I’m madder than a happy little ice crystal floating in the upper atmosphere that suddenly collides with a bunch of friends and ends up becoming so heavy that it falls to the ground and dies over the fact that this winter won’t seem to end, and the snow won’t stop falling, and worstest of all, it forced us to cancel BWECC!’s 50-something annual gala at the last second!
Look, you all know the ol’Screecher puts his heart and soul into the Carmine Awards every year just to make sure everybody that needs to be honored does so, and I get a chance to eat for free at the fabulous El Caribe Country Club in beautiful Mill Basin.
And this year was no different — until the snow started falling and the roads became impassable, and I had just two hours to make the decision of a lifetime — to hop on Tornado and pick up every one of our hundreds of guests individually, or choose the Nuclear Option and cancel the event and reschedule it sometime when the mercury in my mercury-filled thermometer (the only way to get a true reading on the temperature — no matter what your Apple Watch might say!) outside the kitchen window gets into the 70s!
Folks, I’ve told you time and time again that this has been the worst winter on record, but I never thought it would lead me to cancel the event beloved by so many, and hyped by me on these very pages (both web and print) for weeks on end — all to no avail.
It all started Thursday morning, when that lying weatherman said the snow that started early in the morning would move through quickly, and drop just about three inches in and around my beloved Harway Terrace. But by Thursday afternoon — sometime after 11 am — he dramatically changed his forecast, claiming that snow would continue all day, making travel to Mill Island almost impossible!
So I immediately started making calls on all of my five cellphones to my pals over at El Caribe to discuss the possible and probable calamity that was about to transpire. As has been the case for the past 25 years that I’ve been doing business with them, Phil Kelly and the staff over there were as professional as ever — just like they were five years ago when we needed a bigger space to cram 500 people into for our 50th Anniversary Gala, and they answered the call.
By high noon, we had two hours to make a decision to cancel or not. So the Screecher did what he does best — I personally rallied the troops and together we made an executive decision to do what we had to do.
That mean’s this week’s column won’t tell you about all the delicious items I sampled during both the cocktail hour (which is always more than enough to fill even me up) and the dinner itself, which I usually take home and eat as a midnight snack on the comfort of my couch.
However, I will bring your attention to my dinner dance committee that was responsible for setting up the reservations and all the thousand of things that make a function like this function — even when the weather makes it unfunctionable. First, Linda Dalton, who handles the congratulatory ads that make up the gala’s journal, takes care of the awards and communications, with Heather Fiorica a Mistress of Ceremonies. Then there is Randi Garay who is was in charge of reservations for the dinner as well as sending all checks and reservations to Mary Montomarano, who puts all the information into an Excellent spreadsheet.
So with this crew we were able to come up with the honoree’s unanimous decision to postpone the gala for another future compatible date, preferably when it is snowless. Terrance was amazed how efficient the committee was getting in touch with every one to inform them of the new May 27 Wednesday evening date for the Gala.
Also, I have to acknowledge each honorees’ secretaries that collected and made reservations for the seats, set up the tables and collected for the journal ads.
I thank the honorees for their wisdom in postponing this event, even though it makes double work for us at the BWECC. They were perfectly right to make that decision considering how difficult and dangerous it would have been to travel to the gala. Please help spread the word the gala is now on Wednesday evening, May 27 and reservations can be made by contacting us at BWECC
The Carmine Awards will go on!
Screech at you next week!
