Not
seeing any pigs flying, I checked out of my Carlyle Hotel suite. This epiphany
came to me when I shared an elevator with Herb Allen of Allen & Co after
sharing one with Anne Bass of the Fort Worth Bass family the day before. My
living in the 1980's at the Carlyle in a $15k a month suite suddenly seemed
ludicrous, hideously insane and plenty fucking stupid.
When
I shared the elevator at the Carlyle with Herb Allen, a very big time investment
banker, I thought, ‘What the hell am I doing here? A lower case bronx jew like
me belongs in the Carlyle when pigs fly'. Nouveau riche for sure. I immediately
walked to the front desk and told them that I was blowing the whore house. I
happily, pissed away the pre-paid portion of my rent, walked across the street,
made a deal with the manager of the Surrey Hotel and moved into the Surrey that
day.
Staying
at the Carlyle was some kind of a totally whacky experience but I felt like a
pig in shit living there. At the Carlyle, the bell hops acted as though they
were guests and contributed to the surreal royalty atmosphere. They thought
that being around big shots made them big shots and they looked down, with
discernible disdain, at no name schmucks like me. How I loved snapping their ‘wanna
be’ royalty asses to attention with four letter word shows.
But
since over tipping has always been my shtick I quickly bought my way into their
acceptability. The room service people absolutely 'loved' me. Buying the 'love'
of people who survive on tips is a slam dunk. Just takes a total, fucking
disrespect of money. Those poor souls will, when getting big tips, positively
fawn over you. Which does get to be fucking boring. And while currently busted
on my lower case bronx, jewish ass I would do it all again. Even though at 90, I've
out lived (aka: outspent) my money and sadly, my sex life. Viagra no longer
works. As Willie Nelson so famously said, 'I'm sorry that my dick died before
the rest of me.'
Living
in New York City is for the rich or the young. The rich have cars and drivers.
Getting around is a big fucking deal. For the young, New York has almost
everything they want to do. Knowing that getting there is a huge pain in the ass
doesn’t bother them at all. It's just part of the rhythm of their New York City
lives.
Making
New York wildly expensive was super easy for me. I spewed $100 bills to maître
d's of Michelin rated restaurants like there was no fucking tomorrow and always
insisted on paying when with others.
Eating
at the long gone American Place with Stanley Druckenmiller more than several
times a month was always fun. One ridiculous but fun dinner I had with Stanley
was in my suite at the Carlyle. I had invited Stan to have dinner and watch a
football game on TV. Since The last time that I had watched TV was in pre-remote days, using a remote was beyond my technology skills.
I
went nuts trying to get that piece of shit TV to function before Stanley showed
up. In the end I waited for him to get that fucking thing working right. The meal
itself was very expensive but surely not memorable. But the server loved
serving and I loved being served. And being with Stan, who is a born again
genius and a great philanthropist was always loaded with laughs.
Cipriani's,
a non-Michelin rated restaurant, with mediocre, over priced food had become
almost a second home for me. It is in the Sherry Netherlands Hotel. It was like
going to a Broadway show every day, with laughs galore. Women with bodies of
Auschwitz survivors and boobs by Dow Chemical were the order of every day at
lunch. The combination of hookers, trophy wives, kept women and captains of
industry plus celebrities was something else again. The manager Hassan and the
maître d’, Sergio, were unbelievably great hosts and were wonderful to me. Hassan
walked around telling diners his joke if the day. He and Sergio became 'family'
for me.
A
real star luncheon diner was the financier Ron Perelman
who is a litigator's dream. He is one of the three most dangerous people in the
world. 'A Jew with a lawyer'. My bet is that if Perelman isn't suing someone he
must feel that his life is empty. He would sweep into Cipriani's with an
entourage including disciple and business partner Don Drapkin. What a pair to
'draw to'. Drapkin learned the art of law suits well. He recently sued his
mentor Perelman, the Master Litigant and beat him to boot. Actually the two
deserved one another.
Perelman,
being a big shot, got the same table, near a window, whenever he showed up.
Living in a non-kosher life style incited Perelman to eat kosher as though
eating kosher would redeem him. Very smart guy, a billionaire but something
less than a weed to me. Didn't ever really meet him, though he nodded to me in
Cipriani's. But then I really didn't want to meet him. No way was I going to
suck up to that bum.
The
other side of that coin is Ken Langone, a very close friend of Druckenmiller's.
Ken is a street smart guy who has made billions but is as common as an old
shoe. Ken is religious, spiritual, huge-hearted and a really smart guy. While
living at the Surrey I would continue to play big shot and eat at the Carlyle
where Ken and I had breakfast one Saturday morning. Ken was going, after
breakfast, to visit a Home Depot store. Ken co-founded Home Depot.
Ken
was looking for a placement agent to help solicit funds from pension funds for
a private equity fund he was organizing. My good friend, Ed Spiegel of Goldman Sachs,
suggested me to Ken who I had met previously. And this is when I made the
fucking huge mistake of a lifetime.
Having
read the preliminary document I had concluded that the deal had a major flaw
where 25% of the money could go into one venture capital deal. That ''flaw' was
compounded by the choice of the manager of the fund. He had been an investment
banker with Lazard Freres. There was no way, in my view, that a fee driven
background would work in an acquisition/operating environment. In those days this
schmuck, Bernie, fancied himself as the investor's protector. But I was right
in both instances. At the end of the day the investors got their money back, the
manager ended being a lot richer and I fucked up, again.
My
huge error was in playing genius and not recognizing that I was missing an
opportunity, on some level, to associate myself with a very, very smart, successful
business man, Ken Langone. Ken has touched a lot of lives, all of which were
better and richer for Ken's touch. I was too fucking stupid not to recognize
that.
Yeah,
one more jackass time I had taken the 13th unwritten AA step.....I had become
powerless over my own bull shit. And too clever by half.
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