NEW YORK—I am seriously thinking of visiting a shrink (just kidding) as I now have definite proof that I am crazy: Instead of remaining in England and going to Badminton for the duke of Beaufort’s 70th birthday bash, and catching a glimpse of ...
Harvard man Russell Seitz has sent me an extraordinary present as an object lesson in “what a magazine should be, in case you start another one.” The paper has yellowed and is dog-eared, pages are falling out and the print is faint, but The ...
Privilege at birth displeases wannabe types, and the subject came up rather a lot last week, especially in the Land of the Depraved, where the Bagel Times regards monarchy as antidemocratic and the cause of most human ills, including the common ...
None of this would have happened had I accepted my neighbor’s invite to dine with a Swiss billionaire banker, or bb. He’s an old friend, the bb, and untypically Swiss: He boozes, schnoofs, and chases women, or AFABs, as the absurd youth of today ...
GSTAAD—A fin de saison feeling around here, but the restaurants are still full, the sons of the desert still moping around, building is going on nonstop, and the cows are down from the mountains making the village a friendlier and more civilized ...
Eighty-two years ago, when Mussolini attacked Greece, the people—deeply offended—simply fought back. Their response followed Plato’s definition of a situation whereby the desire to win a fight is fueled by the desire to have one’s honor ...
GSTAAD—Nostalgia barged in like gangbusters. What brought it on was a brief article about the most charming and enchanting of young women, Nancy Olson. Seventy-two years ago she was in that rare gem of a movie, Sunset Boulevard, playing the ...
GSTAAD—As the great Yogi Berra explained, “It’s déjà vu all over again.” The great one also contributed the following wisdom: “You can observe a lot by watching.” Yogi came to mind as high inflation and a recession loom, and merry old ...
CORONIS—I suppose there’s always a first time, and looking back it was bound to happen. I scrambled off a sailing boat and took the coward’s way out after being bashed about by an angry Poseidon and a furious Aeolus. Actually it was the wife ...
An F. Scott Fitzgerald biographer by the name of David Brown refers to America’s promotion of deviancy (my words) as “the great post Appomattox launch toward materialism.” I liked that line and was thinking about it as I left the boat early ...
PATMOS—Judging by the news, the world is finally coming apart: Chinese lab escapee Covid is still going strong, the monkeypox plague is targeting gays, record heat waves are crippling Europe and America, mass shootings are becoming a way of life ...
I now find resorts more fun out of season. Civilized tourists are as rare as an intelligent Hollywood movie, so local talent will do nicely, and to hell with the vulgar jet set. Gstaad is perfect in June and July, March and April, as are St. Moritz, ...
