A few above-freezing days lately melted our snow cover. That’ll never do, Old Man Winter mutters, and so this morning we had a fresh few inches. At least it’s light snow this time, and proved fairly easy to remove from the driveway and sidewalk.

This was fun to write. Since then, a reader suggested Lex Luthor as a real estate villain. In Superman (1978), he hatched a scheme to sink most of California so his desert land would be the new West Coast, and thus instantly worth a fortune. Not a bad suggestion for a villain.

Still, Luthor’s plot is comic-book logic for you. I’d think the destruction of California would set off a deep economic panic worldwide, and so it might be years before much is developed anywhere. Also, people might be a mite skittish about repopulating the “new” West Coast, even after the economy recovered.

Not long ago, we got the first political robo-call of the year. From an unexpected source. I quote in full:

“Hi, this is Jessica with Mike Bloomberg 2020. We have brand-new yard signs. Will you show your support with a yard sign at your home? Go to w-w-w Mike Bloomberg dotcom slash 2020 slash yard hyphen signs to request one now. Thank you and have a great day. Paid for by Mike Bloomberg 2020.”