Tag Archives: bet on crazy

SUKKOT / BET ON CRAZY

Ten years ago the Hassidim were hurrying home from the Diamond District. The High Holidays had come early this year with Sukkor coinciding with the ancient pagan festival of Mabon, which commemorates the autumnal equinox. Sukkor is not only a bridge across the Indus, but the festival honoring the 40 years during which the Hebrews […]

Rolling Stones – Shea – October 1989

October 1989 Joey from Bay Ridge, a client at Manny’s diamond store in West 47th Street, repaired elevators.He was as filthy as a coal miner and as greasy as an oil rigger. “Every job was an emergency.” He pulled out a wad of bills with a filthy hand. “I like getting paid in cash.” A […]

Bah Humbug Stop your Kvetching

My 2009 Xmas season consisted of a marathon work schedule at the diamond exchange. 7 days a week. 9 hours a day. No caroling or egg nog or festive cheer. I was at work to sell diamonds and jewelry to the public to support my families in Thailand. Business on 47th Street is better than […]

The Plight of a Billionairess – 2009

Back in 2008 a shoe dropped on the world economy week. The downturn was unlike anything I had seen since gas crisis of 1973. One spring weekend in 2009 I couldn’t take any more bad news and fled New York for the bucolic hills of Dutchess County. My good friend AC picked me up at […]

BET ON CRAZY 1 by Peter Nolan Smith

In the 1970s I knew very little about diamonds as a child other than Superman could squeeze coal with his steel-hard hands to create diamonds and my father had bought a diamond ring for my mother. It was a hundredth of the size of the diamonds Superman never gave to Lois Lane, but my mother […]