Will Tesei kneel during the singing of their national anthem?

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Bring a coonskin cap

Bring a coonskin cap

Al Dente came through

Al Dente came through

10:00 This morning, town fathers will celebrate Mexican Independence Day.

This Friday September 15th, 2017 at 10:00am there will be a flag raising ceremony to honor Mexican Independence Day in front of Greenwich Town Hall located at 101 Field Point Rd.
This is the first time Greenwich has hosted this ceremony.
Greenwich First Selectman Peter Tesei will speak.

Why?

Hillarity: "Alternate nostril breathing" as remedy to Trump Derangement Syndrome

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Or maybe just a couple of good, deep breaths through either

Or maybe just a couple of good, deep breaths through either

She advocates it; if only her followers would adopt it

Failed Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton demonstrated on Wednesday one of the ways she dealt with her shocking loss to President Trump in the aftermath of the 2016 election while promoting her new campaign memoir.
"Seems like you've been doing a lot of yoga?" CNN's Anderson Cooper asked during an interview organized as part of Clinton's What Happened book tour.
"Yes, I have," Clinton responded. "And alternate nostril breathing."

Happy story of the day: 83-year-old grandpa deals with burglar

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Tired of the damn fool

Tired of the damn fool

"Just 'cause you're old, doesn't mean you have to sit down".

An elderly man pushed a suspected burglar off his roof during a police chase Tuesday in La Puente, Calif.
The alleged burglar met an unlikely match when Wilford Burgess, 83, “got tired” of his tomfoolery. The suspect was jumping from roof to roof, then sat on Burgess’ roof for five hours and refused to budge when police ordered him to come down. While neighbors called crisis negotiators to help out with the situation, Burgess decided to speed up the process, reported Los Angeles Times.
“I’m going on that roof. That sucker’s coming down,” Burgess said. The grandfather borrowed a ladder from his neighbor, climbed onto the roof, and pushed and shoved the suspected burglar onto the ground. The man slammed into Burgess’ car, broke the windshield, and was taken into custody, ABC7 reported.
“Come in my house, you don’t have to worry … because I’m going to load up,” Burgess said. “Just ’cause you’re old doesn’t mean you got to sit down. As long as you’re able to move, move.”
 

New format update

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Working on adding a comment notation on the front page, so readers (and I) won't have to click on the follow-up page to see new activity, and we're also soon, I hope, adding a summary sentence or two to each post so that you can decide whether to  pursue the matter.

There's now a "see all posts" button at the bottom of the face page, so that you can scroll the blog, but bear with me while further tweaks are made. Reviews of this format by readers are generally positive, and I like it myself, so indulge me, and we'll get it right.

It's always worth it to make a token gesture, I suppose: BET "election" today.

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Your next RTM —no, they aren't protesting Antifa brownshirts 

Your next RTM —no, they aren't protesting Antifa brownshirts 

Seven candidates, six slots. Andy Duss, Karen Fassuliotis, and Bill Drake would be my choices, and though I know nothing about Debra Hess, she's bound to be better than Leslie Tarkington or Bill Mason. Vote away, though know that our charter gives equal votes to the free-spending Democrat minority, so I have no confidence that the election will matter. 

Of more concern, to me, are the 65 vacancies in our 230 member RTM. The "non-partisan" Democrat, anti-Trump organization, Indivisible Greenwich, vows to fill at least 40 of those spaces, and, while the RTM is pretty much useless these days, you can count on that sort of block to push for continued, expanded spending on town employee pensions and benefits. I've served my tour of duty on the RTM — two terms —, and won't return, but you civic-minded young whipper snappers might consider wasting your time, too, if only to retard the town's demise: it's your property values at stake here, after all.

Fire the messenger

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Maybe it will appeal to a Brit nostalgic for his old boarding school

Maybe it will appeal to a Brit nostalgic for his old boarding school

61 Lower Cross Road is back with a new broker but the same price, $9.9 million.

It started at $11.9 in May, 2016, but chopped a full $2 million in January, 2017, without effect. Now the owners have fired their first, excellent agent and replaced her with one just as good, but they apparently still can't come to grips with the fact that back country homes like theirs just aren't moving at $10 million.

"Green" homes command no premium

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"Transitional design", so it says. Uh huh.

"Transitional design", so it says. Uh huh.

130 Old Church has cut its price again, to $3.295. Started a year ago June at $3.995.

Its listing touts all the architectural and builder awards it has won, and describes it thus: "This home is at the height of Green Standards from the air purification system to the geo-thermal heating/cooling, Crestron Home automation system, whole house distributed built-in audio and surround sound system in family room."

None of that is particularly persuasive to buyers, in my experience. The fact that the lot was carved out of a cliff, and was overpriced at the start, is. This new price may do it, because it really is a good house, and Old Church Road's a good, convenient location. But bamboo flooring, low volatile paint, geo-thermal heating, and Crestron systems are all just manifestations of feel-good builders' virtue signaling and ego, and do nothing to increase market value.

This is not literally a "lipstick on a pig" situation, because the house itself is fine, but all the green stuff is indeed lipstick, and of no value. The listing agent, Sabine Schoenberg, is the woman behind the current Greenwich PR boondoggle, so she knows from illusion and reality. Maybe this new price reflects that.

Stamford developer pleads guilty to $71 million swindle

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"Would I lie to you?" John DiMenna at his most charming

"Would I lie to you?" John DiMenna at his most charming

John DiMenna, 74, is about to lose his liberty, forever. Not sure I'd make that same decision.

Like most successful fraudsters, DiMenna presented himself, and was perceived as, a perfect gentleman, all while he was stealing from investors who considered him a friend.

As recently as 2015, the Stamford Advocate was still publishing gushing tributes to him, despite his history of fraud dating back to 1995.

STAMFORD -- In his sun-filled corner office overlooking the downtown, John DiMenna has an unusually calm demeanor for a businessman in the thick of Stamford's building boom.
At 70 [sic] the tall, salt-and-pepper-maned DiMenna has the bearing of a likeable English professor. Those who know him describe him as articulate but thoughtful, choosing his words with care and taking the time to observe and listen to those around him.
In short, he is not what you expect. [Or think he is — ED]
"Not to cast aspersions on the industry, but John DiMenna certainly does not fit the mold when you think about a developer," said Jack Condlin, the president of the Stamford Chamber of Commerce. "He's soft-spoken, very easygoing and very genuine." [hahahaha]
In a slightly astonished tone, he added: "He's actually interested in hearing what you have to say."
Similarly, Sandy Goldstein, the president of the Downtown Special Services District, said of him, "You will never meet a nicer or more humble person."
Since founding Seaboard Properties in 1992 and pursuing a strategy of acquiring office buildings, mostly in the South End, DiMenna has over the past six years moved his focus north, assembling a portfolio of mixed-use properties entirely in the downtown that encompasses 900,000 square feet and is valued at $250 million. Along the way, he has earned a reputation as a savvy but low-key real estate investor and developer.
"Traditionally, John is a value investor," said Randy Salvatore, a downtown developer who has worked with DiMenna. "He's bought at the bottom and sold at the top."
In 2007, Seaboard sold a significant chunk of its holdings to Greenwich-based Antares Investment Partners for $87 million, Antares being the initial development team behind Harbor Point. The sale included the company's flagship property, Stamford Landing, a five-building, 206,000-square-foot waterfront office complex. All told, DiMenna unloaded roughly half of his one million-square-foot portfolio for a total of $125 million.
The timing amazed real estate observers. By DiMenna's estimation, he beat the crash "by an hour." Antares would go on to lose control of the $3 billion Harbor Point redevelopment to then-Norwalk-based developer Building and Land Technology.
While the recession hobbled most developers other than BLT, DiMenna took his time and studied the landscape.
"What happens after a recession is there is a lot of a fear," he said. "For us, fear spells opportunity."
DiMenna has also made a foray into the hospitality industry, buying Courtyard by Marriott in 2011 from developer Tom Rich for $30 million. As part of an expansion plan, he is constructing the Marriott Residence Inn, the first extended-stay hotel in the downtown. The seven-story building, wedged between Seaboard's headquarters at 1 Atlantic St. and the Palace Theatre, will connect to the Courtyard by Marriott and have 156 rooms. 
Although the project's towering crane has become one of the symbols of the downtown's growth, work on the Marriott site recently halted, causing city officials to speculate privately. Patrick Ryan, a spokesman for a group of contractors, said the stoppage was the result of an organized walkout in November because the construction workers had not been paid.
Asked about the status, DiMenna said he decided to suspend construction after the holidays because of changes that were made to the building's interior design, as well as cold weather issues. He said he was not aware of any contractor disputes. Construction is set to resume in February. The delay, he added, would not affect the slated October 2015 completion date. [In fact, it turned out that DiMenna owed millions to the workers, and never paid them - FWIW] 
Among its commercial holdings, Seaboard owns two boutique office buildings in the downtown's historic district: an eight-story 81,000-square-foot office building at 300 Main St. and 1 Atlantic Street, which is comparably sized. Both were built in the late 1920s and reflect DiMenna's penchant for architecturally interesting buildings.
A Mount Vernon native who majored in English at the University of Miami, DiMenna got his professional start working in his grandfather's construction business, which specialized in public works infrastructure. When he was 45, he decided to embark on a career in real estate. Traditionally a high-stakes industry, its members often learn the hard way how quickly the tide of investor confidence can turn. DiMenna was no different. By 50, he said, he was broke. 
Over the years, he has learned the value of patience, being content with perhaps one deal a year. And yet he still exhibits the characteristic long-term vision and grit of a developer. Looking ahead, he said his company, with 12 employees, is targeting properties between the train station and North Street.
He later added: "For people who are in it, it's an avocation as much as a vocation."

If you believe this 2016 article, and in light of his guilty plea, I do, DiMenna stole from at least 131 of his fellow Wee Burn Country members, and completely wiped out 18 of them. I've often wondered why the Madoffs of this world, and mini-Madoffs like DiMenna, choose to stay alive in prison, for the rest of their lives, instead of doing the honorable thing, atoning for their sins and at the same time avoiding that fate, but I guess these people are different from you and me; at least I hope they are.