I went to see The Death of Stalin with Hania, whose mother returned home from prison after his demise. So it was hard for us to buy into the Monty Pythonesque characterization of his inner circle.
About a hundred people gathered at the Fisher Island Tennis Center yesterday evening for the christening of the Caroline Wozniacki Courts. The event was held to congratulate the Number 2 player in the world – a sometime resident of the island – on her victory at the Australian Open in January, her first Grand Slam title. Wozniacki thanked the attendees, including her parents and her fiancé, and then graciously posed for pictures with the dozens of people who wanted a keepsake (or postsake).
“A lot of great players played on these courts,” one resident told me. “Agassi, Sampras. They’d come here and practice during the Lipton.”
Another told me that Wozniacki practices here now, and is always very friendly. “Courier lived here for about five years,” he added. “He wouldn’t talk to anybody. Sampras could hardly put two sentences together.” This was a criticism of his social skills, not his English fluency.
I heard the susurrations of Polish coming from one of the tables and wandered over. I’d been emboldened by Wozniacki who, immediately after our introduction, had complimented me on my Polish. Further demonstrating her niceness.
In January my dermatologist prescribed Imiquimod – a sun damage cream apparently used by Eskimos – and told me to apply it to my face for three weeks and then come back in two months.
My reaction was quite dramatic – an outbreak of red welts on my forehead, a strip of fiery skin by my left eye – though not as bad as some people’s, whose pictures I had gawked at on the Internet. I took a few rare (in both senses of the word) selfies to show my doctor on my next visit.
It came this week. Shortly after he walked into the examination room, I told him I had some photos to show him.
“Oh yeah?” he said. “Have you been someplace interesting?”
It’s been almost seven months since Amazon bought Whole Foods and my local store still doesn’t sell books.
During the documentary the other night, one of the artists interviewed said that she is drawn to singers who are more in love with the song than with their image. I immediately wondered if any pop singer today fit that description. Then I thought of Sinatra, a man very conscious of his image. But even he cared more deeply about the song, a passion that in large part created his image.
Down to Miami yesterday to see my first movie of the Miami Film Festival: the documentary Me, My Father and the Cariocas: 70 Years of Music in Brazil. I learned that the bossa nova grew out of the hopeful period of Juscelino Kubitschek’s presidency in the late 1950s; in fact, the man who is known as the father of modern Brazil was also called the “bossa nova president.” A title that would seem to have made him cooler than Kennedy.