A few ramblings while waiting to see if Tropical Storm Ivo lives up to all the advance billing and brings us some meaningful rain over the next couple of days:

Count me as concerned about the Red Sox, who seem to be struggling mightily to score runs as the season enters the final five weeks plus. Last night John Lackey pitched another gem, only to see it wasted. I think if you asked most people at the start of the year if they thought the Sox would be sitting atop the A.L. East on August 24 they would have been thrilled, but that’s where they are and the season would be a big disappointment if the Sox can’t make the post-season.

Count me as not yet concerned about the Patriots, who got slaughtered and looked sloppy against the Lions the other night. There’s still much work to be done on both sides of the ball, for sure, but Tom Brady looks great and the defensive pass rush shows promise. The #1 thing Bill Belichick hates is not protecting the ball, and all those turnovers will be the topic of much-needed improvement needed in the last couple of pre-season games. And their secondary needs to play a whole lot better.

It’s nearly fall, so the music I’m listening to is veering away from surf and tropical to classical and tropical, with a good measure of Pink Floyd and Gordon Lightfoot thrown in for good measure. It’s not one of the band favorite pieces of work, but Atom Heart Mother and Obscurred by Clouds have always been amongst my favorites, while Lightfoot’s The Circle Is Small and Daylight Katy from his “Endless Wire” album are moody reminders of the best that Gord has ever done. And how good a backing band he had (an still does!).

While I understand and respect the Weekly Standard’s Yuval Levin’s piece on the state of Obamacare as we’re just weeks away from the first health exchange rollouts, the problem is your dealing with the Obama administration and a HHS led by the ghoulish Kathleen Sebelius – left-wing zealots who have no interest whatsoever in compromising any aspect of the law. As Harry Reid has already said, Obamacare is merely the first step towards a government-based single-payor system, and Democrats are banking that once Obamacare gets rolling and Hillary Clinton gets the White House in 2016 and the Dems win back the House (hey they can dream, can’t they?) that’s exactly what they’ll do.