By Dee Richard
We started out Monday, New Year's Eve, with a party at Il Bacco. The place was packed to the rafters – in fact, they were practically standing out on the sidewalk to get in.Tuesday, New Year's Day, we were invited to Judge Nicholas Garaufis' and his wife Betsy Sideman's annual New Year's Day reception at their home. That is always one of the more interesting holiday events. It's a virtual who's who of Queens with a sprinkling of guests from other boroughs and counties. It is a very charming way to start the new year. It is a VIP invitation to be treasured.Thursday, Jan. 3, the Jefferson Democratic Club held a new year party rather than their usual Christmas party. From what I understand, their club president, John Frank, decided to step down as he was too busy to continue giving the time required. We hear he might be considering running for Tony Avella's seat.According to their by-laws, in the absence of a president their executive director steps in and takes over until a new president can be elected. In this case it was Joe Bechtold. It was such a fun party that Mimi Burnham said they might do it the same time next year rather than compete with everyone else during the month of December. Sounds good to me!Carol and Larry Gresser were at both the Garaufis event on Tuseday as well as the Jefferson Club party on Thursday. Could the rumor be true that our girl Carol is considering running for political office again? Would she also be a contender for Avella's seat? Does she have her eye on another prize? Or is this just idle speculation? That's what makes politics so much fun, the never-ending, changing turns of events.After the Jefferson Club it was over to the Electchester JIB Building for Nettie Mayersohn's Stevenson Democratic Club's installation of new officers. The honors were performed by former Borough President Claire Shulman. Claire and Nettie are two of my favorite political ladies. We also understand that in this season of musical chairs, Michael Simonwitz, Nettie's right-hand man, is going to run for City Council. If he runs and wins, Nettie is going to miss Michael, big time. As if all the above wasn't enough to cover in one evening, after Nettie's event it was off to O'Lunney's at West 45th Street in Manhattan to watch the Iowa caucuses being televised. The NYC Young Democrats had rented O'Lunney's upstairs party room and were gracious enough to invite the NYC Young Republicans to join them. While I didn't know any of the Young Democrats, I did run into a few Republicans that I knew from Queens. They were Daniel Egers, Robert Hornack, Michael Ricatto and Lou Carbonetti. That, kiddies, was the end of a very long, busy day for your faithful columnist. Did I ever mention how good it is to be retired? Robert Hornack also intends to run for a Council seat in Astoria. Is there anybody out there not running for something?We wound up the week on Sunday at the Polish Oplatek holiday party at the Polonaise Terrace in Greenpoint. Mostly all the members of the Queens Flag Day Committee and the Little Neck-Douglaston Memorial Day Parade Committee were there. Those groups are also dedicated to their respective communities and are personally responsible for much of the volunteerism that supporting organizations require.That's it for this week. I always look forward to hearing from you directly, with information on people, parties, politics or some plain old-fashioned gossip.I also like to receive your voice-mail at 718-767-6484, your faxes at 718-746-0066 and your e-mail at deerrichard@aol.com.Till next week, Dee.
