Mid-Week Miscellany and R.I.P Steve Jobs

Are you already starting to make your plans for Christmas? 
I am.  This year has really flown by, hasn't it?

I didn't want to let the week go by without sending a big congratulations to Parisian blogger Tish Jett for her article in More Magazine, A Crime of Fashion Narrowly Averted.  Well done Tish.

Also, I was thrilled to see Wendy's post on the creative process that goes into making a piece of jewelry. 

If you aren't reading the weekend Wall Street Journal, you should be. It's a great paper.  Last weekend's issue had a great article on the Death of the Playboy.
In his day, a playboy didn't shout he was a "playah"—he just . . . was. What the deuce did he care if anyone else knew it?

Included in the list of long lost playboys was the playboy of the century, Porfiro Rubirosa.   Polo playing dilettante Rubrirosa managed to marry not one but two of the wealthiest women in the world, Barbara Hutton and Doris Duke.  Imagine what kind of charm he must have had to pull that off. When is someone going to make a film about his life?

I also enjoyed reading about Luca Cordero di Montezemolo
La Bella Vita,
Meet the uncrowned king of Italy, Luca Cordero di Montezemolo,chairman of Ferrari,multimillionaire entrepreneur and champion of Italian culture. Is he ready to give up his charmed life to save his troubled country?

All I have to say after reading this article is... run Luca run!
Italy needs you.

More miscellany regarding Italy
don't you just love the fact that Fiat has recently introduced the Fiat 500 to the US. 
Fiat's haven't been sold here is like what, decades? 
Here's a couple of photos of the one of the Gucci versions that I saw on Rodeo Drive

It's like a Mini...but with a little more.
Loving Italian design, jewelry and of course food
it only makes sense that I would love Italian wines too.
My fabulous Italian client Giulia suggested that I try these
Nero d'Avola, Greco di Tufo and Fiano d'Avellino
Have you tried them?
Opinions?

On the topic of wine, closer to home I can recommend Salus Cabernet from the Staglin family vineyard in Napa Valley.

I just tried it a couple of weeks ago and it was delicious.
Last weekend I met the Staglins at an event and learned that they are serious about their philanthropy.  A portion of every sale from Salus wine goes to mental health research so not only do they make amazing wines they raise a huge amount of money for mental health charities.
On my Roku I'm just now getting around to watching the second season of Mad Men but honestly I'm having trouble staying interested.

While I love the production value of the show and the attention to period detail especially with the clothes, architecture and dismissive attitude towards the women, I find that most of the characters are just so obnoxious that I get annoyed with the show.
Right now I'm more interested in reading about the advertising business from the perspective of a real ad man.

Pickett, Plunkett and Puckett  was written by my friend Larry Postaer who's ad agency has created so many memorable ads.

OK, so I really can't finish without blogging a little for Beladora.com.

If you are perusing this month's Marie Claire magazine, be sure to check out he jewelry worn by Reese Witherspoon.

Vintage English Retro Link Bracelet from Beladora2.com

Cute bracelet, isn't it?

Addendum

Steve Jobs RIP

If This Box Could Talk - The Stories It Could Tell

Have I mentioned that I love all kinds of history including military history.
And, I consider myself extraordinarily lucky to work in a business where everything that I touch, wear, appraise and sell, has a history.  Of course I don't always know the provenance of a piece of estate jewelry or object d'art, but I appreciate the fact that every piece has a story behind it.
Take this sterling silver cigarette case for example.

I am rarely enamored with inanimate objects but there is something about this specific item that moves me.
Let's start with the top.  You can see from the photo that the case is engraved with a map of Burma with the names of the major cities. Ten of those cities, including Rangoon and Mandalay, are emphasized by flush set Burma rubies. 

The back of the case is engraved
India 1945
Burma 43-44-45
China 45
Obviously, we all know what was going on in these countries during these years.

Then we have the interior which is engraved
Helen From Jim
Who was Helen? And more importantly, who was Jim?  Was he an Aussi, an American or a Brit?  Was he an officer, a diplomat, a businessman, a reporter or a spy?  Who did he know? What did he witness during the war years?
When I hold this case in my hand I have the inexplicable feeling that there is a Somerset Maugham quality story of love and loss connected with it.
So much happened in Burma during 1943,1944 and 1945
and of course so much has happened since.

And on the topic, last weekend's Wall Street Journal listed five of the best books with first hand accounts of WW2 and Quartered Safe Out There: A Harrowing Tale Of World War II by George Macdonald Fraser was on their list.
Here's what WSJ reviewer Andrew Roberts had to say about the book.
George MacDonald Fraser, British author of the Flashman series of novels, fought in the 17th (Black Cat) Indian Division of the 14th Army during the siege of Meiktila and the battle of Pyawbwe in Burma. He believed, probably correctly, that soldiering in Burma rivaled flying in the RAF's Bomber Command as "the worst ticket you could draw in the lottery of active service." This was so not just because of the Japanese enemy; there were also 15-inch poisonous centipedes, malaria, "spiders the size of plates," typhus, jungle sores on the wrists and ankles, dysentery, and leeches. In terse, unsentimental language, Fraser's superb war memoir, "Quartered Safe Out Here," relates how the soldiers in his close-knit company fought their battles, mourned their friends and simply tried to survive from day to day.

Perhaps Jim fought with 17th Black Cat Indian Division.
I wish that I knew.

Summer Reading - Music, History and Joy

On my summer reading list...if I can ever find the time to just relax and read.

From the review in the WSJ by Norman Lebrecht

Destiny in D Minor - The origins and influence of Beethoven's last symphony

Of all Beethoven's works, the Ninth Symphony is the least explicable. What on Earth was he doing decorating its finale with a chorus and soloists singing an ode of Schiller's, ostensibly about joy but in reality about brotherhood and liberation? What is the Ninth about? Is it a charter for social reform or for individual rights? A religious ecstasy? Does the symphony mean to us what it meant to Beethoven? Does it mean anything useful at all?

These are some of the questions that set Harvey Sachs off on a painstaking search to discover the roots of Beethoven's last symphony in the time of its creation. The year was 1824, and the Congress of Vienna had turned Europe back to a network of despotic monarchies, as if the Enlightenment and French Revolution had never happened.

Perhaps the Ninth was all some sort of musical Masonic code.

I shall have to read the book and find out.