Dan's Papers - July 13, 2007

Last weekend was Fourth of July weekend and my girlfriend was away, which is pretty unusual for a weekend like this.

I was blue about it, but decided to make the best of it, mostly by accepting practically any invitation that came my way. I'd have a good time anyway.

Friday night, I attended a party for Guild Hall at the Maidstone Tennis Club in East Hampton, where they had those little hors d'oeuvres on trays besides the courts, and then a wonderful buffet in the tennis building, which had been all set up with tables and chairs. There was great entertainment -- John Pizzarelli and Jessica Molaskey -- who are, according to the New York Times, the best cabaret performers in the city at this time. The dinner was good, but what I really liked best were those little tiny hamburgers they served courtside.

Saturday night, I attended a big fireworks display at South Beach on Lake Montauk where we sat on blankets and drank beer and ate hamburgers and chips out of a wicker hamper until 9 p.m., when the big display went off.

Then on Sunday evening, I attended a private Fourth of July party at a great estate in Bridgehampton, where a vast lawn at the back of the house slopes down to a magnificent lake.

The host of this party pulled out all the stops. There were valets in white out front who would park your car, formal waiters with white gloves who served sushi and little caviar and sour cream things and tiny hamburgers and other stuff on the back lawn, including Mojitos and other drinks from two outdoor bars. A big tent off to one side, with red white and blue bunting and balloons figured into a horseshoe entrance, invited us in to this big Independence Day dinner that would be served there later. About a hundred people were in attendance, many dressed in jeans and bandannas. The party invitation said "jeans and junk food" and many took it seriously.

At the dinner, a terrific rock n' roll band performed as we ate from four buffet tables set up at the corners of the tent. One had hot dogs and sauerkraut, another had fajitas and avocado and beans, another had fried chicken and chips and a fourth cheeseburgers and fries. I went for the cheeseburgers and fries.

Monday at noon, I had to take my college-aged son to Southampton to have his wisdom teeth taken out. They wouldn't let me into the surgery and so, nervous, I went out to McDonalds where I had a Big Mac. I took my son home after the surgery -- he slept in the car -- and babysat him much of the day, feeding him tea and clear soup and power drinks. I hoped he'd feel well enough to enjoy the meal he likes best, the makings for which I had bought at the supermarket in the morning -- cheeseburgers with pickles and bacon. But he fell asleep in his bed at about five p.m. and didn't wake until morning.

Around seven that evening, my older son, David Lion, seeing that I was alone, invited me to a Fourth of July party being thrown by the parents of one of his best friends. It was just family, but David called to see if it was okay if I came too and they said sure. It was at one of those cozy waterfront cottages on Gerard Drive on Gardiner's Bay and it was a fine time. Hamburgers were on the grill and they had a variety of cheeses to put on them. I went for the Swiss.

For Tuesday's lunch, I went to Bobby Van's and sat at the bar by myself and had had a rum and Coke and a cheeseburger. They serve truly great cheeseburgers there. On the TV, they had a replay of the final America's Cup yachting race from Valencia Spain and I enjoyed watching that.

Tuesday night is when we put out the paper and we often stay up very late. It's a team effort and everything is passed back and forth between the editorial, production, sales and art departments for about ten hours -- the paper is sometimes 300 pages on the big weekends -- and it breaks the rhythm if people have to break for dinner, so we have the place catered.

That night, Chef Jeff brought in what he said was an Independence Celebration dinner, which consisted of baked beans, hot dogs, hamburgers, fried chicken and cole slaw. I opted for two hamburgers.

Back at my desk -- dinner is served about 5:30 -- I discovered an email from someone I hadn't seen in awhile. It was from Richard Weise, the longtime President of the Explorer's Club in New York City, who is now the explorer-in-residence for the American Museum of Natural History. His email had been written just two hours earlier.

"I know this is short notice," he wrote, "but some family and friends of mine are having a Fourth of July BBQ at my home in Mecox. If you can come, we'd love to see you." He gave the address in Mecox, just three miles from my office, and the street, which was Flying Point Road. The party began at 6:30.

And so, after seeking and getting permission from the art, sales, production and editorial departments -- everything is going to be FINE, they said, just be back in an hour -- I went to this party. There were valet car parkers in white with black bow ties out front, which seemed to suggest a rather grand affair inside, but it really wasn't. There were about thirty people there and everyone was standing around the pool drinking beer or wine served from a bar nearby or getting dinner from a table laden with a wide variety of foods including shrimp, chips and guacamole, carrots and dip, salad and cheeseburgers. These were really good-looking cheeseburgers.

My girlfriend came back from her trip on Wednesday afternoon and though she would be out to the Hamptons on Friday, I decided to take the Jitney into the City in the afternoon. The college-aged student was recovering admirably and was out and about, though I saw that he hadn't yet dived into the ground beef in the refrigerator. So I did and made myself a cheeseburger.

Then I took the 2:30 Ambassador Jitney -- they serve wine and chips on board --and came into the city for a reunion with my girlfriend.