Topped out at nine above, a whole five degrees above the projection. Lucky us. I had two pieces due, so there was no chance for the auto dealerships. No time for much but walking and typing then walking back then driving then walking the dog then more typing. Then Vikings! (I write this in advance of the game.)
While at the office I noticed a piece in the WSJ about imminent collapse of the bourbon boom.
The problem is that everyone decided to make bourbon, and there wasn’t much to distinguish between the flood of newcomers.
This quote stood out:
“We’ve been in a post-Covid hangover where everyone was home day-drinking and you had this hockey stick increase in consumption that was not normal,” said CEO Pete Barger.
Well, I don’t think everyone was day-drinking at home. But it would be interesting to see if they had stats on the uptick in people who did. Perhaps during the first weeks, when we expected the front loaders to drive through town loading up the citizens who had fallen over dead in the streets, yes, you might have taken a nip at four to steady your nerves, but I never did. I did allow myself bourbon on Tuesday, which was a new rule. A bit of the weekend in the middle of the week. Heck, let’s add some ice cream, too. Okay okay just a little cocaine.
Kidding. One of the comments made a good point:
Looking at my cohort of friends and family I see people going out a lot less. Dining and bars are just too expensive. (At the hotel down the block: well bourbon and soda $22, +20% tip, +10% F&B tax / sales tax.). And often too much trouble: valet / parking issues, traffic, etc.
Well, that is a hotel. But I’m not sure other Gotham bars are that much cheaper. Is it just me, the one who's watched too many old movies, or was it possible in the olden times to find a bar on any block, with some white-aproned bull punishing a glass with a tired towel, two or three regulars in the dim recesses, a couple of booths, a TV in the corner, and the possibility of a drink for a dollar? So it seems. Every town had one, complete with peroxided doxy at the end of the bar, acting special, and a jukebox playing rote swing.
Time to go watch the game. What a grand season it's been. Our mery troika - myself and the Crazy Uke convening in the Giant Swede's living room - began with no expectations at all, resigned to the cellar, but determined to earn the victories of the future by cheering on the efforts of the present. And then it turned around and took off, a series of Sundays that produced whoops of joy and ever-growing hopes of an improbable year of well-earned victories. And now here we are, starting the hard work of the playoffs. Skol!
LATER Nevermind
I signed up for Tubi, with some trepidation. It’s free, but it’s not as if I don’t have enough options. I’m behind on all the shows I used to watch and the idea of adding more to the list was disheartening. But my pal at the paper was talking about the Jimmy Steward biopic of Charles Lindbergh’s flight, and since I’d just read a story about a Surprising New Theory about the famous kidnapping ( Lindy gave his son to a doctor who shared his belief in eugenics, and the doctor did an experiment on the kid, whom Lindy never really liked, and the kid died, and they faked the kidnapping. Uh. No) I wanted to see the movie to see how they shot the long flight. And it’s a Billy Wilder movie, so. I signed up.
At one point Lindbergh is raising money, and goes to New York., I always stop when I see things like this.
Where could it be?
Let's zoom in . . .
Merchants Fire Assuurance. Well, that will help!
Or, I could unpause . . . D'oh.
Okay, well, the Woolworth. So that makes it easy.
The building's carvings have been removed. Otherwise it's all the same as it was. Well, except for the fact that the building went up in 1926-27, and the scene showed Lindbergh's trip to get investors in 1926, so it wouldn't be completed. The building's website says:
1834
The site was cleared for the Astor House, which was then known as the Fields, where Washington read the Declaration of Independence
I think all that could be made a bit more clear. Wikipedia:
"Washington in the Fields" refers to the event where General George Washington had the Declaration of Independence read aloud to his troops in New York City on July 9, 1776, essentially "in the field" to his assembled soldiers, informing them of the newly declared American independence from Great Britain.
Then building on the left of the picture is the Telephone Building, 195 Broadway. I didn't recognize it at first, because when I was last in the neighborhood, I approached it from a different angle. It has a gorgeous lobby.
I took that shot on a rainy night in New York in 2022. It was a good trip. I had not gone to rustle up money for a transatlantic flight, but to make a personal appearance of sorts and entertain people. In that respect I had more luck than Lindy.
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