Massiel speaks English quite well. She does, however, have a problem with problem sometimes determining when to use the word watch (as in watching tv) and when to use look (as in to look at something. She has the same problem making a choice between hear and listen. Today we went to the pool and then into the casino for a free lunch. In talking with the bartender, I had to use "heard" and after I had said it in Spanish, I asked Massiel if I had said it properly. The choice was between oiste (heard) or escuchaste (listened). Massiel told me that it didn't matter, they both mean the same. I reminded her that they didn't really and maybe that is why she has a problem with those words in English. I told her that I would try to give her a few examples to help her remember the difference in the future. Here they are:
I hate listening to your voice.
Every time I hear your voice I want to vomit.
I can't stand listening to your idiotic ideas.
You have never said anything that was worth hearing.
I think she got it.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Thursday, January 28, 2010
A Long Story
This happened a long time ago so some of the details are omitted. They are omitted because I forgot them.
I met Bonnie while working for a garment center company. I had been brought in to run a new Junior budget division called C'est Chic. We started to date, got married and our first apartment was a 1 bedroom apartment on East 56th St. between 3rd and Lexington Avenues. We didn't realize it at the time, but it was a horrible apartment. The area is very commercial, and it just didn't feel like a "home". The location turned out to be the best thing about the apartment. The apartment was on the second floor in the back of the building. In our excitement at going to view an apartment in a "good" area at a reasonable price we never realized that it had no light. It was in the back of the building and our windows faced other buildings and there was never any natural light. Kind of depressing after a while. That wasn't even the worst part. The worst part were the cockroaches. We are talking about millions of them. They owned the place. I don't know what the landlord did to make them disappear when we went to look at this place, but when we moved in they suddenly appeared. It was so bad that if you were leaving the bedroom to go into the kitchen, it was not enough to just turn the kitchen light to frighten them, you had to make some noise by yelling or banging something to get them to hide. It was horrible.
After about 6 or 8 months we got lucky. We found a great 1 bedroom apartment on East 79th Street, between Second and Third Avenues. We loved it. I am going to guess it was on about the tenth floor. We lived there for about 3 or 4 years. Michele was born while we lived there. We took what had been the L shaped living room and closed it off with a plaster board wall. That space became her bedroom. It was a tiny room, with access only through the equally small kitchen. Her bedroom was probably 6 feet X 8 feet, or less. It didn't really matter at first because Michele was kind of small. However, it really was a tiny room. We never considered leaving Manhattan so the only option was to find a bigger apartment. Finding a big apartment has never been a problem if you are really rich. However, if you only earn a good living, which we did, finding suitable living space is really a crap shoot. People actually read the obituaries to check to see who died and, more importantly, where they lived so that they could inquire as to vacancies. I am guessing (one of the things I forget) that we were paying about $800 per month. It was a reasonable amount for a 1 bedroom apartment in our neighborhood, but 2 bedrooms were way more and not available.
I had a friend, Bob Mait. Bob and I met when we both worked for a California Company and we had stayed friends after he left the company. One day he called me to tell me of his good fortune. His girlfriend knew a guy who worked for a major real estate company, Rudin Management. Rudin is the owner/manager of some of the most prestigious apartment buildings in Manhattan. (The trophy for the winner of the New York City Marathon is named after Sam Rudin, the founder.) Bob was calling to tell me that through the person that his girlfriend knew, someone by the name of Jeff Steinman had called to offer them a two bedroom apartment at a great price. Bob told me that I could call Jeff, but that I could not use his name because he didn't want Jeff to know that he was the reference. I was so excited to find the name of someone to call directly to help in my search that I agreed. That afternoon I called Rudin and asked for Jeff. I remember that at that time he used to answer his own phone by saying his name, "Hello, this is Jeff Steinman". I said hello, told him my name and said that a friend of mine had given me his name, and that the friend had specified that I not give his name to Jeff. Jeff's answer told me that at some point he was going to help me. His answer was, "Was it my wife?" After we finished laughing he explained that periodically he had access to two bedroom apartments, but the waiting list was substantial and that he could not make any promises. I asked if he minded if I called him on a regular basis to check with him and he said that that would be fine. So began a series of weekly phone calls to Jeff. I have been a salesman for my whole life. I know how to get people to spend time talking to me and I know how to use my sense of humor to help me achieve results. Jeff and I had some great conversations, but every called ended with him telling me that there was, as yet, no apartment available, but to, "Stay in touch". I remember that at one point I went to Los Angeles for a business meeting for a week and I had Bonnie call to keep the chain of calls unbroken. She got the same answer that I always got, "Nothing yet, but stay in touch". At some point I decided that something had to be done to distinguish myself from all the other people calling (I am sure that there must have been hundreds).
I decided that pictures were the way to go. With the help of a neighbor, Sylvia, we posed and took these pictures. They showed us standing in our "eat in kitchen" (with plates in our hand), Michele in her bedroom (her bedroom was small but this really was a closet), all of us sitting in the family room (with all of our entertainment, books, puzzles, etc.), Michele and Bonnie in the living room part of the family room, and Michele alone in our bedroom (my bedroom closet). I enclosed a note with the pictures explaining that these pictures clearly demonstrated why we needed a bigger apartment.
Rather than taking a chance with the regular mail, I decided that the pictures would have more impact if they were hand delivered so I called a messenger who came to my office to pick them up and then brought them over to Jeff's office. About 1/2 hour after the messenger left I was called to the phone. Sure enough it was Jeff calling to tell me that he had the pictures and they were great. He told me how much he enjoyed them, and then he finished with his regular finish to all phone calls, "I still don't have anything, but stay in touch". I did.
About a year later may mother passed away and while we were sitting Shiva at her house I got a call from my office telling me that Jeff had called. It was a Friday. I couldn't understand how he learned that my mother had died, but I figured that maybe he had somehow found out and was calling to express his condolences. I returned his call and he greeted me by telling me that he might have something, a big two bedroom, if I was willing to live on the West Side. I said, "Of course I would". He told me that he had a two bedroom available on West 86th St. and that I could go to see it on Saturday during the day. I told Bonnie and her initial response was, "What are you crazy? I'm not living on the West Side". I told her that we should at least check it out. Since it was a Friday, normally a busy night I said that we should check at least check out the block. I remember exactly what I said. "We should go over there and see if there is a lot of Police activity. If there is, we won't go tomorrow to look at the apartment, but if it is quiet, we should at least check it out". She agreed and we went over to the West Side. 86th Street is a wide, crosstown street. This apartment was between Columbus and Amsterdam Avenue. It is a great quiet block. We asked the doorman if we could go up, since we were told about the apartment and he told us that the people weren't home. The next day we went to look at the apartment and loved it. A couple of years later Bonnie found out through one of the doormen that an even bigger apartment was going to be available. We checked it out. It was actually a three bedroom apartment. I called Jeff to inform him that the apartment was coming available and I wanted to move in. He agreed and we moved in a few weeks later. We turned the third bedroom into a full dining room. The West Side was, and still is great. Bonnie still lives in that apartment.
I met Bonnie while working for a garment center company. I had been brought in to run a new Junior budget division called C'est Chic. We started to date, got married and our first apartment was a 1 bedroom apartment on East 56th St. between 3rd and Lexington Avenues. We didn't realize it at the time, but it was a horrible apartment. The area is very commercial, and it just didn't feel like a "home". The location turned out to be the best thing about the apartment. The apartment was on the second floor in the back of the building. In our excitement at going to view an apartment in a "good" area at a reasonable price we never realized that it had no light. It was in the back of the building and our windows faced other buildings and there was never any natural light. Kind of depressing after a while. That wasn't even the worst part. The worst part were the cockroaches. We are talking about millions of them. They owned the place. I don't know what the landlord did to make them disappear when we went to look at this place, but when we moved in they suddenly appeared. It was so bad that if you were leaving the bedroom to go into the kitchen, it was not enough to just turn the kitchen light to frighten them, you had to make some noise by yelling or banging something to get them to hide. It was horrible.
After about 6 or 8 months we got lucky. We found a great 1 bedroom apartment on East 79th Street, between Second and Third Avenues. We loved it. I am going to guess it was on about the tenth floor. We lived there for about 3 or 4 years. Michele was born while we lived there. We took what had been the L shaped living room and closed it off with a plaster board wall. That space became her bedroom. It was a tiny room, with access only through the equally small kitchen. Her bedroom was probably 6 feet X 8 feet, or less. It didn't really matter at first because Michele was kind of small. However, it really was a tiny room. We never considered leaving Manhattan so the only option was to find a bigger apartment. Finding a big apartment has never been a problem if you are really rich. However, if you only earn a good living, which we did, finding suitable living space is really a crap shoot. People actually read the obituaries to check to see who died and, more importantly, where they lived so that they could inquire as to vacancies. I am guessing (one of the things I forget) that we were paying about $800 per month. It was a reasonable amount for a 1 bedroom apartment in our neighborhood, but 2 bedrooms were way more and not available.
I had a friend, Bob Mait. Bob and I met when we both worked for a California Company and we had stayed friends after he left the company. One day he called me to tell me of his good fortune. His girlfriend knew a guy who worked for a major real estate company, Rudin Management. Rudin is the owner/manager of some of the most prestigious apartment buildings in Manhattan. (The trophy for the winner of the New York City Marathon is named after Sam Rudin, the founder.) Bob was calling to tell me that through the person that his girlfriend knew, someone by the name of Jeff Steinman had called to offer them a two bedroom apartment at a great price. Bob told me that I could call Jeff, but that I could not use his name because he didn't want Jeff to know that he was the reference. I was so excited to find the name of someone to call directly to help in my search that I agreed. That afternoon I called Rudin and asked for Jeff. I remember that at that time he used to answer his own phone by saying his name, "Hello, this is Jeff Steinman". I said hello, told him my name and said that a friend of mine had given me his name, and that the friend had specified that I not give his name to Jeff. Jeff's answer told me that at some point he was going to help me. His answer was, "Was it my wife?" After we finished laughing he explained that periodically he had access to two bedroom apartments, but the waiting list was substantial and that he could not make any promises. I asked if he minded if I called him on a regular basis to check with him and he said that that would be fine. So began a series of weekly phone calls to Jeff. I have been a salesman for my whole life. I know how to get people to spend time talking to me and I know how to use my sense of humor to help me achieve results. Jeff and I had some great conversations, but every called ended with him telling me that there was, as yet, no apartment available, but to, "Stay in touch". I remember that at one point I went to Los Angeles for a business meeting for a week and I had Bonnie call to keep the chain of calls unbroken. She got the same answer that I always got, "Nothing yet, but stay in touch". At some point I decided that something had to be done to distinguish myself from all the other people calling (I am sure that there must have been hundreds).
I decided that pictures were the way to go. With the help of a neighbor, Sylvia, we posed and took these pictures. They showed us standing in our "eat in kitchen" (with plates in our hand), Michele in her bedroom (her bedroom was small but this really was a closet), all of us sitting in the family room (with all of our entertainment, books, puzzles, etc.), Michele and Bonnie in the living room part of the family room, and Michele alone in our bedroom (my bedroom closet). I enclosed a note with the pictures explaining that these pictures clearly demonstrated why we needed a bigger apartment.
Rather than taking a chance with the regular mail, I decided that the pictures would have more impact if they were hand delivered so I called a messenger who came to my office to pick them up and then brought them over to Jeff's office. About 1/2 hour after the messenger left I was called to the phone. Sure enough it was Jeff calling to tell me that he had the pictures and they were great. He told me how much he enjoyed them, and then he finished with his regular finish to all phone calls, "I still don't have anything, but stay in touch". I did.
About a year later may mother passed away and while we were sitting Shiva at her house I got a call from my office telling me that Jeff had called. It was a Friday. I couldn't understand how he learned that my mother had died, but I figured that maybe he had somehow found out and was calling to express his condolences. I returned his call and he greeted me by telling me that he might have something, a big two bedroom, if I was willing to live on the West Side. I said, "Of course I would". He told me that he had a two bedroom available on West 86th St. and that I could go to see it on Saturday during the day. I told Bonnie and her initial response was, "What are you crazy? I'm not living on the West Side". I told her that we should at least check it out. Since it was a Friday, normally a busy night I said that we should check at least check out the block. I remember exactly what I said. "We should go over there and see if there is a lot of Police activity. If there is, we won't go tomorrow to look at the apartment, but if it is quiet, we should at least check it out". She agreed and we went over to the West Side. 86th Street is a wide, crosstown street. This apartment was between Columbus and Amsterdam Avenue. It is a great quiet block. We asked the doorman if we could go up, since we were told about the apartment and he told us that the people weren't home. The next day we went to look at the apartment and loved it. A couple of years later Bonnie found out through one of the doormen that an even bigger apartment was going to be available. We checked it out. It was actually a three bedroom apartment. I called Jeff to inform him that the apartment was coming available and I wanted to move in. He agreed and we moved in a few weeks later. We turned the third bedroom into a full dining room. The West Side was, and still is great. Bonnie still lives in that apartment.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
A True Story
I don't know what started it, but tonight while we were getting dinner ready (http://www.rachaelraymag.com/Recipes/rachael-ray-magazine-recipes/pet-friendly-dog-recipes/Sensational-Salmon-Cakes) (don't be put off by the fact that they are pet friendly, they are sensational) I started doing The Twist. I asked Massiel if she had ever seen that done here. She hadn't. I did it for a little bit and then we finished cooking (by the way, I use 2 eggs, not one, and a little tiny bit extra bread crumbs.....wow). After dinner I went to You Tube to show Massiel Chubby Checker's original version, which he is shown performing on the Dick Clark American Bandstand Show The recording was made in 1960. While watching it I remembered that one night I had gone to the Peppermint Lounge with some friends, while I lived in Mount Vernon, while I was a senior in high school. That would have made it either 1961 or 1962.
Here is the Wickipedia entry for the Peppermint Lounge:
Here is the Wickipedia entry for the Peppermint Lounge:
The Peppermint Lounge at 128 West 45th Street opened in 1958 and was the first rock and roll nightclub in New York City, it is also where Go-Go dancing originated in the early 1960s and where the Twist craze, that went around the world, was launched from. Sam Cooke immortalized The Peppermint Lounge in his hit song, "Twistin' the Night Away". Adult women in dresses joined teenage girls in jeans to get up on tables and the bar to dance the twist.[1]
When the Twist craze hit, celebrities swarmed into the Peppermint Lounge: Jackie Kennedy, Audrey Hepburn, Truman Capote, Marilyn Monroe, Judy Garland, Liberace, Noel Coward, Frank Sinatra, Norman Mailer, Annette Funicello, even the elusive Greta Garbo. The Beatles caused a near fan frenzy in the club during first U.S. visit in 1964. The lounge was the home base of Joey Dee and the Starliters, who recorded their #1 hit "Peppermint Twist" at the venue in the early 1960s. When Joey Dee went on tour, he took a then unknown guitarist named Jimi Hendrix with him. Members of the Starliters later went on to form the Young Rascals. Artists including The Beach Boys, the Ronettes (who made their professional debut here in 1961), the Crystals, The Isley Brothers, Chubby Checker, Liza Minnelli, and The Four Seasons all performed at the Lounge.
What they neglect to mention, and the reason that this is memorable for me, is that another celebrity that went there was Leonard Bernstein. He was the director of the New York Philharmonic, and one of the co-authors (he wrote the music) of West Side Story. I was dancing with a girl, and he walked up to me and asked me to teach him how to do The Twist. And I did.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Best Christmas Scene, In Lights, Ever
So realistic (that's a dummy hanging from the drain pipe) that the owner had to take it down after two days.
Monday, January 4, 2010
First Time
This has been a 4 1/2 day holiday for Massiel. She decided, along with her grandmother, that this would be a great time to make a day trip to the beach. Plans were made to go yesterday, Sunday. In addition to Massiel's grandmother we took her aunt, her aunt's daughter, her aunt's boyfriend and his two sons. Including Massiel and I, eight in all. We had a great time even though the best thing I can say about the weather is that it didn't rain while we were at the beach (about 3 hours). It rained on the way to and on the way back from the beach. It was overcast the whole time we were there. I checked the Weather Channel forecast and the prediction was for rain the whole day. When I saw this, I took off my bathing suit, meaning to take it with me, but I forgot it. Rita, Massiel's grandmother is one of my favorite people. This Saint of a woman, not only raised Massiel, but when I met her, 5 years ago, she was raising 3 more children of one of her daughters. She still has two of them (the slaves that Massiel brings over every so often). They are getting a terrific upbringing, as did Massiel. I discovered that this woman (64 years old) had never been to the beach in her life. This was her first time. Of course, everyone with a bathing suit went in the water. I took this picture of Rita, Massiel, and her aunt sharing Rita's first time in the water. That's her on the right.
P.S. The only disconcerting thing is that when Americans talk about going in the water they talk about swimming in the water. Dominicans use the word bañar, which means to bathe. Hmmmmm.
New La Moda Sighting
I am pretty sure I read about a cap company in the US that was very popular with "street" people. If I remember correctly, the buyers of the caps, in order to show their stylishness, leave the paper hangtags on the hats so that you can tell that they come from an expensive cap company. Well at the beach yesterday their were some "street" locals with their new, cheap hats, with labels intact. I guess they missed the point. You are going to have to look at this picture really carefully to see the tags, but there are two guys en "La Moda". One is the guy standing in the white shirt and the other is being hugged (under the armpit in the shadow).
Wait a minute!! Wait a minute!! Wait a minute!!
If you click on the picture you can see the labels much more clearly, only I'll be damned if they don't look like condoms in colors to match the hats. What have I discovered now?
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