Shoes Dropping

Ruh Roh!

When she began her current campaign for president, Hillary Clinton famously hit the road in a van named "Scooby," after the popular cartoon character Scooby Doo...

"There aren't enough Scooby Snacks in the world to make me support that wench."

As it happens, most people nowadays erroneously associate "Ruh roh!" with Scooby Doo, but the catchphrase I used for this item's heading actually belongs to Astro, from The Jetsons...

"Go figure."

Attributing Astro's catchphrase to Scooby is an understandable confusion, since voice actor Don Messick did both characters.

In any event, one can certainly imagine Hillary saying "Ruh roh!" now that the news has broken that, despite her repeated denials, there were classified messages on her private server, in violation of both federal law and the explicit instructions of the White House.

"Can a convicted felon still run for president? Asking for a friend."

And in the "when it rains, it pours" category, Hillary is now trailing socialist Bernie Sanders in the latest polling from New Hampshire...

"Your Schadenfreude is showing, you know."

I'm fine with that, actually...

Things That Make Me Happy: Big Fly Edition

My beloved Kansas City Royals won their fifth straight game last night, a 6-1 victory over the Detroit Tigers at Kauffman Stadium. Starting pitcher Yordano Ventura gave a highly encouraging performance, pitching six scoreless innings, allowing only two hits and striking out eight. He had to depart after six innings due to a high pitch count (he issued six walks), but he improved his record to 7-7 and lowered his ERA to 4.97.

The Royals are not a power-hitting team (in fact they are last in the American League in home runs), but the big story last night was Big Flies from Eric Hosmer (2-run shot), All-Star Lorenzo Cain (mammoth solo shot), and All-Star Mike Moustakas (2-run shot). Mike's blast was particularly welcome, as it snapped an 0-for-18 skid...

"Boom!"

The Royals go for their second straight series sweep tonight, with Edinson Volquez (11-6, 3.11 ERA) facing the Tigers' Daniel Norris (2-2, 4.24).

Wild Kingdom Bed & Breakfast Update

It has been really warm here of late, which means my avian customers are under a bit more duress than when the weather is milder.

I was quite worried about one fledgling in particular, until Monday afternoon. The first time I saw him, on Saturday, he simply stood in the shade on my patio, without moving much at all, for close to an hour. This despite all the other birds on the patio hopping all around him, using the bird bath, etc. I was concerned about him, so I eased myself out onto the patio with him. He let me get quite close as I talked to him, but eventually he hopped away, out into the sunny part of the patio (a fully healthy bird would have just flown off straight away). He gathered himself, launched off the edge of the patio, and flew away most unsteadily. For the rest of the day I felt enormous guilt. I was worried that I had forced a sick bird back out into the hot sunshine that was making him sick, rather than leaving him alone to rest in the shade.

Fortunately, he returned to my patio on Monday, and seemed to have improved. He still spent quite a bit of time standing perfectly still (can birds actually sleep on their feet?), but eventually, after he had rested for awhile, he got himself something to eat, and took some water from the bird bath. I walked around to the outside of the patio fence, and he stayed put even though the rest of the customers took off. I spoke to him for awhile, and he didn't seem at all fearful at hearing my voice again.

His flying is still a work in progress, though...

"If you think it's so easy, let's see YOU try it, wise guy."

I don't mean it as a criticism. Glad to see you're feeling better...

The Most Popular Part of Anywhere, I Would Imagine

From the wonderful Non Sequitur comic strip by Wiley Miller, which you should read every day, like I do (even though he's a squishy liberal).

Until Next Time...

Most of the time, the musical selections for this segment are connected in some way to one of the subjects discussed earlier in the post. Every so often, though, there are exceptions. This is one of those.

While having a conversation with a dear friend yesterday evening, I learned that he wasn't familiar with the wonderful 1982 Blake Edwards film Victor Victoria. That was enough to inspire today's send-off, which is the best production number in the film, in my opinion (and that's saying something, as the movie won the Oscar for Best Original Score). Herewith the amazing Julie Andrews singing "Le Jazz Hot." Enjoy...