polo ponies in tanks assault francless bank account
“Polo like Ralph Lauren or Polo like ponies?”
“Phyllis said it involved horses.”
“Ah! It’s a game: like ice hockey with grass and horses instead of ice and penalty boxes.”
“So you know how the game is played..”
“Not at all. But I do know that the field they use, called the Polo ground, is large - much bigger than a football field or a soccer pitch.”
“I thought soccer didn’t have pitchers.”
“Well..”
Match morning arrived and so did rain.
“Rain?” A shocked reader asks.
There are no words to describe the amazement that this baffling, befuddling, bedazzling and bewildering event caused. As a former Swiss resident, I had, of course, seen rain before. (So I was merely bemused.) Naturally the rain, which failed to alight at the official Santa Barbara weather station, dissipated quickly. Nevertheless, actual short-lived puddles formed in some places. The precipitation was not forecast by the local TV weatherman.
“But,” I explained to Nazy. “he can retroactively explain what he didn’t see coming.”
“Really?”
“Precisely. It’s a skill that makes him ideally suited for politics. He will claim that this rainfall, which he reminds us “doesn’t count’ since it didn’t fall at the official station, was caused by a rare tropical monsoon.”
“I thought a tropical monsoon was not rare. I thought The Monsoon came every..”
“Monsoon season?”
“Right.”
Aside: The job of the Santa Barbara weather forecaster is the least demanding job on the planet. There is no weather in Santa Barbara. Every ‘weather’ segment on the local news looks the same: High 76, Low 61, AM Clouds, PM Sun. It would be cheap and equally accurate if they simply recorded one forecast that was repeated every night. (It is a successful business model followed by the advertising industry.)
Nazy’s friend Phyllis picked us up for the drive to the Carpinteria Polo Grounds.
“This,” I thought, “brings back memories of High School. I went to the Polo Grounds to watch the Mets, an expansion baseball team, get clobbered. It would have been much nicer to go when Willy Mays and the Giants were playing there.But I was too young then.”
We feasted on hors d'oeuvre before watching 6 chukkers of Polo. After the third chukker..
“We can go out on the grounds and replace the divots.” Phyllis noted.
“My gosh!” I exclaimed. “That is sooo exciting.” “Thank God she didn’t ask us to help remove the horse dung,” I thought.
The match was fun to watch. The horses, eh, ponies, are well trained and the action is fast.
Nazy with Polo ‘Ball’
We’re also enjoying Darius’ visit. A few nights ago, I returned home to see Darius watching CNN. I took a quick glimpse at the screen and..
“What happened in Beirut, Dar?” I asked.
“This isn’t Beirut Dad.”
“Baghdad?”
“Missouri.”
“Missouri? It must remind you of home in Beirut.”
“The police don’t have tanks in Beirut.”
“So a violent armed force is taking over and terrorizing a small town in America?”
“Exactly.”
“I hope Obama orders an air strike on the weaponized police,” I thought. “I think we’ve found the ‘boots on the ground’ that have the weapons needed to fight ISIS,” I said. “Let’s deploy the Ferguson police to Iraq.Then I changed the subject: Luckily, Dar,” I said. “The cold war is over.”
“Maybe Dad. But I can’t believe how quickly Putin moved Russia from communism to crony capitalism.”
“I know. It took the USA hundreds of years to make the transition that the Russians made in a few short years.”
This week Nazy’s sister Shahrzad was visiting. We took her to all of the exciting Santa Barbara venues.
“You want me to drive to the Premium Outlet Mall?” I asked.
“Yes, Dan.” Nazy replied with a tone that suggested I suffered from neuron deficiency disorder.
We also drove to Solvang, a Danish-ish tourist city nearby. We had a nice lunch at a restaurant staffed by an inept waiter and a socially challenged hostess. However, Melika and TRA IV drove up to join us.
Melika bought some hats (including a BIG ONE for Nazy) and fudge. (Solvang is famous for fudge.)
Back home, we had time for a ‘selfie’ with Shahrzad and the baby..
Finally, Credit Suisse has formally closed my Swiss bank account - an action that will increase the cost of collecting my Swiss pension. I asked about the rationale.
“Credit Suisse cannot take the risk.”
“I’m not a risk.”
“Your IRS is the risk. We can’t afford..”
“It’s not my IRS. And by the way, If Tier 1 Bank, one of the biggest in the world, can’t afford to deal with the IRS, how am I supposed to cope?” I asked. Franc(less)ly.
