LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth |
Gay 'n Gray |
by John D. Siegfried |
How to Save Money and Stimulate the Economy
How do you save money and at the same time stimulate the economy? I'm not sure I know the answer, but I gave it the old college try over the Easter weekend. Unexpectedly, because of a death in the familymy father's second cousin's third wifeI found myself in Allentown, Pennsylvania, my old home town, four days before Easter. While "father's second cousin's third wife" may sound remote, Edith, the dear departed, was a close member of our family. The truth is, there are so few family members left that any relationship is close, like it or not. When my partner went on line to make an airline reservation for me the prices had doubled. It was the Easter weekend. The usual Lauderdale/Philadelphia round trip fare is around $250 in economy. But with Easter and spring break tilting the supply and demand equation, the price had doubled. However, if I didn't return on a Saturday or Sunday, but returned on Monday, the fare fell to its standard level. So fine, I agreed, I'll come back on a Monday and save $250. To fill the few unscheduled days, I planned to visit my son and his family in Winchester, Virginia. Then, after I was ticketed, a glitch developed. My son and his family wouldn't be home over the Easter weekend. They were taking their youngest on a college shopping tour. But to change my flight plans at that stage would incur an extra hundred or so for schedule changes plus going back to the $500 fare, that is, if seats were available at all. Following my long tradition of making lemonade when given lemons, I decided to fill my time with a trip to New York City and indulge a desire long suppressed to see several shows. Immediately, after checking into the mid-town hotel my partner had booked for me (where overnight parking cost more than I used to pay in my younger days for a room at the YMCA) I went to the half-price ticket booth in Times Square, TKTS. After all, I'm saving money you know; a half price seat will be fine. I snaked along at a snail's pace for more than an hour before getting a ticket for August: Osage County, the '08 Tony Award winner for "Best Play." In the process I was given a coupon for15% off a three course dinner plus a free glass of wine at a small French restaurant in the theater district. Sounded good; I'm saving money you know. And it was good until a tour bus of French Canadians arrived filling every seat, gobbling up all the bread and growing more raucous with each additional glass of wine. Fortunately, I was almost finished with my three course dinner when they invaded. By the way, does water count as a dinner course? On Saturday morning, undaunted by the gray skies, I went back out to the Times Square ticket booth and spent another hour snaking through a line but now we were in a cold continuous rain. As I noted to the woman standing in front of me, "You know, this is a bit crazy." "Whadda ya mean?" "Well, to save a few bucks we're all standing in a cold downpour. For many of us, whatever is saved will go to the doctor and the pharmacy when we get home. We'll end up with pneumonia." "Ya gotta die of something," was her stoic response as I dodged another umbrella spoke aimed at my eye. For the Saturday matinee I saw Jane Fonda in her new show 33 Variations, a really terrific piece of theater, and in the evening I was able to get a ticket for Billy Elliott, but this one was full pricea hundred and twenty bucks to swing from the chandelier. By Sunday morning, it was still cold but the rain had stopped and, as I always do when I'm in NYC on a Sunday morning, I went to see the best show in townthe service at St. Thomas Episcopal Church at Fifty-fourth and Fifth Avenue. St. Thomas has one of only four boys' choir schools in the world. Kids are in residence from third grade to eighth in order to train and prepare for the various liturgical choral programs. Being Easter, the music included organ, brass, tympani as well as the men's and boys choir. It was glorious. At the end of the service I stepped out onto Fifth Avenue and into the middle of the Easter Parade. To my delight, the Easter Parade is no longer snooty society women in fancy hats. In its current form the Easter Parade is a cross between Mardi Gras and a drag show. In front of the church were three guys in formal attire sporting terra cotta pots with live tulips and daffodils on their heads. They wore big signs saying, "I'm Potted." Drag queens, with towers of flowers and feathers on their heads, made Carmen Miranda look like a millinery neophyte. They all strolled the Avenue pausing for pictures and handing out small packets of jelly beans. And one tall gal (at least I think it was a gal) wore a hoop skirt with diagonal rows of pink, lavender, and yellow marshmallow bunnies and chicks pasted on. I guess it was a new definition of pasties. What a hoot. Flying back to Fort Lauderdale on Monday I did a quick calculation. I saved $250 by flying on Monday and it only cost me about $1200 dollars to do it. That, however, wasn't just stimulus to the economy. It was personal stimulus as well and, "Good Lord willing and the creek don't rise," I'm going back and stimulate the economy again next Easter. I might even take my own Easter bonnet. A couple of purple condoms blown up to simulate rabbit ears might work, but it's probably already been done. More appropriate, perhaps, would be a big gray bunny tail to match my gray hair and something small and understated in the way of a hat; perhaps a lavender beret with a few peacock feathers. I have a whole year to work on it and I'm sure, with the help of my friends, I can come up with something creative.John Siegfried, a former Rehoboth resident who now lives in Ft. Lauderdale, maintains strong ties to our community and can be reached at hsajds@aol.com. |
LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth, Vol. 19, No. 05 May 22, 2009 |