The first big horse racing day of the calendar year came Saturday with important tests for horses and trainers hoping to smell roses in fourteen weeks.

Back in the day when the pals and I here had serious Derby fever, we’d meet up at an OTB parlor in either Queens or Manhattan and watch the Gulfstream card on the last Saturday of January.

Those days are gone now, but I still enjoy going out to the track to see Derby hopefuls try to stay on the trail.

Even though it’s become the dump of all dumps, I went out to Aqueduct Saturday for the Withers and had a fun day out there.

The Withers is a grade 3 that typically attracts New York-based runners with modest Derby dreams. With only six going and a prohibitive favorite, the race was positioned as the fourth contest of the day to keep it out of the late pick 4.

I liked Sunny Ridge (pictured above), especially when the tote board had him at 7-1 to win right up until the last few minutes prior to post. When he ran to the front and got caught three wide in the opening turn, I became discouraged. Was I starting off 2016 with a losing bet slip? No. It turns out jockey Manny Franco knew what he was doing by seeking the front end. The anticipated early speed from the balance of the field never developed and Sunny Ridge gutted out late challenges to win at 3.75 to 1.

Sunny Ridge is a really beautiful animal and I will now cheer for him hard every time he runs. A New Jersey-bred son of the great Holy Bull, he has a very interesting color pattern on his forehead – between and just above his eyes.

After the race, his trainer Jason Servis told the Mig on the in-house feed that he’d keep Sunny Ridge in New York. Servis said he would consult with owner Dennis Drazin to determine a next step. Servis said he would nominate Sunny Ridge to both the Gotham and Wood but would likely race in just one of those two.

A few post-race reports indicated Servis may not even be thinking Derby with one racing writer speculating that the Haskell might even be a bigger goal given Drazin’s management responsibilities at Monmouth Park. My hunch is that Drazin will get Derby fever just like anybody else if Sunny Ridge wins whatever his next prep may be.

After the Withers, I sat in the outdoor seats on the second floor and created a pick 4 ticket. That sequence started off favorably with a $19 winner. The wager’s pool of 261-grand barely exceeded the track’s 250 K guarantee, which was surprising although wagering dollars must have spread a bunch of different directions on Saturday given all the great action at Gulfstream, Santa Anita, Oaklawn and Tampa.

I got knocked out in leg 3 of the wager, which was a thrilling rendition of the Toboggan, a race that had been rescheduled twice because of bad weather. The late-to-blossom Green Gratto should have won at a short price and would have kept my ticket alive but jockey Kendrick Carmouche went too hard on the green light. Gratto blazed a 57 and 1 over the opening five panels and petered out in the final half-furlong. Rudy Rod’s B entry Sassicaia split horses and won by a neck. Gratto was third. I never would have had Sassicaia because I don’t play the juice in stakes races. It seems like everybody on track had it though – which would make sense when the juice is loose. Rudy’s having a huge meet. One in three Rudy Rod’s are getting the job done. Ernie Munick picked Sassicaia on the in-house and a guy sitting next to me said the tote blinked from 10 to 6 just before the gates opened. This is what you get at Aqueduct.

One observation about the pick 4 payoff: all the results and chart sources I looked at this morning indicate that the wager paid $1417.50 on a $2 ticket.

That seems awfully low for a sequence that went $19.40, $4.90, $14.60 and $9.00.

Also, look at the pick 3 sequence ending in the Toboggan. It paid $1485.00 on a two-dollar play. That’s MORE than what the pick 4 paid with the $9.00 Rice winner at the end of it! What is going on?

Attendance was “unavailable.” It’s always unavailable. So, I can tell you there was probably 5000 in the house. These people that come do so even though NYRA acts like they don’t want you there. There is no viable concessionaire accessible to the regular, grandstand crowd. The seats are covered in gull shit. And the tellers are uneven in their demeanor. The bathrooms are a mess. Yeah, they gave away winter caps and gloves to those who bought a program. That was nice. Rudy Rod wore the hat all day. But as I’ve said a bunch, horse racing fans want to get a hot dog and a beer and sit in a clean grandstand and they’re happy. That’s all the track has to do. But year after year, it seems like NYRA just lets the place slip away.

Track announcer Travis Stone does a really good job. He felt bad yesterday about glossing over the horrible-looking fall by Captain Serious in the Toboggan. Captain Serious appeared to take a bad step, went to his knees and tossed Aaron Gryder like a rag doll just before the quarter pole. Stone took to Twitter to express misgivings about excluding much in the way of a description of the incident during his race call but I had no problem with it. I’d prefer of course that the track announcer tell me everything he knows and sees while on the mike but the action on the front end of this race made it such his eyes were locked on it at the expense of the chaos on the final turn. Both Gryder and the horse are said to be OK.

One political prediction before Iowans make their choices on Monday: Donald Trump will not win the GOP nomination despite the bevy of polling data in his favor. His lack of a legitimate field operation makes him a paper tiger. Even should he gain early success in Iowa and New Hampshire, doubt very much remains about his seriousness and commitment to a job he would make a mockery of. To win either party’s nomination requires backing of a huge network of day-to-day political lifers and devotees who don’t and won’t latch on to a guy who is so wildly un-presidential in his conduct.

After half a winter without any real winter, we got a bunch of it all in one shot. It was a legitimate snowstorm. The official snow number at LaGuardia from the all-day Saturday blizzard was 27.9 inches.

The hype on it started five days earlier and so you saw the grocery store free-for-alls and usual over-the-top type behavior as it played out.

At the 36-hour-before-first-flakes mark, Channel 7’s level-headed meteorologist Lee Goldberg told his audience it would be a six-incher in the city. He left open the possibility of thick bands reaching here unexpectedly – spiking the total.

Something more dramatic involving multi-faceted aspects of nor-Easter movement in concert with a strong low pressure system turned it into a monster without much heads up.

The snow piled up and the weird jurisdictional conflicts in responsibilities between the governor and mayor led to a jumble of seat-of-the-pants decisions aimed at bringing some order to the government response.

I went out at noon Saturday. There was a foot of white stuff on the ground and everybody out there was having a good time. I jumped on the F. When I exited at Smith and Ninth in Brooklyn, I saw a tweet from the MTA saying it was shutting all “above-ground” subway lines at 4 PM. Both the F and G go above and below so it was unclear to me where service would begin on the Brooklyn side under the revised scenario. To play it safe, I got back on the train a little before 3 PM. When I got home, the MTA actually had good detailed info on what was running – and which stations constituted the new reality. They posted a really good “underground subway service” map – an in-the-moment transit-user aid that I don’t recall seeing during the Sandy crisis or other interruption episodes.

Because I was off from work on the weekend, I had zero anxiety about this storm and actually enjoyed being out in it. Back to work on Monday with what will likely be a difficult restart on the air travel system at all three New York-area airports.

Also, I’m a little late on this, but I’d been chipping away at putting together a list of my ten favorite records of 2015. In no particular order, here they are:

–All Dogs – Kicking Every Day – Salinas
This record came to my attention via outreach not unlike the traditional release of a single well in advance of an LP’s street date to stir up excitement. When I was younger, I’d hear the spotlighted number on radio and get excited about what’s to come. I’d buy the record otherwise blind simply because I loved the single. I suppose what’s left of the industry still pushes a variation of this concept although most indie bands let you listen to the whole thing for a week and then you end up buying it if you like it because you want the physical part and all that comes with it in your collection. For this debut full-length, All Dogs touted their effort months in advance with a short video showing them making the record in Philly. Underneath the images, a portion of the record’s very compelling “single” provided the soundtrack. It was a really effective way to publicize the record I thought. A Twitter post pointed me the way of the video. I was all in on the record the moment I first saw the promo. The standout single is “That Kind of Girl.” It’s the kind of song that will hold up forever. Maryn Jones howls gorgeously throughout and sounds heartfelt when wishing her significant other good luck finding whatever it is that individual is looking for outside of what may already exist in the current match. The recurring key guitar line played by Jones is brilliant, with fidgety twang maximized by the great recording engineer and top guitarist in his own right Kyle Gilbride. I’ve not yet seen All Dogs live despite multiple pass-thrus by the band here but I did catch their live set on the great Chicago-based internet video platform Audiotree. I saw the band’s Audiotree set in real time on my home computer and continue to play the archived tape of that session. Jones sings out of tune in spots during the Audiotree spot but it doesn’t matter given the songwriting and passion in her live delivery. The other cool thing about All Dog’s visit to Audiotree for me was discovery of that platform’s host Blake Norris. He’s really great at eliciting interesting information from bands during Q and A sessions between songs. He has a warmth and earnestness that seems to make visitors to the Audiotree studio comfortable. When All Dogs wrapped up their great tune “Your Mistakes,“ Norris made an observation that was identical to what I had been feeling about the number since I’d heard it. Norris was highly complimentary of the “pacing and phrasing” of the Nick Harris guitar part running through Mistakes – especially “that sort-of solo at the end. Sweet.”

-Helen – The Original Faces – Kranky
I wrote about this record when it came out and I still haven’t shaken it from regular rotation. It’s brilliant. And I think it even got some attention from somewhat mainstream music writers including Ben Ratliff who put it in his top ten. I guess the question I have yet to see answered about Liz Harris and this project is whether it has legs – or is it just a one-off?

-Woolen Men – Temporary Monument – Woodsist
When this record came out late summer, a bunch of songs on it sounded immediately familiar because the band played many of them at one of those special goodbye-to-Death By Audio gigs near the end of 2014. It’s a killer record top-to-bottom and I hold it even closer to my heart because of the label it came out on. The song University is great and we get a deserving Spalding Grey dedication and a futile wish he was still around through a wonderfully-written and well sung number called “On Cowardice.“ Please don’t go away, Spalding.

-Eskimeaux – O.K. – Double Double Whammy
I’ve been moved in a huge way by the growing body of work coming out of The Epoch. Eskimeaux is Gabby Smith’s project with support in the live setting by three Epoch pals who rotate in and out of each other’s artistic endeavors. This is an incredible record for its variety in sound and mood. Smith’s humble but mostly confident view on navigating life and relationships is backed by beautiful sounds she makes on keys. I saw Smith’s Eskimeaux perform on a Queens beach this summer. Her rendition of The Thunder Answered Back on that late August afternoon was a musical moment that will stick with me for a long time.

-Palehound – Dry Food – Exploding In Sound
This debut full-length from Ellen Kempner’s Palehound sparkles with guitar virtuosity. On the big performance stage at Gramercy Theatre last August, Kempner twirled to and from the mike between howls to lay down a complex jam on Cushioned Caging. She told a tour story that was ultimately empowering and then celebrated post-gig with family in front of the stage. Palehound also made a stop at Audiotree’s studio late in the year. Norris and Kempner had great conversation on a range of themes that further bolstered my hope that Kempner will keep writing, keep performing. What a talent.

-Titus Andronicus – The Most Lamentable Tragedy – Merge
I could be off with my gauge on public reception to this monumental feeling double-record effort from Patrick Stickles but it felt to me like it didn’t draw the attention it deserved. Much like Foxygen’s double-platter effort a year before, this one might be too big a serving for the small-plate download crowd to handle. Stickles and his great Brooklyn band celebrated this really amazing achievement with five shows at Shea, sweating out really strenuous sets for an admission number that made it accessible to the audience the record was aimed at. Stickles and T-A continue to van it all over the place and play gigs that are triple in length, quality and effort to what most everybody else is doing. Tragedy is an auto-bio of this important band’s leader and it’s totally worth spending time with. Now and forever.

-Rozwell Kid – Good Graphics (EP) – Infinity Cat
Saw these guys at Shea with the Toulouse contingent and loved ‘em. This six-song release on cassette/digital only is lots of fun. Not too serious. Ween comparisons are fair.

-Waxahatchee – Ivy Tripp – Merge
Katie Crutchfield’s third release using the Wax moniker has really awesome, resonant lyrics that can be heard clear as a bell. The previously mentioned Kyle Gilbride helped make this record, too, which says something about his talents. Katie’s sister Allison played guitar and sang for the live dates. When the sisters sing in harmony, it’s pretty amazing. There’s a really excellent recording of the full band’s set at what’s becoming perhaps the coolest festival going right now – the “This is not a Love Song” fest in Nimes, France. The Crutchfield sisters with help from Gilbride and their Philly crew have become one of the most exciting music-makers between their various efforts. While Katie’s band may have won more critical acclaim, Allison’s band Swearin’ is right there with them on all levels.

-EL VY – Return to the Moon – 4AD
Caught a listen of the title track on XMU just before leaving for France and couldn’t get it out my head – especially after hearing Seb tell some tales about his days as road manager for Matt Berninger and the National during a stretch of Euro dates early in that band’s career. I’m not a National fan but I love this record which is a collaboration between Berninger and Brent Knopf of Ramona Falls. EL VY’s spot on the 9-30-15 Conan show proved the material could work in the live setting, hand claps and all. The Pitchfork review of this record ripped the songwriting yet the overly-influential website routinely doles out exponentially higher scores for mush so the heck with ’em. A vinyl manufacturing backlog plaguing the music business at a time when the platter has found favor was blamed for a six-week gap between this record’s release date and actual receipt of the LP.

-The Choo Choo Trains – Foggymotion – Meat ’n’ Tatty Tapes
The young London trio appeared on my radar thanks yet again to Laura’s show on WNYU. This collection of songs was released on cassette/digital only but it’s a beautiful recording. The guitar sounds are crunchy, tasty and varied in support of fun and generally happy words from lead singer Veronica Dajani. The release is interesting in part because it seems to be structured to get better as it goes along. There are a couple of really awesome instrumentals near the end of the release. One called “Snufkin” combines a catchy Dajani piano part with a guest harmonica spot by the band’s friend and record’s producer Spencer Evoy.