Month: June 2021

Posted on June 14, 2021

I love quotes from the famous and infamous. They stimulate the mind and spring me loose from my default state of…who knows.

There’s a great quote written in cement in front of the building in Washington housing the originals of our Constitution and Declaration of Independence, “What’s Past is Prologue.” It’s from Shakespeare, modified, in music, by Justin Timberlake (who I wouldn’t know from a cord of wood), to “what goes around comes around.”

By the way, I love the Tip O’Neill expression “I wouldn’t know him from a cord of wood.” You gotta love Tip! (The Speaker of the House, for Math Majors) I call him “Tip” for two reasons. Most importantly, he’s dead and he can’t say he “doesn’t know me from a cord of wood” and, secondly, I actually did meet him twice and the second time he called me by name. You’ll just have to take that on the, admittedly, flimsy support of, my word.

There are certain people that just cry out to be quoted. Like Dorothy Parker, for instance. She was known for being known, doing some writing and having an acerbic wit. Dorothy described a Broadway starlet who recently arrived from Hungary as “speaking seven languages but unable to say ‘no’ in any one of them.”

Many Jews claim Dorothy as one of theirs. But, without being argumentative, I will point out that her Mother was Celtic (Scotch, Irish, Welsh…not NBA) and Dorothy attended The Convent of the Sacred Heart Elementary School on 79th Street in Manhattan. I’ll always claim her as one of mine, at least partly.

For what its worth, there is a Private Library across from the Convent School on 79th St, of very distinguished history from which my own self and George Washington, at different times in history, enjoyed borrowing privileges. I can report that I am no longer a Member, and my overdue fines have been paid. I have to assume the same for George. Continue Reading……