06 November 2014

Stuff

So, sitting here in Paradise for a few more days, I reflect on our forthcoming return to reality, a/k/a Deblasioland.  The Paul Weiss NYC office is "updating" my floor. Why? I dunno. As far as I can see, the current facilities are just fine.They have been for 30 years.  (Of course, that's as far as I can see, and I don't see that well without my new glasses.)

Anyway, the physical update requires a reduction in onsite file storage. After 50+ years of sending to my secretary, (maintenant,  my "admin") every piece of paper that crossed my desk, the new floorplan requires that I reduce 144 feet of onsite file storage to 12 feet.

Okay, even with my stilted vision, I can see some justification for discarding the documentary evidence that supports my 1961 federal and state tax returns, and I do recognize I am the only person in the world who thinks those documents have "historic" significance and deserve preservation in the Martin London Non-presidential Library.

And I am willing to send the 40 yr. old house closing binders to the warehouse, but what about the important stuff: 

Twelve-year old Jesse scrawls on his first postcard of the camp season: 
"Dear Dad, I threw up on the bus. Love, Jesse"

Later in the same season, I get this one from him:
 "Dear Dad, Camp is great, Liz is in the infirmary."

And two weeks later, my darling 7 yr. old Liz, who went off to camp after Railway Express (whatever happened to them?) delivered up a  camp trunk straining at the hinges, writes:
"Dear Dad, Send stationery so I can get into lunch, and I lost my bathing suit, so send one."

Warehouse? Shred? C'est impossible.

Fall is done and winter is upon us. The historic Montauk "Fall Run" of striped bass turned out to be more of a "Peripatetic Stroll."   The new boat "L34" is now on the "hard", covered in a white plastic shroud, impatiently yearning for the month of May. And, as I feared, neither Medicare nor Obamacare would pay for it. Worse, I just paid a bill for 2015 dockage!

Half of our current ten-day stay in St. Barths is behind us. The island did well in Hurricane Gonzalo, despite the fact that the Miami Hurricane Center goofed badly, and on two hours notice changed the forecast from a tropical storm centered 100 miles to the north to a Catergory One hurricane with the eye passing directly over the island. Hardest hit were the boats. With no advance warning,  there was no time to take precautions, and 47 vessels were sunk or seriously damaged, leaving some families homeless. Happily, no loss of life, or serious injury.

Our house did just fine, except for some water in one of the driveway lights that shorted out all outside lighting. A week-long amateur hunt for the culprit got us nowhere.  Then Cedric the electrician arrived, pointed to one of the ten fixtures, said "I don't like the looks of that one," took it apart, and, voila, the lights were restored.


Breaking News Bulletin:  No, nothing to do with yesterday's election. No surprises there. Just a lot of yucks today reading that Mitch McConnell says now he will cooperate with the President. Huh? 

But I just finished reading Walter Isaacson's book "The Innovators" and I am pained to report that while Al Gore certainly did not "invent the internet", he did, while in the US Senate, actually play a major role in getting the government to fund those who did. This makes it much more difficult to mock his claims on that score, (but not others) and it should also make it much difficult for TP'ers to mock government spending on technical development and energy-saving projects. (Yeah, lots of luck with that.)  And learning that govenment action made a substantial contribution to the digital age makes me sentimental about the old days when The Congress of the United States actually did something.

Gotta go,This is a brief report: If I do not go the gym this morning, Pinks threatens to deprive me of my morning pain aux raisins pastry. Drinking morning coffee in the tropics without a pain aux raisins is like having your four-PM- return-from-the-beach Tanqueray and Tonic without popcorn. Sacre bleue!

A bientot.