to wear facemasks and not bitch about their fundamental rights as Americans being violated. If we were having a surge like Texas, Arizona or Florida, and a major suburban hospital had to close in the midst of it, it would be chaos to the Nth degree.

Another reason why 2020 has been the year voted by the yearbook staff as "least likely to succeed."

** What a news dump there was on Sunday night for fans of the New England Patriots.

First, the NFL's penalties were announced in the case of the videotaping of the sidelines by a Kraft Sports Productions crew during a Cincinnati-Cleveland game last fall -- and they were pretty steep.

And second, the team signed former NFL MVP Cam Newton to a one-year contract, which would presumably put him in line to start at quarterback over Jarrett Stidham this season.

Then this morning, the news came that Patriots' owner Robert Kraft isn't totally out of the woods yet where his arrest for solicitation of prostitutes in Jupiter, Fla., is concerned. More on that later.

Cam Newton comes to Foxboro as a starter, not as a backup.

First, let's address the Newton signing.

I've got to admit, I was one of those individuals that said the Patriots would never sign Newton when the Carolina Panthers cut him loose months ago. I thought that Bill Belichick was willing to commit to Stidham as the successor to Tom Brady, and especially because the Patriots had very little room under the salary cap at the time.

But things change.

For one thing, Newton signed a one-year contract for the veteran's minimum of roughly $1.04 million, with lots of incentives added on. The cap value is almost negligible because almost all of the incentive-based aspects of the contact won't hit the cap until after he has achieved them.

At that point, Newton was exactly the sort of signing the Patriots love to make -- low risk, potentially high reward. As stated before, he's a former MVP and played in a Super Bowl. He's a multi-tool threat, although he's been saddled with injuries the past two years and will have a lot to prove once he steps back onto the field. His former Carolina teammates have nothing at all that's bad to say about him. And if he is healthy and able to use many of the tools in his repertoire, it will certainly allow Belichick and offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels to throw a lot of new looks at opposing teams.

And let's accept one basic premise -- Cam Newton is here to win or lose the starting position. He is NOT here to be a backup quarterback. If he doesn't win the job in the NFL preseason (and we're still not fully aware of what form that will take), I believe that Belichick will thank Newton for his efforts and release him so he may have the opportunity to catch on someplace else. That's a courtesy he has extended to other veterans in the past, and I see no reason for Cam Newton's circumstance to be treated any differently.

And yes, Belichick will do that. Just ask Bernie Kosar, Tom Brady, Lawyer Milloy or any number of other athletes who were cut or told that the team was moving on.

One thing that bothers me, however, has been the tone of some of the negative reactions to Newton's signings. I'd have to suggest that racism is behind some of the vitriol, which should come as no surprise. And a lot of people seem to be put off by Newton's unique post-game attire, which includes outlandish hats. "Belichick will break him of that," they suggest.

Well, no, Belichick probably won't. If Newton is attentive and committed in meetings and productive on the field, Belichick will likely be fine with Newton being Newton as long as it isn't some sort of distraction between the white lines. After all, he let Rob Gronkowski be a goofball as long as it didn't interfere with his football.

NFL Executive VP Troy Vincent
imposed the penalties.

** OK, that's my Newton take. Now let's take a serious look at the penalties for Whatevergate (no one seems to have come up with a legitimate " -gate" nickname for the latest videotaping incident), as imposed by NFL Executive VP Troy Vincent.

The Patriots were docked a third-round draft pick in 2021 and fined $1.1 million for the filming of the 2019 Bengals-Browns game (including field and sideline shots) that was allegedly done for the Patriots.com online series of video vignettes called "Do Your Job." The video crew, not affiliated with the football operation, was supposedly filming footage for use in a story about the team's advance scouts, and had credentials from the Browns to be in the press box, but the Bengals (a later opponent of the Patriots) objected to the filming of the sidelines.

In addition, the Patriots are barred from sending video crews to film any game action in 2020, and their video producer (who has since been fired) is banned from any and all NFL events.

Not unexpectedly, fans are crying foul over the supposed harshness of the penalties. This is the third time their team has been caught with their hands in the cookie jar over potential cheating, and it surprises them that the league would come down hard? And how hard was it, actually? Bill Belichick was not suspended, nor was the owner. The league seemed to acknowledge that the video crew in question was not affiliated with the football operation, but it's pretty hard to trust the Patriots when they keep getting involved in situations of this sort.

My advice? Take the penalties and just shut up. There's probably still more to come.

Bob Kraft is still being rubbed
the wrong way in Florida.

** And that brings us to Robert K. Kraft and his dalliances at the Orchids of Asia massage parlor in Jupiter, Fla.

According to an Associated Press story that hit the wires this morning, the prosecutors charging Kraft with twice buying sex from massage parlor prostitutes will attempt to save their case later this week by arguing to an appeals court that his rights weren't violated when police secretly video-recorded him in the act.

The story said that prosecutors will tell the Florida Fourth District Court of Appeal during an online hearing Tuesday that a county judge erred when he invalidated the January 2019 search warrant allowing police to install secret cameras at Orchids of Asia spa as part of an alleged sex trafficking investigation.

It's really a pretty pathetic tale.  Kraft, 79, pleaded not guilty but issued a public apology. The AP story said he faces a possible one-year jail sentence if convicted, but would likely receive a fine, community service and other sanctions.

Forbes Magazine ranks Kraft as the 82nd richest American with a worth of almost $7 billion, and not surprisingly, he is employing several high-priced attorneys to fight the charges.

What bothers me and many other people is that Kraft has painted himself and his organization as paragons of virtue. He elevated his late wife, Myra, into a symbol of his team's culture of community activism and commitment to charitable endeavors after her death from ovarian cancer, yet somehow, he failed to recognize how reckless and potentially damaging it might be to that image when he engaged in the pursuit of "happy endings" at a strip-mall brothel masquerading as a massage parlor.

I mean, the guy is worth $7 billion! He can easily afford having Asian hookers brought by the truckload to his Chestnut Hill compound and no one would be the wiser. But instead, he absolutely had to have his crank yanked at a massage parlor before jetting to the 2018-season AFC Championship Game in Kansas City the same day? Wow.

(As an aside, I understand there might be some haters out there who would suggest that I'm being holier-than-thou by criticizing Kraft, and might even suggest in retaliation that I've done similar things, without having any possible way of knowing if that's true or not. I'm no saint, but in this instance, I can truly say that those without sin can cast the first stone. I've never paid for it, nor would I ever. Especially at a "massage parlor." Ew.)

Kraft had better hope that his lawyers are successful in quashing this last-ditch effort to keep his case alive. I don't think the NFL is in a mood to endure another Patriots-related scandal without really bringing down the hammer this time.

** By the way, I will be working on a "re-mix" of three past episodes of "The Owner's Box" to address the MIAA's recent decision to scrap the plan (for at least this year) to let national clearinghouse MaxPreps create power rankings for the seeding of this state's high school tournaments.

After that appears as Episode 26, I'm also thinking that it might be time to end "Season 1" and start Season 2 -- after all, 26 episodes would represent one every two weeks in a full calendar year. Also, Apple Podcasts seems to like it that way.

Yes, I've got some plans for future episodes. The painful knee issues are still present and that interrupts the creative process a little, and July is basically a vacation month, so I'll keep you posted as soon as I make some decisions. Rest assured, "The Owner's Box" is here to stay.

** That's all for this post. Keep washing your hands and please keep wearing the masks. I'm sticking with latex gloves for a while longer, too. Let's make the commonwealth the model for the entire country in knocking COVID-19 on its ass.

Stay safe, folks!

Disclaimer: This post may be way too personal.

One of the points of reviving this blog back in February was to empty some of the desk drawers of my mind, and I knew not all of the topics I would address would be of general interest to the world. It's not an official blog of any publication and never has been, although I did use it 10 years ago as a means of repeating posts from a blog established by The Sun Chronicle, where I worked for 41 years prior to my retirement in 2018.

These days, this blog is mine and mine alone -- and that's why I want to share something personal with you. You've been warned.

I have fallen head-over-heels in love -- with a photograph.

It's a photograph of a real person, a photo of a woman (not a celebrity) whom I do not know at all, and will not identify here or even hint at because I realize this is the ultimate among pipe dreams. In fact, it would make me a complete fool if I even remotely tried to act upon it in any way, shape or form.

I'll offer a little bit of an explanation, though.

When I open Facebook, I'm often greeted with a feature called "People You Might Know." What follows are several photos of individuals that may have some connection to me, or have common Facebook friends. And several times in recent weeks, the first photo on the scroll has been of this particular woman, who shares three mutual "friends" with me. I'm very picky about Facebook friends and I usually don't approve requests if I don't interact regularly with those asking to befriend me, so they are legit.

And every time I see the photo, something ignites inside my aging heart.

I thought of trying to describe the pose of the woman in the photo, but then I realized that if I am too descriptive, someone might say "hey, I know that photo!" and I'd probably be ratted out.

All I will say is that the woman's eyes are penetrating -- expressive and welcoming, as if to say, "you would really like to know me." And she has an absolutely flawless smile. Her image is absolutely haunting. I'd like to say more, but it's too risky.

That's as far as my interest goes, or shall I say, how far I will allow it to go. My interest sounds strictly superficial and shallow -- that's probably all it is -- and it would be pretty creepy of me to investigate any further. It's almost to the point where I'd like to prevent her photo from coming up on that list, but I've got to admit, I enjoy looking at it.

It's the sort of photo that would inspire a writer to create a fictional narrative around it. And yes, I've given that some thought. There's something inspirational about the image I saw. But I'm also fortunate there, in that I never finish anything I start, so I'll probably never get around to that.

No, the best I can offer is a wish that my mystery woman has a good life, one that's comfortable, productive and safe.

And I feel better just getting that off my chest. Time to return to the real world.

Knee Update: "Better football through chemistry!"

The line in the title above comes from the movie "North Dallas Forty," where the North Dallas Bulls' star running back with the muscle pull watches aging wide receiver Phil Elliott (portrayed by Nick Nolte) take a painful injection of medication in his knee before playing in a big game. It's Elliott's way (under orders from the corrupt Tom Landry-like coach played by G.D. Spradlin) of trying to convince the running back to take a numbing shot and forget about any potential consequences because the team needs him to play.

Of course, it doesn't end well for the running back. But I digress.

The spot is where the needle went in. Ow.

Something similar happened to me Thursday, although not for nefarious means and it certainly wasn't to get me into the big game. There's not much of a demand for 66-year-old, 290-pound wide receivers in today's NFL.

As you probably know, my left knee has been a mess since April (if not for most of my life). So earlier today, I had my first appointment with a very accomplished arthroscopic surgeon at the Brigham & Women's health center at Patriot Place in Foxboro (I'll keep the surgeon's identity anonymous for the time being, as I didn't think to ask for permission to use it). After X-rays were taken of my injured knee to accompany the results of an MRI taken last week, the doctor examined the injured joint and came up with a plan of treatment.

Most of the damage is to the meniscus below my left knee, a combination of injury-related tears and age-related degeneration. There's some bone damage and arthritis present, as well as a few stretched or frayed tendons in the vicinity. The ligaments, fortunately, are intact. So the doctor suggested as a first step an injection of a combination of a steroid and a pain-killer into the knee (see photo at left), followed by three scheduled physical therapy visits over the next month. At that point, we'll reassess the situation, and surgery could still be an option.

It would likely be more of a cleanup operation than a full-fledged knee replacement, but I was also reminded that some weight loss would be beneficial to both knees. Anyway, the injection seems to be a common first course of treatment for people that have knee issues that haven't resulted in full-blown incapacitation, so I agreed to it.

It wasn't all that bad, although I immediately envisioned the aforementioned movie scene and regretted that, unlike Nolte, I was not gulping down a can of beer as the doctor administered the shot.

Several hours later, and I am walking without the cane I've been using the past two weeks. I'm walking very gingerly and I feel as if I'm dragging the left foot a little, and any thought of pronounced lateral movement is out of the question. But I do feel a little more normal -- still a few reminders that all is not right inside there in the form of a few twinges of pain here and there -- and thus the next few months don't appear to be on the road to being as disrupted as I thought they might have been.

But we'll see. I consider myself way too young to be heading for a future of inactivity (inevitable as that future may be). These two battered old legs still have quite a few miles left in them, I hope.

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering ...

At far right, Glen Farley and this blog's author are calling the game action.

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering while counting the minutes before a real orthopedic surgeon looks at my damaged left knee:

** The photo you see above is somewhat nostalgic in the context of the times. It's the press box at the Arnold Macktaz Field at King Philip Regional High School in Wrentham, and those two robust gentlemen standing at the far right end of the box are the North Attleboro Community Television (North TV) telecasting team for KP football, Glen Farley and yours truly.

I post that photo hoping that Glen and I can renew our roles in about 2 1/2 months, but as I type this, I have no idea if there will be high school football in Massachusetts this fall -- let alone whether I can make a reasonably understandable call of a game while wearing a mask.

Earlier this week, I learned that at least one Massachusetts high school has already canceled its upcoming football season -- Mystic Valley Regional Charter School in Malden. As far as I know, that's the only one. I've chatted with a few athletic directors in our corner of the universe and they are still planning for a resumption of high school sports as scheduled in late August, although they admit that they're awaiting directions from their individual school systems once it's determined how (or if) in-school schooling will take place.

All this comes at a time when some of the professional leagues are trying to rekindle themselves. The NBA will play a truncated playoff tournament with all the teams converging upon one city (Orlando, which just happens to be in the middle of a state surging in coronavirus cases). The NHL has similar plans in the works. Major League Baseball has finally approved a 60-game regular season starting at the end of July. And the NFL? As far as anyone knows, it may be business as usual -- although reductions in stadium capacity aren't being ruled out, as well as a few other accommodations being made to the rugged and uncooperative COVID-19 virus.

It is disheartening to see the huge leaps in coronavirus infections in the Southern states (and California) that chose to buy into Donald Trump's nonsense and reopened too soon. It's equally disappointing to hear from all of the undereducated conspiracy theorists that claim that wearing a facemask is a violation of their fundamental rights as Americans. If they truly feel that way, then I hope they feel free to take as many deep breaths as they can at one of the Nitwit-in-Chief's campaign rallies.

The only thing that may save then from a horrible disease is the fact that at the last of those rallies, there were two times as many empty seats than there were gullible and toothless MAGA sycophants in attendance.

Yeah, I'm generalizing. So sue me. I despise Donald Trump and everything he represents. You know that. And right now, he represents a cavalier disregard for anything that doesn't benefit him personally. We've lost more than 120,000 Americans to this disease and it's not gone yet, but does he give a shit? Not in the slightest.

I've gone astray from sports a bit here, but it all ties in. Here in Massachusetts, the COVID-19 curve has been flattened because we still actively wear the masks and endure other minor hardships so we can put this mess behind us eventually. That, in fact, is my hope for a high school sports season starting with King Philip's second game of the year (Jared Ware and Del Malloy would probably be calling the opener against North Attleboro) -- that the curve will be flat enough to allow a football season to take place.

Hey, if I have to, I'll wait. There will be plenty of basketball games for me to do at KP, Mansfield and Foxboro in the months that will follow. And if that means more people will be healthy and happy in our towns, I'm all for it. But I'd surely hate to see another high school season shelved as this past spring season was.

** As I mentioned in a previous post, there will be some changes in the upcoming high school sports season regardless of whether there's a COVID-19 interruption. One of them is the decision by the MIAA's Tournament Management Committee to shelve the use of MaxPreps for seeding the end-of-season tournaments for another year.

MaxPreps is a national clearinghouse for high school sports information that also has a proprietary and secretive system for ranking teams, and that system was going to be used for seeding all of the MIAA's tournaments starting this year -- replacing a simpler system where a team's record was the basis for where it was seeded in the tournament pairings.

The biggest complaints about the plan involved the annoying tendency of MaxPreps' schedules and results to be incomplete or incorrect, as well as the organization's unwillingness to explain its algorithms to those that wanted to understand why it ranked some teams ahead of others.

Over the course of my podcast, "The Owner's Box" (25 episodes entering a brief injury-related hiatus), several of my guests spoke about their concerns over MaxPreps' involvement in the MIAA Tournaments. What I think I'll do once I can sit in one place for more than 10 minutes at a time is edit some parts of those interviews together into a 26th episode that underscores the concerns that led the TMC to slam on the brakes -- at least temporarily -- on MaxPreps.

Then after my July vacation, maybe I'll be able to corral a few of those individuals for an update and ask them what they think the eventual outcome will be.

** As hinted above, I'm seeing a surgeon on Thursday morning to start the steps toward fixing my battered left knee. I read the explanation of the damage the MRI found, and it almost made me gag. But I'm no doctor and I don't play one on TV, so I'll leave the next steps to the professionals.

Flo makes the save, but why?

** Last on the docket tonight, I'm watching that Progressive Insurance commercial where Flo smacks away the newspaper that a delivery boy is throwing into the yard where it's supposed to be delivered. Why would she do that? That's preventing a family from receiving the newspaper for which it paid. And I bet that family would call the newspaper to complain, instead of blaming the insurance spokeswoman who's preventing delivery.

I know that's how things went in Attleboro. It was always the newspaper's fault, whether it really was or not.

These things bother me. And they really shouldn't.

Stay safe, everyone. Wear the masks.

Let's have a contest!

When I rediscovered this long-dormant blog back in February and decided to rekindle it, I had no idea what kind of response it would have.

It was incredible, as it turned out. Almost overwhelming, in fact -- close to an average of 2,000 hits a month since then, which is somewhat amazing in that I worked for a pretty small newspaper for most of my life and wasn't sure how many people would still remember me after nearly two years since my departure from it.

That being said, it's now time for me to reward you (symbolically, at least) for your loyalty.

This blog recently went over the 9,000-hit mark, according to the counter that appears on the left-side column of the Web-view version of this blog (sorry, not the phone version). Even though it's summer, I suspect we'll still be hitting the 10,000 plateau within a month. So when that happens, let's make a contest out of it!

The coolest coffee mug ever, and it works with tea, too!

The person that either hits 10,000 exactly or comes closest to it will win not just one, but TWO of my spiffy new "The Owner's Box" coffee mugs, emblazoned with the logo of my popular series of podcasts. Four other viewers that come close to the magic moment will win a mug apiece.

How will we figure that out? Well, I'll need your help. If you should open this blog someday and you notice 10,000 (or above it and close to it) on the counter to the left, I want you to follow these easy steps.

1. Either take a cellphone photo of the page or a screengrab.

2. Send me an email at theownersbox2020@gmail.com and attach the photo or screengrab. Make sure there is a timestamp to accompany the email, because that will determine the order in which winners are chosen.

3. I'll review all the emails and determine from the order of the timestamps who wins the mugs.

At that point, I will respond to the winners asking for a name and mailing address that can be verified. And within a short amount of time, you'll be drinking your favorite beverage out of the same mug given to guests that appear on the podcast -- and those mugs are proudly owned by people from here to Florida and California and back!

Just one restriction -- only one winner per address. No flooding my email box with timestamped entries trying to corner the market on coffee mugs. Take your best shot, and may the best emailer win!

We're just about 890 hits away, so I'll re-post around 500 to remind everyone. And thanks so much for viewing Blogging Fearlessly!

Division 1 boys' basketball just got a whole lot easier to win.

The 2019-20 Mansfield Hornets following their D1-South title-game victory.

I happened upon this little tidbit of information yesterday, that the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association has approved a lot of future alignments for several sports as part of the top-to-bottom reorganizing planned for the next two years. And one of the most significant results of this effort is that when the statewide tournament begins in two years, Division 1 boys' basketball teams can let out a big sigh of relief … because one of the best programs in the state will be dropped to Division 2 because of enrollment.

My alma mater, Mansfield High School, has won one Division 1 state title and appeared in another title game in this decade, and has been a consistent sectional finalist since being bumped up to D1 in 2010. But when the tournament goes to five statewide divisions based upon enrollment in 2021-22, Mansfield's relatively small enrollment will drop it to Division 2, where it will be the third largest school. A full list of the boys' basketball alignments can be found here.

This was not unexpected, although it is a little bit on the poignant side, given how those of us that have lived in Mansfield for any length of time remember the days when the school was the smallest in the Hockomock League and went 50 years between boys' basketball league championships. Indeed, the top-to-bottom athletic Renaissance of the high school in the 21st century has been a source of intense pride in the community because, in a large part, it has been accomplished in a home-grown manner.

Yes, Mansfield did undergo remarkable growth in the nearly half-century since I graduated from MHS. But the school does not recruit athletes from anywhere else and does not, as far as I know, participate in "school choice." It took a willingness to lead by example from coaches that may have moved here from elsewhere, as did long-time football coach Mike Redding and former field hockey coach Leda Levine, but put down roots in Mansfield and proved to others that success could be achieved here by making athletes want to be part of a successful and caring program.

Mansfield coach Michael Vaughan

Even more impressive is the fact that the boys' basketball team is home-grown from its very roots. Head coach Mike Vaughan moved here as a youngster and wore the Green and White as the Hornets' point guard. In 16 seasons, Vaughan has amassed 297 victories (average of 18.6 per year) and has a streak going of 12 straight winning seasons and eight straight of 20 or more wins.

That's pretty impressive -- even more so considering some of the huge schools Mansfield has had to vanquish on the way to that success (Brockton, Lowell, Newton North, Lynn English) or those with the benefit of being able to draw talent from multiple municipalities (BC High, Central Catholic of Lawrence, Catholic Memorial, Xaverian).

One thing you may notice once you peruse the alignments is that the five divisions are practically equal in size -- two of them with 69 schools apiece and three with 70. There are multipliers involved for parochial schools, so that is what is bumping CM, Bishop Feehan, Central Catholic and Xaverian up to D1 in the statewide system and pushing Mansfield down to D2. And in the new alignment, Hockomock League members Taunton, Attleboro, Franklin, Milford and King Philip (by fewer than 20 students) will remain in D1.

And there's still the possibility of appeals -- but we'll cross those bumpy bridges when we get to them.

For those of you from my old readership that are wondering how the other area schools fall in the alignments, the rest of the Hockomock League (Mansfield, Sharon, North Attleboro, Oliver Ames, Stoughton, Canton, Foxboro) will all be in D2. Dighton-Rehoboth, Norton, Seekonk and Southeastern Regional will all be in D3, Tri-County gets a bump up to D4 and there are no "locals" in D5, although local students attending Bristol Aggie and Norfolk Aggie will compete there.

Things are a little different in girls' basketball, however -- and you can see those alignments here.

Mansfield High coach Heather McPherson, who by that time will be entering her second year at the helm, will still be bringing her Hornets into D1 competition as the 65th-ranked team out of 69, enrollment-wise. Fellow Hockomock members Attleboro, Taunton, Franklin, King Philip and Milford will join the Hornets in D1 along with Bishop Feehan (the last school to make the D1 cut). In D2, Dighton-Rehoboth gets a bump up along with the rest of the Hockomock (Sharon, North Attleboro, Oliver Ames, Stoughton, Foxboro, Canton). Norton, Seekonk and Southeastern will compete in D3, Tri-County in D4, and the two aforementioned agricultural schools in D5.

The MIAA also made a decision last week about another thorny part of the redefinition of the high school tournaments, the use of MaxPreps to conduct seedings -- basically, to put the entire issue on hold for at least a year, rather than implementing it this fall as planned.

I'll have a lot more to say about that in a future post, which I'll probably start writing a little later today if I can get my knee to stop throbbing for a while.

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering (Part 2) ...

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering before I gave up on finding a comfortable typing position yesterday:

** Hello again. As promised, I have more thoughts to share -- not the least of which is the good news that an appointment has been made to see an orthopedic surgeon next Thursday and start the process of getting this injured knee back whole.

But first, an explanation of yesterday's interruption.

Bitburger beer, my antidote for leg pain.

I really wanted to sit at the computer and type, but the angle at which the injured left knee was resting was a problem -- not as much for the knee itself, but for the fluid buildup lower in the leg for which I'm undergoing treatment. The situation is improving, but it's still painful and that makes it difficult to sit and type, or to record a podcast, and so on.

Movement does help to some extent, however -- and so not long after I stopped typing, I headed out for some shopping -- and one stop was at the local boutique liquor store over at Mansfield Crossing for a brand of beer I figured they'd have when others locally would not.

I was correct. They had Bitburger, a brand of imported German beer that's very popular in the western part of that country and in much of the rest of Europe, and is now starting to get a little exposure in the US market.

Understand, I'm not a big beer drinker. I'm not US Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. I like beer, but I'm not going to become an obnoxious asshole and potential sex offender because of it. I drank a lot more of it in college and up to about my 40s, but I've cut down my alcohol intake a lot in the last two decades for no particular reason other than maybe I outgrew it.

But when I do drink beer, I drink Dos Equis … er, no. While I may be the most interesting man on earth, my preferences run to the crisp, clean tastes of beers from Germany or Holland. I want something that tastes very refreshing when ice cold but can hold its taste when it grows a little warmer. I don't chug.

So, I had heard about Bitburger while watching a movie, and I will try to provide a clip of that here. It's from "X-Men: First Class," the re-imagined origin story of the Marvel Comics mutant superhero team. The scene is when Michael Fassbender, as the master of magnetism Magneto, goes to Argentina in search of the German scientist that first discovered his power and terrorized him to bring it to the surface. He walks into a bar and orders a glass of beer, while nearby, two men notice what the newcomer has ordered and make note of his preference for German beer -- in this case, Bitburger. One askes if Fassbender likes it, and after a long sip, he responds, "The best." Then Magneto uncovers that they are both expatriate Nazis and he kills them.

So I looked up Bitburger and discovered it was, indeed, a real beer. And a friend of mine that has spent a lot of time in Germany confirmed that Bitburger was a palatable beverage. So I found some, chilled it and tapped into it as my left leg continued to ache.

I am pleased to report that after three 500 ml cans of Bit (the slogan on the can is "Bitte ein Bit," which is, I assume, means "A Bit, please."), I was feeling no pain. And since I was not going anywhere, why not? My doctors might not be pleased with my choice of painkiller, but I was -- and I can guarantee you that three beers is not going to send me down the long and winding road toward alcoholism at age 66.

Although … I have cracked open another one this afternoon. It's good stuff. Not overly heavy, smooth and full-bodied … like me!

Here's that clip (sorry about the pop-ups and ads and whatnot:) ...


** I have also arranged for mowing of my lawn while I am incapacitated. My thanks to the folks from Guerrini Landscape Inc. in Mansfield, who handle the big jobs for me at the beginning and end of the growing season, for the quick response to my situation -- although, sadly, it also coincides with a dry stretch here in Massachusetts that has turned my otherwise lush lawn a prematurely crunchy brown.

Yard and knee, both on the disabled list.

We really need some rain around here, and I figured out when it's going to happen -- somewhere in the middle of July, when I am supposed to be "on vacation" -- although in retirement, every day is a vacation of sorts. But that's just how things have been going in 2020.

I do wish I could get out there with trimmers and weed whackers. The overgrowth from the pond and other unwanted weeds have overtaken my capacity to deal with them at this point. They should have been addressed last month, and as this knee situation basically began in April, that was the opportunity for the unwanted vines and weeds to gain a foothold.

Ah, homeownership.

** The Bitburger is doing its job, but I still think I will retire to the living room to continue the Battlestar Galactica marathon (yes, I am a big nerd sometimes). The outdoor thermometer is registering 101 degrees, which is probably a little high given that the sensor gets direct sunlight after noon. But it's still brutally hot out there and there's no shade -- at least until I clean off one park bench in the backyard that my parents bought a long time ago and needs to have two decades' worth of lichens scraped off it. A task for later.

Cheers to all. Talk to you soon, and don't forget to listen to Episode 25 of "The Owner's Box," featuring my old friend Paul Souza and his successful battle with COVID-19. We'll have more podcasts down the road at some point, I promise.

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering (Part 1) ...

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering while squirming in my seat and waiting for the orthopedic surgeon's office to call me back:

** Hi, folks. Sorry about the length between posts, but these have been difficult times within the Farinella household.

The meniscus is the white padding below the kneecap.

As you are probably aware, I've had lots of issues with an injured left knee. Along with that, I've had swelling up and down the entire lower leg, ankle and foot that sent me to the hospital Friday night. Ultrasounds revealed no blood clots, so I was diagnosed with a skin infection and sent home with a seven-day antibiotics regimen, of which I have just begun the fifth day. There has been some progress, but I still have swelling, especially in the foot and ankle area, and the pain is significant -- and is not reduced by common household pain-relievers.

I had a virtual appointment with my primary care physician on Tuesday and he referred me to a very accomplished orthopedic surgeon, whose office I called just about an hour later. They said they'd get back to me, and that's where we stand as this is being typed.

I'm told that the repair of the knee should not be a massive replacement. The meniscus tissue beneath the kneecap and between the two sections of my leg is a mess, and will basically be cleaned up. Had arthroscopic surgery been widely available in 1972, this could have been done then and I wouldn't be having these issues now.

The biggest problem, as someone that lives alone, is being able to function at severely reduced mobility. It is certainly making me appreciate the plight of those that have mobility issues every day of their lives, and I promise you, I am not trying to minimize their problems by talking about my own. Indeed, I'm fortunate that I can still get around -- driving, walking very slowly (my leg actually feels better when it is moving) -- although there's not really much of a point in moving around when there's still a pandemic afoot and I'm probably better off to be riding this out where I am.

Pain, however, does impede the creative juices involved in writing. I can't get comfortable in a seat, and thus I start writing, and stop, start again, rinse and repeat. You get the idea. I have thoughts I want to share about things that have nothing to do with pain, but that's exactly what is creating the impediment to completing those thoughts.

I may just go into the backyard and sit in the sun for a while, telephones at my side and a frosty can of Bitburger beer in a koozie. Yeah, Bitburger. It's what Magneto was drinking in "X-Men: First Class." Look it up.

I will add more thoughts to this later, I promise.

Update: My knee is a mess, but I'm OK.

Brigham and Women's Faulkner Hospital, which I visited Friday night.

Just wanted to let you folks know what's up. 

Last night (Friday), I went at the recommendation of my PCP (primary care physician) to Faulkner Hospital in Jamaica Plain, now part of the Brigham and Women's system, to have ultrasounds performed on my left leg in the wake of issues that arose after I had an MRI in West Bridgewater on Wednesday.

That MRI revealed a host of damage to my time-worn left knee -- mostly with the meniscus, as I suspected. A surgical repair will be in the offing in the weeks to come. But I also had a lot of swelling develop in the lower leg in the last few days, hence the ultrasound order.

I'm glad to report that no issues (a blood clot was suspected) were found at B&W Faulkner. I'll be on antibiotics for a while to reduce the swelling.

My most gracious thanks to the pleasant and helpful professionals I met at B&W Faulkner -- including the woman that greeted me at the entrance who was from North Attleboro and was a reader of mine from the local Blue Ribbon Daily days. She was so helpful in getting me to the right place, and I'll be damned if I didn't catch her name. My apologies!

It's a lot more difficult to navigate around an unfamiliar hospital these days, given all of the precautions that must be taken with COVID-19 still lurking around. And I must note that listening to podcasts is a wonderful way to while away the hours awaiting test results. But again, the people who helped me were absolutely terrific -- and given what they've been through during the height of the coronavirus pandemic, I tried to be as cooperative and pleasant as I could be on what was otherwise an relatively quiet night -- quite welcome to them, I'm sure.

Onward and upward -- limping notwithstanding.

Why this flag needs to be banned.

After 155 years, it's time for this flag to disappear because of what it represents.

I have a confession to make. I used to own a Confederate flag.

More accurately known as the Battle Flag of the Army of Northern Virginia, it's the flag that is most commonly associated with the Confederate States of America, the breakaway republic of seven, 12 or 13 Southern states (even they aren't really sure how many there were after all these years) that existed between 1861 and 1865 before the Union Army, backed by the financial and industrial might of the Northern states, finally put an end to the rebellion, and essentially, ended legalized slavery.

Of course, the outcome of that war did not end racism -- a fact that is painfully evident 155 years after the fact. But I digress.

I was the product of an inter-regional marriage -- the son of Tony Farinella, a Northerner who was the son of Sicilian immigrants, and Jeanne Chambers, a native Floridian whose family tree can be traced back to the earliest English and Irish settlers of Georgia and Florida. My paternal grandfather came to America at the turn of the 20th century and my dad (the first native-born American in the family) served in the US Navy in World War II, and while I'm not sure if any members of the Chambers or Paulk families fought in the Civil War, at least my maternal grandfather, Buford William Chambers, fought in the US Army in World War I and had to endure respiratory problems for much of his life because of the Germans' use of mustard gas. His son and my uncle, Buford Jr., served with the Army in Korea -- and suffered from PTSD for the rest of his life because of it.

So I come from a family of loyal Americans, but also a family steeped in different cultures. While my mother relocated to Massachusetts after the end of the war, she and my father made annual pilgrimages to the little hamlet of Williston, Fla., until the mid-1970s -- and I was along for the ride during the tumultuous 1960s, when the push for civil rights legislation was at its peak.

The crossroads of Williston, Fla., in the 1960s.

Williston was a little town that had become isolated from the world when Interstate 75 plowed through about 20 miles to the east. Businesses closed along US routes 41 and 27 because vacationers' traffic no longer flowed past them, so Williston was practically a ghost town when I'd visit every April. I didn't know too many people my own age and I didn't want to hang around my grandparents' house all day, so I would just go for walks -- long, long walks through the crumbling downtown of one-story buildings (all painted white), across the tracks and all the way up to the Holiday Inn at the top of the hill, and then back down, past Williston High and the Methodist Church, the A&P, the gas stations that had machines selling 5-cent bottles of Coca-Cola and Dr Pepper, through the town again until I reached the railroad tracks that my grandmother said I shouldn't cross.

And why not? Well, that was where the black folk lived. Of course, that wasn't the word my grandmother used. She didn't use the six-letter word that has become one of the most offensive words in the English language, nor did she use the five-letter word that was considered proper for the time. It was sort of an amalgamation of the two, one that sounded proper to the white folks but still carried the inference of superiority and disdain.

Don't get me wrong, I loved my grandparents. But they were the products of a culture of which I wasn't a part. And even as a pre-teen, I knew my grandmother never really accepted my father, a swarthy "Eye-talian." When I came out of the womb as blond and fair-skinned, it was Bessie Chambers' most fervent wish to turn her grandson into "her special little Cracker," which was a phrase I never accepted long before I learned of its racist overtones.

I've never really been "down" with racism or prejudice. When I was a first-grader and riding the school bus from Mansfield to Dominican Academy in Plainville, I remember an older boy on the bus saying to me, "You know you're a Wop, right?" Of course, I had no idea what in the hell he was talking about. That popular slur for Italian immigrants was not discussed within the Farinella family. So when I quizzically said, "I'm a Wop?" and the older boy said, "Yeah, but you're a good Wop," and started laughing derisively, I thought about it for a few seconds -- and then swung my metal lunchbox around in a 360-degree arc and clipped him off the top of his head with it. Wham!

That got me thrown off the bus despite my father's very spirited defense that I was responding to an act of prejudice. As a result, my parents had to drive me to and from the school for the next five years.

The third storefront down was the 

entrance to the theater in Williston.

Back to Williston -- one thing I noticed during my mid-1960s strolls around the town was that there were two entrances to practically every building. It was especially obvious at the little movie theater in the building at the corner of North Main Street and what's now NE 1st Avenue. White people entered through the North Main Street entrance, while the African-American patrons had to enter in the "colored" entrance around the corner and stay clustered in a tight little area away from the rest of the movie viewers.

The first door was the "colored"

entrance to the theater in Williston.

And yes, there were "colored" water fountains (we call those "bubblers") and so on. And it was all a puzzle to me. I may not have been exposed to a lot of black people in my youth -- Mansfield was and remains predominantly white, although the old Yankees didn't want the Italians to move south from their enclave near the chocolate factory until we started marrying their daughters. But living and growing up in this bastion of liberalism, at least I learned about what the struggle for civil rights was all about. And that's how I came upon the realization that while my grandparents weren't overtly racist, and even interacted positively with many black people, I never got the feeling that they fully accepted them as equals.

Me at 6 years old with the new US flag.

And that brings me to the Confederate flag. It was about the size of the American flags that are placed at the gravesites of veterans. My father's grave has a sparkling new Old Glory next to it right now, in fact. I'm not sure exactly when I got this particular flag, but it was probably around 1960, about the same time the new 50-star US flag was introduced. We probably picked it up at a Stuckey's stand somewhere along US 301 heading south -- those roadside stores had tons of souvenirs as well as pecan candies and a very tasty coconut milk mix -- and I thought nothing of it because even though the flag was the symbol of a failed rebellion against the United States government, the former Confederate states still embraced it as a symbol of their "Lost Cause" to preserve a way of life (i.e., slavery).

For a while as a youth, I put it in my room, hung next to Old Glory, as a representation of my mixed heritage. Then it got put away, then it was rediscovered, and it followed me through moves from four different addresses to my apartment in a house bordering Bungay Lake (Greenwood Lake on your maps) in North Attleboro. 

My first boat on Bungay was my family's original 8-foot aluminum skiff, to which I attached a 3 HP outboard so I could motor very slowly around the lake and visit friends at the other end. And on the Fourth of July, boat owners on the lake would decorate their crafts in patriotic colors and parade along the shores, so I joined in -- adorning the little skiff with several American flags and one notable exception -- the Battle Flag of the Army of Northern Virginia that I had purchased 40 years earlier.

Needless to say, it was not received well by my fellow lake residents. And I couldn't figure out why. So I asked my friends at the other end of the lake, and the response was quick and adamant. "It's because of that fucking racist flag you were flying!" 

At first, I didn't get it. After all, it was just a part of history to which my family had a tangential attachment. I didn't really see the bigger picture. And also, in the town of Walpole just a few miles away, the high school's athletic teams were proudly called the "Rebels," and until 1994, the Confederate flag had adorned the side of the football helmets because their very successful coach, John Lee (called "the General"), had come to the school from Tennessee and brought the imagery along with him.

(As an aside, the "Rebels" name has become much more controversial in Walpole in recent years. Later this week, in fact, the Walpole School Committee will discuss whether the nickname should be dropped entirely in the wake of the nationwide reaction to racism following the murder of George Lloyd by a white police officer in Minneapolis. It's probably long overdue.)

After my friends' pointed comment, it didn't take me too long to realize what the Confederate flag truly represented. So it went back into a storage bin and was never unfurled again. My next boat, a 14-footer with a 40-horse engine, never displayed anything but our true colors.

Almost 20 years have passed since that episode, and the Confederate flag has undergone a rebirth of sorts. It has been further co-opted by hate groups that wave it along with the swastika-bearing flags of World War II Nazi Germany as a symbol of white supremacy. And yet these evil sons of bitches also wrap themselves in Old Glory as if being a detestable racist and admiring the most evil government in the history of the planet are comparable to American values.

And what does President Donald Trump say? "There were good people on both sides," he said after the Charlottesville marches. 

And he objects to the growing call for US military bases named after Confederate generals to change their names. It is rather curious that we would, as a nation, be so forgiving to those that rebelled against it that we would honor the traitors that led the rebellion. But in the context of the times, it was seen as a healing gesture. Still, despite the desire to forgive the sins of the past, there was also an undercurrent of racism (fueled by the Ku Klux Klan's influence over Southern politics) that prodded the move to create longing remembrances to "the Lost Cause."

Today, racism exists everywhere. I was driving somewhere locally the other day and I was passed by a pickup truck plastered with "Trump 2020" stickers and more than one Confederate flag applique. And it was registered in Massachusetts, the bluest of blue states in the union. Yes, I am reminded that this is also the state where a photograph was taken that preserves for all time the image of a white man using Old Glory on a staff as a weapon against a black man during the South Boston busing riots. Nobody in his or her right mind is proud of that. Fortunately, this state generally rejects the underbelly at the ballot box.

Which is why we, as a nation, need to act.

Even the Germans had the good sense to ban display and manufacture of Nazi flags following their defeat in World War II. But we Americans had the weird notion that we could somehow embrace the imagery of the conflict that tore the nation in two. And what was that conflict about? So one group of people could persecute another group just because of the color of their skin. One country put 6 million Jews to death. The other has persecuted generations of black people, even without the presence of slavery. And we're the good guys?

I'm all for a purging of the Confederacy. No statues. No flags. No honored "heroes" of the Civil War. For the same reason why we don't have a "Fort Benedict Arnold," it's time to change the names of military bases to honor the names of those that fought to preserve American democracy as practiced in a united nation.

That's not to "erase history," as some pro-Confederacy zealots claim. All of it should be preserved, in museums and accurately-written history books that illustrate the inherent evils of the Southern cause. It should be preserved not for glorification, but for instruction's sake. 

And with that, I have no problem with outlawing symbols of the insurrection. In the United States of America, there is no need to wave any flag other than the 50-star, 13-stripe banner of unity. Even those states of the former Confederacy that still cling to a similar design for their state flags should be so ordered to come up with a new design post haste.

I suppose someone will claim that Congress would be violating the First Amendment of the Constitution over the expression of free speech. There are those better than I that could and would argue that hate speech, and hate symbols, are not protected by the First Amendment. Let that battle ensue.

As I type this, however, I still wondered what happen to my Confederate flag.

I'm pretty sure that I rediscovered it in 2015 when I moved back into my childhood home and gutted it of what had filled it for the previous 60 years. I think that I found it in the garage and unfurled it, looked at it for a few seconds and let out a dismissive "hmmmph," and then flung it into the 40-foot-long dumpster in the driveway that would take all the junk away.

But I'm not absolutely certain. And because I've been dealing with a few issues that have restricted my mobility of late, I haven't had the desire to search for it. But I promise you, if I do find it rolled up in a long-forgotten cabinet space, I will set a match to it and record the moment for all of you to see.

It is not the flag that represents me and the America I love. 

The Owner's Box, Ep. 25.

Paul Souza, shown fronting the Velveteen Playboys, recently battled COVID-19.

We've hit a milestone with the 25th episode of "The Owner's Box," and it's an important story.

Paul Souza, a former standout Mansfield High School athlete, world-class high jumper at Penn State, successful track coach at Wheaton College and very popular singer with several rock bands, moved to Indianapolis a few years back and is still involved in sports and music. But all that almost came to a screeching halt early last month when he was diagnosed as having the COVID-19 virus.

Souza went through several days of pneumonia and excruciating pain in his head, his back and all over his body, but his good health and good medical attention pulled him out of the fire. He still has a way to go before he will feel totally normal, he said, but like about 800,000 other Americans, he's on the road back and feeling fortunate to be so.

After we get the scary stuff out of the way, we talk about his job helping to mentor young coaches, his young son's success at basketball, and how that dovetails with the very heartening news that Indianapolis avoided a lot of the violence during the recent protests of police brutality that was spurred by the death of George Floyd beneath a police officer's knee in Minneapolis. And you won't be surprised to hear that Souza has plans to get behind the microphone with a new band very soon.

Oh, and by the way -- send your best wishes to Paul's wife, Jill, as well. She came down with a mild case of the coronavirus but got over it quickly.

Here's a link to Episode 25 of Mansfield's most popular podcast. Well, at least no one has told me yet that it isn't.

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering ...

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering while counting the minutes before my MRI:

These bags aren't recyclable.

** The photo you see at left is of a thoroughly beaten man.

Last night, my balking left knee locked once an hour during what should have been my sleeping hours, waking me up with searing pain each time. Needless to say, I did not sleep well, which is why the bags under my eyes in the aforementioned photo say "Stop & Shop" under them.

I finally gave up trying to sleep around 7 a.m. and puttered around the house as best I could, given that most turtles could beat me in a footrace right now. Then around 1, I went outside to sit in the sunshine. But as I sat there, I felt really out of sorts and weak, and figured I'd better get out of the sun lest I pass out and end up with a really bad sunburn. I went back into the house and collapsed on the bed, where I slept for two unbroken hours -- long enough for the gel packs on my knee to melt.

The MRI is scheduled for Wednesday. Hopefully it won't take long thereafter to start to resolve whatever problem I have. Meanwhile, I can't mow -- and while some of my yard has gone dormant, there are some areas that are going to seed, and the weeds are overtaking areas that I would have addressed by now.

Getting old sucks.

** Here in Mansfield, the graduating seniors from Mansfield High School were treated to a motorcade through town on Sunday to mark their passage into the real world. I wish I could have watched from downtown, but the knee just doesn't allow excursions of that sort right now. Be that as it may, I send along my heartiest congratulations to the seniors -- especially to the senior athletes whose exploits I chronicled over the past two years in my role as play-by-play announcer for Mansfield High basketball.

It's been a damned strange year, kids, but what doesn't kill you will make you stronger. Go out and make the world a better place.

** Ditto, I wish I could have participated in the short march that took place Friday from the high school parking lot to the new police station in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. But I was there in spirit. It was peaceful and uplifting, and isn't that what we need in these troubled times?

But of course, the messages left on the local newspaper's Facebook page painted a different picture, insulting the marchers as disloyal to the country and offering support to criminal looters -- which, of course, was inaccurate. We do have our share of Trumpers down here in this corner of the commonwealth, but I just hope they'll shut up in November and go back to hiding under rocks when Joe Biden wins the presidency and throws the racist element out of the White House.

** This state is also starting to "open up" again, but I'm worried that this could signal a resurgence in coronavirus cases. Florida, which has been "open" for about two weeks, is now showing a surge of more than 1,000 new cases a day -- and one can only wonder what the numbers across the country will be two weeks from now in the wake of the large protests of the past week.

We're not out of the woods yet. But I'm retired, so I can keep hiding for a while longer.

** By the way, I want to make something clear. I don't support "defunding the police" because law enforcement is essential to any type of civilized society. But I do support the notion that police officers should adhere to the law while upholding it. Being a cop should not be a license to use excessive force against anyone just for the sake of it. That, however, should not prevent police for using force when it's necessary -- and indeed, it is often necessary.

It was my experience growing up in this small town that police could be corrupt. One of our police chiefs used to run the biggest whorehouse in town, in fact. But also, some of the worst "town toughs" -- the kids that hung out on the street corners and harassed younger and weaker kids just for laughs -- grew up to become cops because it was how they could use their bullying tactics legally and without recourse.

I'd like to think that times have changed. I know a lot of police officers in this town and others around here and they are outstanding individuals committed to protecting their communities. But I still get the feeling that every now and then a bad apple emerges that likes to use his authority to be overaggressive in even the least threatening circumstance, and that has to change. One way to change that is to create a national "bad cop" registry that would keep track of cops that break the rules, and thus prevent them from getting jobs elsewhere.

We need better men and women to do the job.

** All for today. Just wanted to let you all know I was still alive. Wish me luck on Wednesday.

An update.

Really bad day for the knee, but help is on the way. I have an MRI scheduled for Wednesday of next week, and that should be the start of the process toward healing.

Until next we meet ...

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering ...

The lawn is starting to take on a crispy brown appearance, far too early this year. 

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering while watching my backyard turn brown before my very eyes:

** It's been a dry time here at Fearless Mansion, and as a result, the lush green lawn of which I was so proud just a few days ago is transitioning to a crunchy brown a lot sooner than normal.

There is a benefit to this; I would normally be out mowing by now, but it's not necessary -- and that's a good thing for my aching left knee, which forced me to turn a three-hour job last week into one that covered three days. I finished the last segment a week ago today and it is the area closest to Fulton Pond, so it may be drawing some moisture from it as ground water to keep it green. Otherwise, most of my lawn in front and back is heading toward dormant status in a hurry.

There is some rain forecast for tomorrow, but it sounds more like a wave of showers and not a soaker. And I do try to follow the restrictions upon watering here in town because water supply has been a thorny issue for Mansfield for decades -- and especially since the completions of Interstates 95 and 495 made this town a desirable place for industry and residential growth.

Selfishly, though, I'm glad I don't have to be out there mowing today. I could be performing trimming duties along the fences or return to varnishing my back steps, but my knee is so sore, I just want to do nothing that requires moving. 

But there is also good news on the knee front ...

** I've been putting it off and putting it off in hopes that the knee would heal itself as it has so many other times since college. But yesterday I finally sent a message to my primary care provider and I will have a "virtual" appointment later today -- healing in the era of the coronavirus pandemic, yes, but at least it's a start. I'm too old to be in pain all the time and too young to be immobile. Updates as we know what is to follow.

** One of the things that convinced me to seek medical help with the knee was a trip to the supermarket yesterday. I would not have been able to make it up and down the aisles if not for the shopping carts, and even then, the knee (even with the brace) buckled a couple of times.

I do want to thank one young woman near the meat counter that noticed when it buckled and I used the cart to keep my balance, and asked if I was all right. I assured her that I was. I appreciated the moment of kindness enough that I forgave the two other people that did not observe the one-way aisles, and the one person that seemed determined to run her cart right up my ass when it was obvious that I was struggling to walk fast and was hugging the right side of the lane to give her the opportunity to go around me.

** It appears that the intense emotion in the wake of George Lloyd's killing by Minneapolis police is starting to subside, although there are still instances where the message is being attacked and undermined by the presence of looters or instigators looking to discredit the peaceful protests.

That being said, I think we've reached a point where the message is taking hold. People of good conscience are identifying with the deep anguish felt by the nation's African-American community, and rejecting the pompous blustering by an impotent Commander-in-Chief that is trying to spin the unrest as insurrection against the United States government. There are extremists at both poles of the argument, but I have to believe that the gains in race relations since the 1960s are going to eventually prevail over the setbacks to the cause of equality that have taken place during Donald Trump's morally corrupt administration.

Look, I'm a white guy. No denying it and no apologizing for it. I grew up in a practically lily white environment and my family was torn in its understanding of equality -- my Italian grandparents having faced discrimination and marginalization when they arrived here from Sicily in the early 1900s, and my maternal ancestors having been steeped in the white-supremacist culture of the deep South. All that being said, it was much easier for my father's side of the family to become part of American society within one generation because our skin color wasn't significantly different than the ruling class.

Racism was not present in my household growing up, aside from a few defining moments that I won't describe here only to say that they helped my Southern mother break from her upbringing. I've made my own mistakes in my lifetime and I'd like to think I've learned from them. I had a lot of "white privilege" along the way, but I also had a different sort of privilege -- that of covering a professional football team for more than four decades and learning from the African-American athletes that comprised the majority of those teams.

Barack Obama, the president we need right now, but not the one we have..

I asked this question to one racist individual on social media the other day. "How can you understand what black people in America are feeling right now unless you, your family, your grandparents and those before them faced institutional persecution because of the color of their skin for every minute of their lives?" Of course, he called me a libtard snowflake or some similar insult. But the fact remained, unless there is persecution in your background, perhaps you can't respond to the moment and fully appreciate what it means to a person of color when another member of his or her race has been targeted for excessive force by white police officers simply because of the color of his or her skin.

For eight years, this country was led by an African-American president that conducted himself with the highest level of dignity. Barack Obama wasn't the perfect President -- that man or woman has yet to be elected -- but he was a man of compassion, of faith, of belief in the systems of government and how they could benefit all Americans, not just the rich, privileged and white. And his family was equally dignified, great examples and role models for all Americans. And for the past three years, a privileged white man of questionable morality and intelligence has done his level best to eliminate every good thing President Obama tried to do for the nation that he governed with the intent of being the best president he could be for the entire population, and not just the 13 percent that shared the color of his skin.

President Obama has spoken up more in recent weeks, and I'm glad he has. We need to be reminded of our better angels and not the demons that are currently in office.

We need to be better. We need to fight the hatred that has a grip upon those elevated erroneously to power in 2016. 

All for today. Stay safe and be nice to each other.

This photograph should sicken you.

Donald Trump's use of the Bible as his defense of racism should make you sick.

The above photograph of President Donald J. Trump holding a Bible in front of St. John's Church in Washington, D.C., should make you sick to your stomach.

It is the most brazen blasphemy in the history of the presidency.

It is the act of a godless individual whose sole purpose was to curry favor with a gullible segment of the electorate that still believes that this man of privilege -- who sits upon toilets made of gold, has bankrupted his companies repeatedly, has cheated on all three of his wives multiple times, has paid out millions of dollars in settlements to the families of young women he molested in order to avoid prosecution, and even said publicly he would date HIS OWN DAUGHTER if he could -- is somehow "one of them," a supposedly "God-fearing" man of the people that will return our nation to a time when people of color were subservient to the white race.

Donald Trump is not a man of the people. He's a disgusting troll. He is a serial narcissist, a man who is concerned only with enriching himself and his cronies and establishing a legacy for himself as a supreme charismatic leader. He admires dictators. He feels no sense of responsibility whatsoever to the well-being of the nation and its inhabitants unless it can somehow enrich him. The people that would celebrate his tough-talking bravado would be cast aside violently by his bodyguards if they had the opportunity to meet him one-on-one in the street.

Despite his girth, Trump is a small and scared man. Any challenge to his authority is met with bluster first, then by cowering in fear. When the protests that grew in intensity outside the White House gates a few nights ago posed more of a threat than the Secret Service thought it could handle, he was brought to a bunker deep within the bowels of the executive mansion to huddle in fear. Even Richard Nixon, failed and flawed president that he was, still had the courage to speak directly to protesting groups outside the White House gates after the shooting deaths of four students at Kent State University.

Trump has no empathy for anyone or anything other than himself. He has yet to call for unity in the nation following the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis by overzealous police officers. His words of condolence are delivered coldly and without passion, and his understanding of the deep anger within the African-American community over yet another instance of excessive police violence against an individual of color is nonexistent.

And now, as the nation burns and his failed policies of divisiveness erode his power, he responded Monday not with contrition or commitment to change the narrative, but with posturing and force. He gave a nauseatingly smug speech in the Rose Garden calling himself the "President of law and order," while at the same time ordering the dispersal of protestors outside the White House gates by the use of force, flash-bang devices and tear gas so he could make this transparently fraudulent pilgrimage to the venerable old church, which had been slightly damaged during the previous night's unrest.

These were not looters or rioters. These were peaceful protestors, acting within their constitutionally-guaranteed rights to protest, who were forcefully moved in full view of television news crews by heavily armed and armored police units so a morbidly obese president could walk the short distance from the White House -- surrounded by more than 30 Secret Service agents -- to hold a Bible in the air (upside down), call his inner circle of advisers to stand around him (quite nervously, it appeared), and then to walk away.

The photo opportunity was egregiously offensive to the Episcopal bishop of Washington, Mariann Budde, who said she was not consulted about the use of the city's most famous Episcopal church as a prop. She called it, "a message antithetical to the teachings of Jesus and everything that our church stands for. To do so, he sanctioned the use of tear gas by police officers in riot gear to clear the church yard."

Former Vice President Joe Biden, the presumptive Democrat nominee for president who was speaking in Philadelphia earlier today, also criticized Trump for the Bible stunt. "I just wished he opened it, instead of brandishing it," he said. "He might have learned something."

Unfortunately, that's probably not true. Trump is obsessed with his image and he wants to be regarded as the American "strongman," a title usually used derisively to describe despots and dictators. Like the dictators he admires, Trump announced he would invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807 to call in the U.S. military to subdue riots in cities across the nation.

The law has been modified several times since its enactment and was last invoked in 1992 during the Los Angeles riots that took place during the trial of police officers involved in the beating of Rodney King -- and even then, only when California Gov. Pete Wilson requested the assistance of the military to back up the overtaxed police forces and National Guard units.

Trump was within his authority to call in U.S. Army units in Washington because the District of Columbia is federal territory. He has very little authority to send troops into the individual 50 states unless that help is specifically requested by the governors. And already, many governors have told Trump to keep the military out of their states.

This is what it comes to. Trump is clearly trying to turn this civil unrest into his justification for seizing authoritarian levels of power. We have awakened today to see our precious country on the brink of becoming a dictatorship under a failing president that wants to usurp the military to protect his eroding justification to remain in office.

Even Nixon at his worst still understood in the final moments of the Watergate crisis that he was harming the nation by clinging to power. Nixon still loved the country. Trump loves the country only as far as it can further his megalomaniacal pursuits of self-aggrandizement. And I'm convinced that no matter what happens in the November election -- even if Joe Biden wins the popular vote by 10 million and the Electoral College by a comfortable margin -- Trump will claim voter fraud and call for the Second Amendment gun nuts to whom he has pandered to take to the streets and prevent the peaceful transfer of power by any means necessary.

This is not America.