I haven’t been bitten by a mosquito all summer.
This is a first. What happened to all the bugs?

Something’ must be up.

Sooner or later, it had to happen.

Somebody finally wrote a fictional account of a terrorist attack on the Indian Point nuclear power plant. It’s a novel called— get this—“Indian Point.” How’s that for a grabber of a title?

The author is a guy by the name of Barry Arbiloff, who I’ve been trying to reach all day for an interview. So, Barry, if you’re out there, give me a ring.

Since I haven’t read the book (it was published by iUniverse, a vanity outfit), I can’t tell you much about the plot or even if the book is worth your time. However, one review I’ve seen is hardly a rave.

According to the online Kirkus Reviews, “the story has a tired, paint-by-numbers feel to it,” and the plot is “unwieldy.” Numerous characters are introduced and rapidly killed off, and it’s hard to keep them straight, the review said.
At any rate, the story centers on an U.S. intelligence agent, Nicholas Frost, who tries to break up a plot to destroy the Entergy-owned nuke plant with a nuclear weapon packed inside a truck. As best as I can tell, Frost also gets mixed up with some kind of a femme fatale who is in cahoots with the terrorists.

A friend of mine who lives in Cortlandt Manor, which is in the heart of Indian Point country and therefore a prime market for this type of scary book, told me that she and her neighbors have received promotional material about the novel, which included the following excerpt:
“At 3:45, a half mile from Buchanan, a truck with a fancy logo and an American flag, painted on both sides pulled into the parking lot of the A&P supermarket in the shopping plaza in Cortlandt Manor…”

We’re left hanging after that. But I suspect the Islamic crazies are thwarted and the good guys win in the end. I’m also guessing that the loud sound you just imagined going off wasn’t a nuclear blast on the Hudson River..but the thump of a book making a hard landing in the remainder bin.

Yes, I lost the miniature golf match with County Executive Andy Spano and now I’ve got to make good on my end of the deal—which is to let Spano write my column.

He’s probably dying to do it, perhaps as a means of revenge for the criticism I’ve sent his way over the years. But the way I look at it, well, it’s one less column I have to write so I come out ahead.

A lot of people have been wondering when the Spano column will appear.

Here’s the tentative plan: He will come to The Journal News/Lohud offices on Friday, Sept. 8 to write the column and his masterpiece will appear on Sunday, Sept. 10.

In the meantime, watch for my Web cast about the match.

The miniature golf match is still on between me and Westchester County Executive Andy Spano, but I don’t want to get anybody’s hopes up that I can beat this guy.
I’ve had three practice games at Playland where the “Mano A Mano With Spano” match is to be held, and although I’m improving my short game on the rolling carpet, it’s still not good enough. I can’t seem to make the par 41 on the crummy little course! Today I shot 45, four over par.
It’s still an improvement.
Oh well, we’ll see. Match is at 2:30 p.m.

I was saddened to hear of the death of Kermit Hall, the president of Albany University, SUNY.
Hall’s age was given as 61 which surprised me because his vitality and trim profile made him seem younger than that. He died while swimming off the coast of South Carolina where he was vacationing with his wife on Hilton Head Island. Some accounts hinted that he may have had a heart attack.

His tenure at Albany had been brief, less than two years. But even in that short period of time, Hall made a significant impact as an educator, administrator and leader.

He championed that school, and pushed its undergraduate students to excel. I know this because my oldest son is a senior at Albany (another son is entering as a freshman this fall) and so, with self-interest in mind, I had keenly observed the university’s progress over the years.

Albany has a reputation of being a party school, but Hall was working hard to change that image. From my perspective he was doing an excellent job of restoring Albany’s pride while raising its academic standards.

This is a tough loss.

I’m a buff of Custer’s Last Stand at the Little Big Horn, but here’s something I didn’t know about that event until recently: Two of the members of the 7th Cavalry who died on that hot June day in 1876 were from Putnam County.

Both were lowly privates. Both fell on Custer Hill, and their remains were never identified, which was not unusual. Most of the 200-plus soldiers who were killed were so badly mutilated by the Indians that it was next to impossible to tell who they were.
Care was taken to recover the bodies of the officers, but the enlisted men who served out west in the post-Civil War era were often anonymous types. Many of the soldiers in Col. George Armstrong Custer’s famous regiment were raw recruits, vagabonds, immigrants and chronic deserters who re-enlisted under fake names.

They were considered expendable and so the recovery of their remains was at best perfunctory.

One of the Putnam men was 26-year-old William Lossee, a private who was from Brewster, or Brewster Station as it was known in those days. His enlistment papers indicate that his civilian occupation was “showman,” but doesn’t elaborate further. He was in the army only nine months at the time of his death.

The other unfortunate was Pvt. George Howell, of Cold Spring, who first enlisted in 1868 at West Point at the age of 21. For three years, he served in an engineering batallion. He was discharged in Feburary, 1871 then re-upped in December of 1872 and was assigned to Company C of the Seventh, whose commading officer was Capt. Tom Custer, the brother of George. Tom Custer was also killed in the Indian battle.

One other stray fact about Lossee and Howell. Both were under five feet six inches in height.

As far as I know, no one at the Little Big Horn came from Westchester County, but several were from New York state.

In any event, the bones of Lossee and Howell and those of the other cavalrymen were collected and buried on Cister Hill in Montana. Their names are on the monument there.

I’ve been informed that my webcast which was scheduled for today at noon on lohud.com has been delayed a day.

It will be shown tomorrow, beginning at 1 p.m.

So if you log on today, hoping to see me and you don’t see me…well, despair not. Again, the Webcast will be shown tomorrow at 1 p.m.

In it, I challenge Westchester County Executive Andy Spano to an 18-hole miniature golf match and “fact finding mission.” He has accepted the challenge and the contest will be held Wednesday, Aug. 23 at 2:30 p.m. at Playland Amusement Park in Rye.

Tonight’s televised debate between Republican Senate candidates John Spencer and K. T.McFarland was a down and dirty brawl. The only thing they didn’t do was pull each other’s hair out.

If you watched it, you saw Spencer repeatedly come close to a Captain Queeg moment, something that’s very familiar to anyone who has been on the receiving end of one of his paranoid rants. The tone got nasty. Tempers were barely contained and most of the time Spencer was on the defensive.

At one point, when McFarland demanded that Spencer not interupt her, Spencer replied, “Sure” and then gave his mirthless “Heh, Heh, Heh” laugh. If that wasn’t sinister enough, he also said at one point that he planned to pray for McFarland before he goes to bed tonight. Whoa, how’s that for the kiss of death?

That’s how entertaining it got.

McFarland jabbed at Spencer’s personal life. Over and over again, she brought up the affair he carried on with his current wife, Kathy Spring Spencer, and the two children they had while he was mayor of Yonkers and married to another woman. She attacked him for running up a budget defecit, padding the city payroll with relatives, and raising property taxes. She mentioned his gaffes, including his use of the expression “Chinaman’s chance,” which made headlines when he said it on my WVOX radio show “High Noon” last summer.

Spencer responded by saying that McFarland was not telling the truth. “Shame on you,” he said several times. In fact, he used variations of the word “lie” as well as “half-truths” and “innuendos” at least a dozen times during the one-hour New York 1 debate which aired state-wide and was picked up in Westchester by Cablevision’s Channel 12. The word “scurrilous” was another favorite pulled from the Spencer lexicon.

After giving a long list of allegations concerning Spencer’s financial stewardship, McFarland said, “To me that’s not a fiscal conservative. It talks a good game, but you don’t walk the walk.”

Spencer then said McFarland must get her information from The Journal News. She admitted to being a subscriber. To which Spencer said triumphantly, “There ya go! There’s the problem! Ladies and gentlemen, none of it’s true.”

Spencer mentioned The Journal News by name two other times, which must have driven Cablevision crazy since it appears they have a policy prohibiting the local Channel 12 news broadcasters from even hinting that the newspaper exists beyond the all-purpose phrase, “according to published reports.”

Spencer hates the paper. And during the debate, he inadvertantly raised its profile. Now they know us in Buffalo, thanks to Spencer. Sample: In answer to a McFarland charge, he said, “Again, what The Journal News did to me…”

What’s that clicking noise? Sounds like somebody rubbing ball bearings. And hey, who stole the strawberries?”

BEST MOMENT OF THE DEBATE:
It came when McFarland turned to Spencer ala Ann Richards-Lloyd Bentsen-Ronald Reagan and said, “John, the problem with you is that you’re just like the Clintons. You’ve taxed and spent like Hillary and you’ve behaved like Bill.”

It certainly seemed like a canned remark.

Spencer positively sneered. “As you can see, that was probably worked on for months by her staff, saying, ‘Let’s get that sound bite, you know. Let’s get that sound bite. Let’s get the headline.’ What nonsense.”

And what a mess the New York GOP is in.

Check out tomorrow’s lohud.com and look for my Webcast which will be posted at 12 noon.

Crack CBS-TV correspondent Tony Aiello interviews me about my Aug. 23 miniature golf contest with Westchester County Executive Andy Spano. You don’t want to miss this!

I’m wielding the very putter with which I plan to humiliate Spano on the Playland mini-golf links. He’s going down!

Incidentally, Aiello makes fun of my necktie. He asked me if I was going to wear it at the match. I forgot to tell him that what I really want to do is wear one of his conservative gray suits, with the sleeves cut off.

Drum roll, please…Yes, It’s going to happen!!

Coming Aug. 23—the sports event of the century.

Something you can’t afford to miss. Something to tell your grandchildren about years from now.

On that day, at 2:30 p.m. sharp, I will square off in a high-stakes, high-pressure, 18-hole match of miniature golf at Playland Amusement Park with none other than Westchester County Executive Andy Spano.

I’ve written about this already in my Journal News column, so you may know what the deal is. If I win, I get to play county executive for a few hours. But if I lose, well, Andy gets to write my column.

Come one, come all. No ticket purchase is required, merely the cost of Playland parking.

Mark it down. Fifteen days from now, I will go mano a mano with Spano. And yes, this will be a clean event. Do overs will not be allowed—and yes, both Andy and I will be tested for steroids and human growth hormones in advance of the match.

HERE’S WHERE I NEED YOUR HELP: I have a caddy, but I’m also looking for at least two beautiful cadd-ettes to serve as volunteer ball girls during the contest. If you think you’ve got what it takes to perform this impportant chore contact me at this blog or e-mail me at preisman@lohud.com or call 914-694-5008.