Saturday, December 10, 2023
In general, I can be considered a meritocrat. I don't come from a wealthy or privileged background. Whatever I've accomplished, it was mostly on my own with a little help from my friends. I especially admire people whose mentality produced success. So, it's been a bad patch lately. Most notoriously, it was the three university presidents unable to handle leading questions from a hostile source. Under those circumstances, they don't deserve the big bucks and the fancy offices.
Then, there was the professor of accounting who "said
that when the former president tripled the square footage of his Trump
Tower triplex on annual statements of financial condition it was just an 'error in calculation.'”
When is it fraud, professor? Quintupled? Octupled? Of course, if you are being paid $400,000 as an expert witness, you might be particularly sensitive to errors in calculation.
Sunday, December 11, 2023
A little ray of sunshine, at least for prospective home buyers in some large cities. https://www.point2homes.com/
In the last year, the median price of single family homes in Memphis declined by 17.1%. while condominia in San Francisco dropped 10.6%. If you happened to sell a single family home in Manhattan after one year, you made a little money, $50,000 on your $6,400,000 investment.
Monday, December 12, 2023
Clan McMullen has descended on the Holy Land. To enjoy their company, we went to lunch at Jing Fong, 202 Centre Street, the successor to the gargantuan enterprise at 20 Elizabeth Street. This new version has about 100 seats, about one-eighth the original size, with the dim sum carts still buzzing around.
The six of us ate a lot, 17 plates, 10 different dishes. I was knocked out by the turnip cake, tasting exactly like a potato kugel from a first-rate Jewish kitchen. We were guests, so I have no information about pricing, but I found Jing Fong reasonable on previous occasions.
Tuesday, December 12, 2023
I was on the East Side and looking for an early lunch today. I went to Ess-A-Bagel, 831 Third Avenue, which served as my office for several years. At 11:45 AM, the end of line was at the front door, almost all tourists, responding to well-deserved recommendations from myriad sources. I didn’t resent the success, but retreated down East 51st Street to Urban Space, 570 Lexington Avenue, a/k/a Urbanspace Lex, confident that the usual local lanyard wearers won’t appear until closer to 1.
Indeed, I stepped right up to the counter at Mysttik Masaala and ordered butter chicken with rice ($16.99) and naan ($2.95). There was a generous amount of chicken, but I might have gotten there too early because the salt and pepper hadn’t arrived. Although carefully cooked, it was bland.
. . .
Immediately after the end of a soccer game, the president of a Turkish team punched a referee in the head, sending him to the hospital. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/
As I have said before, the American model avoids sports-related violence by giving us variety. Unlike many countries in the world, we don't obsess over one sport alone (usually soccer). Baseball season is over, the New York Football Giants are out of contention, the New York Knickerbockers are competitive, but the New York Rangers are red hot. All my eggs are never in one basket. One bad result may be disheartening, but, get ready, they are about to throw the first pitch, drop the puck, kick off or jump ball again. Violence would be distracting.
Wednesday, December 13, 2023
Happy Birthday to my big brother.
. . .
If you care about the Israel/Gaza mess, please, please take the time to listen to this talk by Rabbi Shai Held.
Thursday, December 14, 2023
In "surveys of over 70,000 high school students at over 24 high schools in the United States . . . 64 percent of students admitted to cheating on a test, 58 percent admitted to plagiarism and 95 percent said they participated in some form of cheating, whether it was on a test, plagiarism or copying homework."
This may be one area where China has some catching up to do. A recent survey
from four public universities in four provinces found "more than two-thirds of the respondents stated involved dishonesty in
examinations and assignments at least once during the previous academic
year." https://www.emerald.com/
So, dishonesty is the best policy.
Friday, December 15, 2023
"Rudy Giuliani ordered to pay nearly $150 million to two Georgia election workers he defamed." https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/
Maybe dishonesty is not the best policy, after all.
. . .
Jessica Hecht, who has a distinguished career on Broadway and television, spoke tonight at West End Synagogue about her philanthropic efforts, founding the Campfire Project, producing theatrical works in refugee camps in locations such as Moldova, Greece, and Uganda. https://campfire-project.org/
This is purely her initiative, organizing volunteers to work in difficult even dangerous circumstances. She is beautiful all the way around.
Let's hope that $150 million to two election officials may promise increasingly enlightened voting patterns and accessibility!
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