Is Christmas bumping aside Thanksgiving in the holiday calendar? Halloween was just 10 days ago, but already Santa is arriving in area shopping malls and retailers are doing their holiday hiring.
Perhaps shopkeepers are trying to make up for the late Thanksgiving — it falls this year on Nov.28 — by getting an early start on promotions. We’ve already seen a number of references to Black Friday sales.
But the surest sign that the Christmas retail season has arrived was the sighting of a pop-up vendor last week in Colonie Center. The Hickory Farms holiday kiosk was piled high with red boxes of summer sausages, cheese and other items for holiday entertaining.
We guess it’s time to start the holiday shopping.
A Prius for Cuomo?
At least one caller to The Buzz thought last week’s opening of the new Exit 3 flyover, as well as the earlier opening of the new Gov. Mario M. Cuomo Bridge, should have involved an electric vehicle, not an 87-year-old Packard automobile with smoke coming out its exhaust pipe.
The electric vehicle, he suggested, would symbolize the administration’s concern with the environment.
And calling the Albany International Airport the front door to the region also was an outdated metaphor, he continued. Traveling by air was also harming the environment.
His suggestion: Take the train.
Scary drive
The Buzz is so happy that Gov. Andrew Cuomo pushed to get the Exit 3 construction completed on time, and under budget. We love it. But getting home from the Times Union can be a little scary at night.
The new lanes on Albany-Shaker Road that take drivers westward to the airport and to the on-ramp to the Northway southbound lanes are extremely confusing and shift near the Desmond Hotel, although it’s not very clear yet to the average drivers how the lanes shift.
Those in the right hand lanes typically don’t realize that the drivers in the left-hand lane are moving over, and they need to shift to the right to avoid them.
Almost every night, drivers are screaming at one another at that portion in the road, and sooner or later, some fenders could get bent.
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