Slightly under 12 hours from the debate, I strolled from my apartment in Rahway, New Jersey, over to a small bodega owned by a friendly Korean couple to load up on snacks and soda.
It was a lovely walk. The day had that cool feel of early fall with temperatures in the mid-to-high teens Celsius and a deep blue sky that reminded me of the morning of September 11, 2001, before the World Trade Center came crashing down in the city.
In a way, waiting for the first debate is like the Super Bowl in American football or game 7 in the World Series in baseball.
You scarf the junk food in front of the TV set with your family or your friends in what passes for a viewing party. In my case, it was a party of two in our pajamas.
This one is a bit serious though. Everything stops as people try to decide who they would want to lead the country in the next 4 years.
I checked the 3 bags and they were all there: buttered popcorn, Doritos, Arizona Iced Tea, Lay’s Classic chips, Planters peanuts, and Sprite.
So everything was in place along with a healthy dose of patience and humor.
Now the problem is to resist temptation and not lay my hands on the goodies before the debate begins at Hofstra University later this evening.
Needless to say, I did not totally succeed. The Doritos were almost gone before the sun went down.
Have I been paying close attention to this election? A little bit, but not with the obsessive flair of a political junkie.
In fact, Americans are already voting and probably a third will have done so by the end of next month and way before the actual voting day on November 8.
Come to think of it, I have to wonder if the debates will trump the number of those watching Monday Night football on ESPN, or any baseball game as the long trek of the national pastime heads into the last weekend of its regular season.
To kill the time further, I took in the sitcoms Big Bang Theory and Kevin Can Wait on CBS. During commercial break, I started flipping channels to see if there is a rerun of Captain America or even Star Wars on the other channels.
A majority of FilAms are going to vote for Hillary, like other minorities who get little love from the Republican Party and think of it as the club of and for white folks.
Finally, 9 pm rolled around.
Melania Trump strode to the middle of the auditorium and shook hands with Bill Clinton. The crowd held its breath for a nanosecond and then they walked away from each other.
Hillary came out in her usual pantsuit. It was red. Her face looked fresh and it seems she had gotten the rest she needed after a bout of pneumonia.
“Donald, it’s good to be with you.”
It was finally on. (WATCH: AS IT HAPPENS: 1st Clinton-Trump presidential debate, 2016 US elections)
At first, I thought I was just imagining it.
It was an audible snort from the Donald, like someone left a plug up his nostrils or he had sinusitis.
Every time he finished a long sentence, we heard him snort, sniff, whatever. Sounds like he is “snorting meth” or something, I quipped to no one in particular.
As usual, Trump would sometimes talk over his opponent and the moderator. He would roll his eyes at Hillary and she would match the eye rolling a few minutes later.
“Who is this crazy person rambling on TV? Can't make sense out of one sentence he's saying,” one friend posted on Facebook.
The one thing I thought became very noticeable is that Trump kept going on about stopping companies from leaving the US although he did not seem to have a clue how he was going to do that.
Trump could also not “intelligently” explain why he does not want to release his tax return and looked very defensive on the issue.
All in all, it made for late night entertainment.
Now the late night comics can have a go at Trump and Hillary. (READ: Clinton, Trump clash in fiery first debate)
This is only the first debate. Two more are coming in next month as the campaign enters its frenetic stage.
This is the highlight of the US presidential election, what anchor Rachel Maddow on MSNBC called so aptly the country’s “political Oscars.” – Rappler.com
Rene Pastor is a journalist in the New York metropolitan area who writes about agriculture, politics and regional security. He was, for many years, a senior commodities journalist for Reuters. He founded the Southeast Asia Commodity Digest. He is known for his extensive knowledge of agriculture and the El Niño phenomenon and his views have been quoted in news reports.