NEW YORK CITY THROUGH THE EAR OF AN EAVESDROPPER

---"Do you know the exact spot in Central Park where Auntie Mame had her fatal fall from a horse? I thought it might be fun to honor her today with an outdoor picnic at that exact spot."

---"I wish I could purchase a special eavesdropping translator device that could provide me with instantaneous translations into English of each of the foreign-language conversations I'm curious about when I'm sitting at a nearby table in a restaurant in Manhattan."

---"I think everyone in New York City at least once per month experiences this massive panic-attack of xenophobia in which they are completely convinced that the individuals speaking a foreign language five feet away are planning to rob a bank."

---"I think there's a tendency by anyone like me who could pass for English on the streets of London to worry that he doesn't look ethnic enough to land a job here as a fashion model."

---"If it weren't for the difficulty I have with trying to eat spaghetti neatly, I probably would express more interest in the Italian-Americans here. But the minute they pick an Italian restaurant for our first meeting, I have to decline. I couldn't handle the spaghetti part of the meal. I realize that I could always order tortellini instead. It's easy to look elegant eating tortellini. But that may be a moot point. The Italians avoid me like the plague. Maybe they sense that I never eat garlic, and they prefer to associate with guys who have garlic breath."

---"I still remember the day I expressed interest in how to help diversify the economy of the islands off the coast of Italy. The Italian-American I was dining with told me he was completely bored by that subject. When it comes to Italy, the islands are of no interest to him whatsoever. He was completely fixated on the mainland. He might as well have shouted that the Italian Islanders can all go to hell! Milan, to him, was the garden spot of the entire universe."

----"I've always wondered whether New Yorkers expecting to get murdered specify in their last will and testament that they want to be buried in the very same clothing they wore at the moment they turned into a specimen for NYPD's Homicide Unit. It may well be a point of pride for expectant murder victims to later show off all the blood on their fatal-outing clothes at their wake ceremony. Maybe they want to look like martyrs to their surviving relatives and friends. Plus, the bigtime drama of being publicly revealed as a murder victim increases their chances for getting a decent turnout at their wake ceremony. I can almost imagine them yelling from their casket, 'So did I at least get a decent turnout at my wake today?' That is the mindset of so many of our New Yorkers these days. Death with dignity, to them, means dying with all of their own bloodshed on display for everyone to be impressed by."