{"id":56721,"date":"2025-12-01T01:13:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-01T01:13:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/56721\/"},"modified":"2025-12-01T01:13:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-01T01:13:07","slug":"a-new-york-thanksgiving-from-hospital-rooms-to-gracie-mansion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/56721\/","title":{"rendered":"A New York Thanksgiving: From hospital rooms to Gracie Mansion"},"content":{"rendered":"

My own Thanksgiving: I was the guest of\u00a0Luigi Romaniello<\/a>, the Waldorf\u2019s managing director, in the hotel\u2019s new Lex Yard restaurant. Just months old, Lex Yard is beyond terrific. D\u00e9cor, service, menu. As I left, there came an unfamiliar phone caller. She quickly spoke about\u00a0Victoria Gotti.<\/p>\n

Her dad, of course, was gangster John Gotti, who died in prison in \u201902. I knew him. We shared lawyer\u00a0Barry Slotnick. I took Anthony Quinn to Gotti\u2019s trial. Gotti\u2019s playground was nightclubs. My husband worked nightclubs. In New York, Italian restaurateurs would slam a bottle of unrequested red wine on our table with another unrequested \u201cCourtesy of John G.\u201d<\/p>\n

I was the only one Gotti spoke to from prison.<\/p>\n

In July \u201903 at a party I gave, I reported Victoria\u2019s stilettos were so high she could barely walk in them. In \u201908 she was unloading her Long Island home for about $4 million. In \u201902 she had open-heart surgery. I knew Victoria Gotti. She lived big.<\/p>\n

The caller said Victoria\u2019s world has changed \u2014 and the voice explained they\u2019re calling me because they knew I knew the family. Per the caller, Victoria was in a Long Island hospital awaiting a kidney transplant. Placed in a room for nearly an hour while staff managed the arrival. Victoria, emotional. Devoted son\u00a0Carmine, who said he would donate his kidney to his mom, stayed with her.<\/p>\n

The telephone lady said Victoria knew word was getting out. A few false callers. Supposedly saying they were her doctors, lawyers, family. At the desk, a nurse quietly said, \u201cShe needs to inform her regular doctor that she\u2019s here.\u201d I was told that through tears Victoria said things like: \u201cMy son .\u2009.\u2009. How did I get so blessed with a son like this?\u201d<\/p>\n

Thanksgiving. People had gone away. Nobody was anywhere. Few reachable through their regular numbers. Nobody in their regular places. I had to leave for dinner. I couldn\u2019t be late. I had no number, nowhere, to call. Nurses wouldn\u2019t say anything. Doctors were on golf courses. I rang the caller\u2019s number back only to learn Victoria had returned to her house.<\/p>\n

An ageless wonder<\/p>\n

I receive a crate of emails daily. Some start \u201cDear Stupid.\u201d One from a political pro. Knows everything. Hears everything. A not wildly brilliant West Side Democrat \u2014 like there\u2019s anything else \u2014 NOT partial to our president. After our term-limited head of state\u00a0Donald Trump<\/a>\u00a0played catch-ball with Clamdammsy, this letter-writer sent me this: \u201cCould the Donald be setting himself up for a run for mayor? Like when\u00a0Zohran Mamdani\u2019s<\/a> term is up? Like maybe exist in antique Gracie Mansion, whose john is even too small for his shoulder pads?\u201d Her thought was: Forget age limits \u2014 Donald could outdo Methuselah.<\/p>\n

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Get it in gear<\/p>\n

Looking for holiday gifts? Try cars.\u00a0Jay Leno<\/a>\u00a0likes Stanley Steamers. Sultan of Brunei\u00a0Hassanal Bolkiah\u00a0has 600 Rollses and his car collection is worth $6 billion.\u00a0Gordon Ramsay\u00a0<\/a>cooks in Ferraris.\u00a0Jerry Seinfeld\u00a0buys and sells Porsches. Sold part of his collection for $22 mil. And what do stars, like maybe\u00a0Nicolas Cage, do on the holiday? Nic: \u201cChannel surf. Movie-making is addictive. I\u2019ve been acting since I\u2019m 17. I\u2019m a much better, more approachable person when I\u2019m working. It\u2019s a balancing act between my career and my family. Acting comes out of a place called survival. I\u2019m more balanced when I\u2019m working.\u201d Meanwhile, there\u2019s the NYC roll out of the documentary \u201cThe King of Color\u201d on Dec. 12. That\u2019s\u00a0Larry Herbert, 97, inventor of the Pantone Matching System, followed by Del Frisco\u2019s dinner.<\/p>\n

Overheard recently on a city street: \u201cI\u2019m weary of people saying there\u2019s too much crime in our town. It\u2019s gotten so bad that our own bank keeps its money in another bank. So tough that when a friend called the police for help, there was a three-week waiting list.\u201d<\/p>\n

Only in New York, kids, only in New York.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"My own Thanksgiving: I was the guest of\u00a0Luigi Romaniello, the Waldorf\u2019s managing director, in the hotel\u2019s new Lex…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":56722,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[153,22535,30729,16034,9,11,10,30730,299,6967],"class_list":{"0":"post-56721","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-donald-trump","9":"tag-gordon-ramsay","10":"tag-jay-leno","11":"tag-jerry-seinfeld","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-headlines","14":"tag-new-york-news","15":"tag-nicolas-cage","16":"tag-opinion","17":"tag-thanksgiving"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56721\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}