Metropolitan Diary
Give Him a Hand
Dear Diary:
I got into a cab on a rainy night to go see my child’s nanny in a play on the Lower East Side. I had an umbrella, my bag and a tote with me.
When I got to the theater, I got out of the cab quickly and forgot my tote. Oh, well.
Just before the play started, the driver appeared, walked to the front of the theater and asked whether anyone in the audience had left a tote in his cab.
It’s mine, I shouted.
As I got up to retrieve it, he received a standing ovation.
— Natalie Epstein
Fresh Loaves of Rye
Dear Diary:
My sister was getting married in a small town in Maine. Both she and the groom were transplants from Brooklyn.
My sister asked that I bring two large, fresh loaves of rye bread as a special treat for the wedding. The day before, I stopped at Lords Bakery at Nostrand and Flatbush Avenues after finishing my classes at Brooklyn College.
I told the woman at the counter that I was buying the bread to bring to my sister’s wedding in Maine the next day.
I asked whether I should get the loaves sliced. The woman said the bread might stay fresher on the long trip if it was unsliced.
It turned out that the groom had asked his brother to bring up two large, fresh loaves of rye. The brother also went to Lords and asked the same woman for two large rye breads, explaining that he would be bringing them to a wedding in Maine the next day.
“Are you pulling my leg?” the woman said. “A lady was in here earlier asking for two rye breads for her sister’s wedding in Maine tomorrow. Am I on ‘Candid Camera?’”
The groom’s brother displayed complete ignorance.
“She got hers unsliced,” the woman said, referring to me. “Maybe you should get yours sliced?”
— Susan Spector
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/24/nyregion/metropolitan-diary.html
