CHELSEA, LONDON, U.K.—Oh, to be in England, but let’s start at the beginning. I challenge any reader to claim they are more technologically disadvantaged than yours truly, or anyone not suffering from Alzheimer’s in fact. I resisted getting a mobile telephone until my days on board a sailing ...
This is for you writers out there: If you’re not canceled, you’re no good. The good Dr. Seuss is out, as is Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, but Adolf Hitler is still in, although I can’t say the same for William Shakespeare. Everyone who’s anyone is getting canceled, so I was glad to ...
GSTAAD—I have not experienced such a long, continuous blizzard ever, and I’ve been coming here for 63 years. The ski lifts are closed, as are the hotels, and it’s been dumping for a week nonstop. My Portuguese handyman Fernando now lives on his snow plow, clearing the private road that leads ...
GSTAAD—Some of you may have noticed I have not commented at all about the running soap opera and latest brouhaha concerning the Halfwit and Meghan Macbeth. That’s because I decided long ago the best way to counter their publicity machine is to never mention them. But I’ve also done something ...
It is the sine qua non of a successful coup to first and foremost ensure the takeover of the means of information: radio, television, and newspapers. That is what the Greek colonels did in the last successful European coup back on April 21, 1967. Some years later, a colonel tried to overthrow the ...
GSTAAD—I was very sad to read of Rupert Hambro’s death. I didn’t know him well, but first met him long ago, along with his younger brother Rick, also gone, both quintessential English gentlemen, handsome, kind, and with a great sense of humor. Rupert invited me to lunch quite a few times, but ...
GSTAAD—That’s all we needed in a great year, for The Great Gatsby’s copyright to expire. Some Fitzgerald wannabe has already cashed in with a prequel, and I’m certain the worst is yet to come. I suppose the insatiable hunger for fame and celebrity in order to impress a shallow and ...
GSTAAD—The sun has returned, the snow is so-so, and exercise has replaced everything, including romance. What a way to go, after a wasted year that did wonders for my health, the diet is about to kill the patient. This is the good-bad news, the really great news is that Shakespeare has been ...
GSTAAD—Good old Helvetia, I’m quitting her for the rainy but pleasant land of England, the cows beginning to resemble chorus girls and the village an alpine Colditz. Too much of a good thing, said a wise man to a friend of mine who wanted to live on the French Riviera year-round. That was long ...
GSTAAD—During these dark endless moments of lockdown, let’s take a trip down memory lane of real high life, of parties galore, of carefree times with girls in their summer dresses, and of drunken dawns playing polo in dinner jackets. Creatures began to move properly about 500 million years ago, ...