Still carrying ’96 baggage
1996. Always toddlin’ Chicago. My plane seatmate was my longtime forever friend NYC’s mayor David Dinkins. We were going together to the Democratic National Convention.
I’d packed one bag. Dave, running for Best Dressed, schlepped assorted heavy-duty duffels. Big-time luggage. Like he’s setting up housekeeping in downtown Madagascar.
For our few days in crappy Chicago — where if you wear a clean shirt they hiss at you — he was dressed — we’re talking DRESSED!
David changed clothes while aboard. High over Delaware, which nobody but Biden’s bankers care about, he changed wardrobe.
Upon landing he actually had his spit-polish boots shined. BUFFED. “Charlie Rangel treated me to a shine,” he said.
OK, fine. I didn’t care if he was dressed like Ben Affleck’s temporary wife. I cared about me. His crates of luggage arrived safely.
My one lousy skinny shriveled bag? LOST! Never made the damn flight. LOST. By then, it was somewhere in downtown Egypt.
Me, zero clothes. Nothing. Not even a fresh pair of drawers. And I’m the date of Shirley Temple Dinkins.
And the airline has no idea — none, zero — where my bag might be. I wanted to tell them where exactly to look for it — but being with our mayor I had to keep my mouth shut.
So he waltzes me into some conclave. Introduces me to some Kennedy lady. She was lieutenant governor of some state. Even her lymph nodes were dressed.
I’m wearing the bedraggled summertime cotton I’d selected for the trip figuring I’d naturally change to some magnificent shmatta I’d packed along. Forget it.
I’ve already reported this. I’m now re-reporting it. She actually looked me up and down — in horror — and sneered: “You still wearing that old dress? That’s a designer thing. OhmyGod I had that same one years ago and I already threw it out.”
I went nuts. Even Dinkins’ bow tie began to wiggle. It was six days — SIX — before they located my bag. My nerves were thinner than a thread.
I went out and shopped but some things needed alteration or accessories, so I don’t even know who got elected. I was too busy trying on. Dinkins had a friend nearly my size so I even borrowed.
Me, so effing aggravated that I wouldn’t have cared even if they’d dug up Ulysses S. Grant and reinstated him.
And now, maybe some old Kitty Hawk remnant can reexamine its closet and schlep out an actual leftover shmatta — a real dress — that’s stuck in there for the Republican hand-me-down to wear.
Presidential primary put-downs
1864. Way before our Chicago Valentine party began, presidential candidate George McClellan called his opponent, Abraham Lincoln: “a well-meaning baboon.”
1960. Former president Harry Truman said (future president) Richard Nixon should go to hell.
Joseph Cummins’ 2007 paperback “Anything for a Vote” calls Reagan “old,” says “Dewey hates you” and “Don’t trust Teddy Roosevelt.”
Sleaze with ease were some of our nicer exchanges.
Only in New York, kids, only in New York.