The Daily News

Ladies and Gentlemen!

Your Candidates!

Nice to see

we in good

hands.

'Murica.

I swear

to you.

The Daily News

1 So. Just like that.

2 Trump v. Clinton.

3 For one of the first times in my life, I'm speechless.

4 I got up this morning and took a walk before I read or saw any news. It gets busy on a Wednesday; it must be Leaf-Blow Day, because everything buzzed and smelled like newly-mowed grass soaked in gasoline.

5 I walked darned close to four miles, following a record daily average of 5.28 miles last night.

6 When I go for a short hike, I usually go into Raley's to get a paper, but for some reason, I held off this morning. I thought I should begin learning not to buy things on a whim.

7 Took me a lifetime, of course, maybe two, but some of us are just plain slow of study. This time I stayed the course, and remained focused. I walked and walked, and then I walked some more. And I wasn't going to go into the supermarket and spend money on an impulse-buy. Instead, I walked on.

8 What's fun is that on the way home, I saw a penny on the sidewalk. I loved it. I looked up at the sky and smiled.

9 I am never too proud when it comes to that. I always felt a penny on the sidewalk is money in the street, and good luck to boot.

10 I reached to pick it up, but it was face down.

11 I didn't hesitate to pick it up anyway, but I wondered: is possible that might be considered bad luck?

12 It probably is whatever luck you make it. I do feel that we can control those sorts of things with good thoughts.

13 The nice thing about walking around is that the mind wanders.

14 I don't pay much attention to most of it. But I did begin to think of hobbies, and how it would be fun to have a hobby. I already have a few, but none I take too seriously. Especially not writing. But my mind always thinks of things anyway. Yesterday was one such day.

15 While I walked, my mind wandered to a short story about an geezer walking around for exercise, finding an upside-down penny (in a story, that would not be a good foreshadowing), and then it all vanished. Poof. Thoughts come and go like that, don't you know.

16 I looked down at my big ol' socks tucked into my top-of-the line Tevas, and moved forward on the sidewalk. I glanced up at the sky, and noticed that it was pink, the sun not quite up yet, and I noticed that it had three different chem trails, split evenly, as if by design.

17 I then walked along a sort of flume near my house. I looked down at a broken umbrella I saw several weeks ago.

18 Right next to the bent-up thing lay a canvas grocery bag muddied from the recent rains. I sighed, because I don't understand people and litter.

19 To me, it's like deliberately throwing garbage on your front lawn.

20 I also looked into the flume. When I first began walking that route, I had noticed a metal shopping cart stuck right next to what looked like a cement boat-ramp, the waters of the flume trickling around it.

21 My first thoughts were this: "That must have been a bunch of kids with nothing better to do!"

22 Before you judge me on that clearly prejudicial call, allow me this: We live right next to an elementary school, and within a mile of a high school.

23 That being said, I caught myself. "Why do you conclude it was young people?" I asked. I glanced up at an apartment building overlooking the area.

24 On the second floor, I saw a porch that had around six garbage bags stacked up.

25 I again judged. "That husband must be one lazy sunnuvva..."

26 I then thought, "There are clearly plenty of shopping carts on the premises." I personally used to walk shopping carts full of groceries home in San Jose, and then toss them into the bed of the T-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-N-D-R-A and take them back to the store.

27 Not only that. I also used to go around the neighborhood and return other carts that people had left in front of their houses. I was a good Sam. At least in my own mind.

28 I looked back up at the apartment porch.

29 "I would have pushed a cart right under that porch, and then I would have tossed all those bags into the cart!" I thought, "completing what we might call splash hits in NBA terms!"

30 That, my friends, is known as having WAY too much time on your hands.

31 I then switched to an entirely different scenario.

32 This is my head talking to me at this point: "Suppose...just suppose a lady was walking that metal cart home from the store, when a cloud opened up, the wind blew her umbrella inside out, and then lightning struck her.

"She screamed, made her way to the edge of the ramp, collapsed, pushing the cart down the embankment and into the flume.

33 "The guy in the apartment was taking his garbage out to his porch when he heard the scream, and then felt the lightning..."

34 And on and on. I thought of it becoming some sort of Hitchcock mystery.

35 And then my mind returned to the sidewalk, my socks, and my sandals, and I smiled.

36 There's a reason I've never published a story. Not a one.

37 Moving On, Part One: All of this was written while Obama was delivering his introduction to Supreme Court nominee Judge Merrick Garland.

38 My first thought: "That guy's short!"

39 Biden and Obama stood to his sides like Athenian columns. This framed the perfect shot for the cameraman, who was probably hoping one day to become a cinematographer.

40 I say all of this with tongue planted firmly in cheek.

41 It is funny though, because that really is how my mind works sometimes. I'm always thinking of things to write. Always did. I had some amazing teachers along the way, and they made writing something that comes as naturally to me as any interest comes to anyone.

42 It's a little bit the stuff of life.

43 We all have it.

44 Even Bieber.