1. It’s Monday, November 2, 2015.

2. In Mexico, today is Dia de Muertos, or Day of the Dead, a day when families commemorate the passing of loved ones in their lives. Like tequila and good tortillas, this is another great idea from our friends south of the border.

Sure, we think of people we’ve lost all the time. But to have a day dedicated to thinking about them seems like an excellent idea. I hope it’s a day of peace and fondness for those who celebrate.

3. I saw “Bridge of Spies” this weekend and thought it was a decent, workman-like film. But what struck me were the scenes when Tom Hanks’ character was passing to and from East Berlin as the wall was being built, and how East German soldiers shot anyone trying to escape to the West.

It was a reminder that this is sort of what Donny Trump wants with Mexico, probably complete with the snipers shooting at anyone trying to cross in from Mexico. That way, Americans can be as reviled in the second half of the 21st century as the East Germans are in this film.

4. Tomorrow is Election Day in many places. When I asked the students in my Journalism class how many of them planned to vote, not a single hand was raised.

So here’s my diatribe:

Local elections are the minor leagues of races for higher office. Politicians who make it through these ranks get to run for jobs with more recognition and power. So not paying attention to these races means a lot of crappy people get a chance to get a job paid for by your taxes. If there’s any kind of scrutiny at all, perhaps it would leave public office for those who can pass muster.

So vote tomorrow. It’s a couple of minutes, but it’s worth your time. If we don’t vote, we get the political figures we deserve, and have no right to badmouth.

5. I was sitting in the middle deck of Citi Field down the right field line when I saw an amazing sight: the instant that summer became winter.

I didn’t think to look at the clock, but I’m guessing it was sometime around 11 p.m. That’s when Lucas Duda’s throw to home trying to nail the Royals’ Eric Hosmer sailed away from Mets’ catcher Travis d’Arnaud. Instead of a 2-1 Mets’ win, the fifth game of the World Series was tied.

At that moment, a frost filled the air and it seemed as though there was snow on the ground. You could almost see the icicles hanging on the arc of the ball’s errant path. The Royals won about 90 minutes later, and baseball’s summer was now a bitter winter.

But it was a really, really cool summer — and the last words echoing through the stairways of Citi Field, a heartfelt “Let’s Go Mets” chant, will ring all the way to spring training.

1. It’s Thursday, October 29, 2015.

2. Three years ago today, Superstorm Sandy made life miserable for folks in these parts. Lives were lost, property was destroyed or damaged and the general state of things in the area was godawful.

I’m not sure what was learned from the storm. I’d like to think that if the same thing happens again, we won’t be so disrupted for so long.

But the power lines are still above ground. And it’s the same utility company that wasn’t especially responsive in 2012.

The consolation is that no one remembers another storm quite like Sandy. So maybe there won’t be anything quite as bad again in my lifetime. Then again, since I’m not a climate change denier, I’m not that optimistic.

3. I didn’t watch the Republican debate last night, being preoccupied with the Mets (more on that later).

But from what I’ve gleaned from watching and hearing clips, CNBC violated one of the interviewing rules I gave my introduction to journalism: don’t ask questions aimed at drawing attention to what you know instead of questions designed to draw out the candidates’ positions.

Arguing with the candidates about how your research shows that their idea is bogus seems bogus in itself. By doing that, you give the candidates the opportunity to deflect any serious questions you have and elicit undeserved sympathy.

The Republicans seem to be able to find ways to entertain audiences with their wackiness without needing enablement from the news organizations that are supposed to hold their feet to the fire.

4. I’m writing this in the middle of Rockland Lake State Park because, when I started, it was this unseasonably warm and sunny day. Now, alas, it’s this:

5. This perhaps is a metaphor for how Mets fans feel today after our team didn’t cover itself with glory in the first two games of the World Series.

To be fair, the Kansas City Royals are pretty good.

But I don’t care about them. I care about the Mets. I have loved this run that has put them in the Series for the first time in 15 years.

This has been special for me not just because the Mets have won – it’s also the year that my former CNNMoney colleagues gave me a 10-game ticket plan as a retirement gift. So this is about the present and the past, and the vibe that such a generous gift leaves in a heart.

Perhaps it’s greedy to want more. But you sometimes you don’t get things unless you try for them.

So even though they’re down 2-0 and looked bad last night losing, I still believe these guys can win. That’s partly because my heart has no other real option. We all die soon enough. Might as well hang in there and celebrate life.

That explains today’s title. It’s disputed that John Paul Jones told the captain of a British ship that “I have not yet begun to fight” when asked to surrender during the revolution.

But there’s no dispute about this from me and my fellow true blue-and-orange Mets fans: We have not yet begun to fight.

1. It’s Wednesday, October 28, 2015

2. The Republicans are debating again tonight. This time, the drama will focus on the evaporation of Donny Trump’s lead and the surge of Ben Carson.

How will Donny, who used to say he was enamored of Carson, strike back at a guy he’s been attacking as the poll numbers shifted? With Carson taking the lead, will CNBC ask the kinds of economic questions that will reveal what he actually knows about the economy? Donny, for his part, will tout his self-described business acumen as a panacea for everything he sees wrong with the country.

And, of course, there are the others. Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio now have less than 100 days before the caucus on Feb. 1. Will this debate once and for all get Chris Christie out of this race? And whatever happened to Carly Fiorina – wasn’t she supposed to be surging after the last of these things? That meteor crashed quick.

3. I won’t be watching the debate. I will be performing the act of self-flagellation known as watching game two of the World Series. I’m still feeling the effects of game one – the slow unbinding of the knot in my stomach, the lack of sleep that comes from staying up past 1 a.m. and then staying awake another 90 minutes after the Mets lost the way they lost.

But after about three hours of a fitful night, I’m starting to recharge my confidence. It’s Jacob deGrom tonight. They can’t lose like that twice in a row. I’ve believed in them this long. I can’t quit now.

1. It’s Tuesday, October 27, 2015.

2. The White House and Congress say there’s a budget deal that takes away the threat that the U.S. would default on its debt. It’s good that this has happened, but it’s still stupid that these negotiations ever come to this point.

The idea here is to give the new Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, a chance to shape his agenda without all the baggage from these ersatz crises. Unfortunately, Ryan already says he won’t work on immigration reform as long as President Obama is in office.

An opportunity to actually do some good, and – if he really thought about it – help his party, is being squandered in the pique Ryan and the Republicans have that Americans elected Barack Obama. Twice.

3.  The latest obscene video of a white police officer roughing up an African-American kid comes from Spring Valley High School in South Carolina. It will lead to protests by people who say black lives matter, counter protests by people say police lives matter, and then all will pass until the next video surfaces.

What would be better is if these stupid things didn’t happen. And while there are few details of what happened before the police officer flipped the girl over in her chair, there can’t be any circumstance in which what he did looks rational.

Why police officers don’t understand that, and figure out that they are supposed to be professional in dealing with problem situations, evades me. It appears to evade them, too.

The United States needs to do a better job of eliminating the kind of policing that exacerbates situations and leads to Ferguson or Staten Island or any of the racially charged incidents of the past few years. Otherwise, nothing gets better, and the reasoning behind the Black Lives Matter movement, the idea that people of color are not just would-be criminals and non-entities, will get angrier and harder to reconcile.

4.   The World Health Organization now says bacon, sausage and hot dogs are carcinogens. I think anyone who eats them knows they aren’t the healthiest things in the world. But, really, are they cigarettes? I don’t think the risk is anywhere near the same.

Putting processed meats in the same class as tobacco and asbestos doesn’t help reduce the risks of eating them – it makes people gives less consideration to how dangerous other substances are.

5.    Tonight is game one of the 2015 World Series. For the first time in 15 times, my team is in there. Whatever happens, I’m proud of the Mets and what they’ve accomplished. But if they lose, my heart will be smashed.

So let’s win this one, Mets, let’s say in five games so that, on Sunday night, my daughter and I can be part of the celebration at Citi Field.

1. It’s Monday, October 26, 2015

2. I can’t imagine Donny Trump or Ben Carson as the Republican nominees for president. And yet, we’re about to make the turn into November 2015, and they’re far and away at the top of the heap. Nobody else is close. The more these guys hang at the top, the less likely it is that anyone who’s more mainstream – although that does seem like a relative term with this bunch of loonies – can overtake them.

3. Blame Sarah Palin. That’s what former White House Chief of Staff William Daley says in a Washington Post op-ed piece. Daley believes that when John McCain picked Palin as his running mate in 2008, he opened the door to the kind of lunacy that has prevailed in the Republican Party since.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        

I understand his point – since bursting onto the national scene, Palin has been an embarrassing example of what happens when right-wing talking points combine with being none too bright. And the veins she tapped with her candidacy – the empowerment of women, particularly working mothers – are clogged by the fact that nothing she claims to stand for helps them much.                                                                                                                                                                                      

But saying Palin is to blame misses a big point. The Republicans have been heading down the path they’re on for a long time. Since George W. Bush and Dick Cheney saw political advantage in a unified nation after 9/11 and went down the path of stupidity in Iraq. Since the Bush White House chose faith-based policies over fact-based policies. Since the refusal to tone down some of the racist sniping at President Obama from the day he was elected. Since they decided that immigration reform was a sure way to give Obama a victory without seeing that it would give them one, too.

Sarah Palin is a symptom, not a cause of the Republicans’ turn to stupid. She found a welcome home – just like Trump, Carson, Ted Cruz, Mike Huckabee and others who have no business claiming they should be our commander-in-chief.

4. Currently where I am, in the suburbs north of New York, it is 47 degrees, and with a mild wind it feels like 44.

And yet, thanks to the New York Mets, the summer continues, and will until at least Halloween night. By making it to the World Series, the Mets – and their opponents, the Kansas City Royals – still have us putting aside dealing with the fall and the fact that the end of the calendar year is fast approaching.

It does mean that, when we get to Citi Field on Friday, the conditions are not going to be quite the same as they were the night in July when there was a Heart concert right after a Met win over the Dodgers.

But that’s all right. As the Beach Boys proved, summer is a state of mind as well as a season. The summer of 2015 goes on here in New York and, with luck and some decent pitching, it’ll last until a ticker tape parade downtown next week.

It’s October 23, 2015, and time for Friday Yes or No. I ask the questions. I answer them simply and elegantly.

Q1: Although it’s hard to beat Donny Trump on a day-to-day basis, is Trey Gowdy the biggest horse’s ass in America today?

A1: Yes

Q2: So, now that Hillary Clinton has answered every possible question anyone can ask about what happened in Benghazi three years ago, will this put an end to the “investigation”?

A2: No

Q3: Is that because Fox News needs something to talk about every once in a while?

A3: Yes

Q4: Is it possible that the Chancellor of Germany is more interested in the truth about the horrors that befell millions of Jews during the Holocaust than the Prime Minister of Israel?

A4: Yes

Q5: Will Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders make a big pitch to woo the supporter of Lincoln Chafee, who’s dropped out of the presidential race?

A5: No

Q6: Did some PR person earn his/her keep with the promotion of Back to the Future Day?

A6: Yes

Q7: Is “Back to the Future II” anywhere near the quality of sequel that “Godfather II” is?

A7: No

Q8: Is Paul Ryan making a mistake in becoming Speaker of the House?

A8: No

Q9: Is that because he isn’t really running for anything, and it doesn’t matter what happens?

A9: Yes

Q10: Two days after the fact, is it still hard to believe that the Mets will be playing in the World Series?

A10: Yes

Q11: Will they win it?

A11: Yes

1. It’s Wednesday, October 21, 2015.
2. I really don’t care that this is the day portrayed in “Back to the Future II.” I saw the first one. But other than “Godfather II,” sequels never measure up to the original.
3. Unless the Republicans in the House have completely lost their minds, Paul Ryan is the next Speaker. He’s told them the conditions under which he’d accept the position, and now they have to accept them or move on. And if they don’t accept them, who are they going to get? Here’s the problem with a nihilist view of government: Unless you seek anarchy, you need to do something that resembles governing. The Republicans — and a lot of people who goad them — don’t seem to understand this. I suppose they could continue down the path they’re on. But the whirlwind they’ll reap would be especially ugly.
4. I cannot tell you how many times I’ve sat in either Shea Stadium or Citi Field and watching a sure thing go up in ignominious smoke. I have a 21-year-old son who can remember some of the most soul-crushing defeats ever witnessed by humans. So the Mets having a three-games-to-none lead over the Chicago Cubs is better than the alternative. But it’s nothing to celebrate, because a team has to win four games to advance to the World Series. And until the Mets win that fourth one, there’ll be no rest for the fan who still cringes at the thought of 2007 and 2008 and countless games before and after.

1. It’s Tuesday, October 20, 2015.

2. It’s a lot warmer than when I almost froze in my seat at Citi Field on Sunday.

3. Americans often forget that Canada is a different country. So trying to read something from yesterday’s election results into U.S. politics is foolhardy.

But here’s a thought: Canadians appear to have gotten tired of a kind of negative vibe that was coming from the Conservatives and Prime Minister Stephen Harper. He had a chilly relationship with President Obama, wasn’t a big believer in climate change and thought confrontational politics was the way to go.

It wasn’t. The Liberals, led by the relatively young Justin Trudeau, swept into power with what most observers believed was a positive message about the country and its future.

Canadians have every reason to see a bright future. So, by the way, do Americans. That’s not the message you’re getting from the Republican candidates, and that could very well be their undoing.

President Obama won twice with a theme of hope, and now so has Prime Minister Trudeau. The next president is likely to have done the same.

4.    Up until this weekend, even the people who lived in his Jackson Heights apartment building were likely to have forgotten George Bell, who died in July of last year.

But the power of good journalism is such that Mr. Bell is now unforgettable, thanks to a terrific story by N.R. Kleinfeld of The New York Times. The story describes the circumstances of his death in his cluttered apartment, who he was and how the details of his solitary life were wrapped up. 

In the process, it showed how much work is involved in wrapping up those details.

The story certainly leaves an impression. It’s a reminder of how many people live by themselves, especially in a place such as New York. It reanimates the fear some of us (I raise my hand) hold about dying alone.

There are issues raised by a story such as this one. One letter to the Times complains that Mr. Bell’s privacy is invaded by the story. And John Hockenberry’s public radio show this morning heard from people distinguishing from living alone and being lonely, with so many saying that they prefer living by themselves and feel anything but lonely.

It’s thought provoking and inherently sad, because it involves death. It’s also uplifting in a strange way. I strongly recommend it. I think it will stick in your mind for awhile. (Read it here)

1. It’s Monday, October 19, 2015.

2. Hillary Clinton is scheduled to testify this week before the Benghazi special committee of the House, also known as the Hillary Is Icky Committee.

This should be quite a show. Nothing would be better than for the former Secretary of State and current presidential candidate to put these cretins in their place. Remind them that they’ve tried to make political hay out of the deaths of four Americans who put their lives in harm’s way for this country.                                                              

Here’s to hoping she nails these jerks every chance she gets.

3. It would be odd to defend George W. Bush, arguably the worst president of my lifetime and perhaps in American history.

But leave it to Donny Trump to make W. look good. His comments about 9/11 are unseemly and preposterous. Hindsight is perfect, and to think that Bush could have stopped the attacks if he had just had tighter controls on federal agencies is a 14-year-old second guess.

To bring it up the way he has in the campaign, to imply it wouldn’t have happened on his watch, is idiocy.

But then, what else do you expect from Trump?

4. The euphoria I feel for the New York Mets this morning is pretty overwhelming.

I was at Game Two of the National League Championship Series last night, and despite the cold and the wind that made it colder, it was a lot for those us wearing orange and blue. What we have to avoid, fellow Mets fans (and the Mets themselves), is the vainglory that strikes the Mets down time and time again.

The Chicago Cubs of 2015 are a very good baseball team, and their fans might be the best in the world. Those fans show up at Wrigley Field even when the team stinks. They’re not going down without a fight, and what makes them tougher is that they’re harder to dislike than the Chase Utley-imbued Dodgers.

So I’m optimistic, but still very, very nervous. Those last two wins are not going to be easy.

It’s October 16, 2015. The sun is shining, birds are singing, food tastes better and Friday Yes or No is here:

Q1: A lot of Bernie Sanders supporters seem to think their candidate won Tuesday’s Democratic debate, and the media narrative that Hillary Clinton did better is unfair. Are they right?

A1: No

Q2: Is that because Hillary Clinton was the only one of those five people who seemed like a President of the United States?

Q2: Yes

Q3: Did Sanders do badly in the debate?

A3: No

Q4: It’s just that Hillary did better, right?

A4: Yes

Q5: Everyone knows Afghanistan is a quagmire. But does President Obama have any realistic option than to keep U.S. forces there?

A5: No

Q6: Should CNBC have agreed to the debate changes Donald Trump and other Republicans demanded?

A6: No

Q7: Is it any surprise that daily fantasy sports leagues are attracting legal scrutiny?

A7: No

Q8: Would a ban on advertising by DraftKings and FanDuel while charges are being investigated be welcome?

A8: Yes

Q9: Do you think Chase Utley is enjoying his offseason now that the Mets have eliminated him and the Dodgers in the playoffs?

A9: No

Q10: Does that make me unabatedly happy?

A10: Yes

Q11: Is there anything more fun than the idea of a Mets-Cubs meeting in the National League Championship Series?

A11: No