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Show Lights of New York by L. L. STEVENSON Slow Down: One of this department's depart-ment's sentinels who commutes between be-tween her Jersey City home and her Manhattan office via the Hudson tubes and the subway, on finding that the trip was taking her considerably consid-erably longer than it did in the past, made a check-up. Her conclusion is that the war is the cause. With more and more able-bodied young men going into uniform, more and more older men and women, and even those who are Infirm, are taking tak-ing employment. Hence crowds on platforms and In stations do not move as fast as they did in the past, there being far fewer who bound up stairways or who run up escalators escala-tors without waiting to be transported. trans-ported. My informant, realizing the importance of the war effort, solved her problem of getting to work on time by a very simple expedient she now leaves her home earlier. Example: When David Harris, son of Jack Harris, La Conga's host, was four years old, his daddy stuck a violin under the lad's chin and proceeded to teach him. Much to everyone's surprise, the little fellow didn't immediately convert the in-' strument into a Tommy gun or fill it up with water to see how much it would hold. As practice sessions ran into weeks and then into years, David failed to become a clock watcher and didn't attempt to shoot arrows with his bow. Now, three years later, David's diligence is bearing fruit and he's a student at .the Juillard School of Music. But daddy, very proud of his son, has become self-conscious. So to uphold the dignity of fatherdom, he periodically period-ically deserts the entrance to his club, sneaks into his private office and. behind locked doors, diligently practices scales. Opportunity: "Lighters to fighters" fight-ers" is a campaign I favor wholeheartedly. whole-heartedly. It seems that our lads in uniform find it difficult to get the matches they need while they always al-ways can find lighter fluid, even though it may be plain gasoline. So the movement to have smokers rummage around in desk and other drawers, dig out old and discarded lighters, have them put in good working order most factories which make them will perform that service serv-ice at minimum cost and then send them on to men in the service. But be sure the lighter is in serviceable condition before it is sent since repairs re-pairs in the field are of course impossible. im-possible. Also send along some flints. No lighters are being made for civilian use now and black market mar-ket operators are reported to be getting get-ting as much as $100 each from some of our men in foreign lands. Timid: Hy Peskin, a newsppoer ace camera man who has won several sev-eral photography prizes, covered a servicemen's party which Phil Spitalny's girl band gave recently. Seeing a chance for a shot of a young soldier and a pretty girl, Hy asked a khaki-wearing youth to pose' for him. The soldier, Private Charles Ritchie of Tennessee, refused with the stammered explanation, "I'd rather not, I'm, er, bashful." Hy let him go but later chatted with one of Ritchie's companions. "Bashful?" "Bash-ful?" was the xclamation. "At Guadalcanal, he crept out under fire and dragged back the body of a friend a hundred yards." Hy thought that the buddy might be exaggerating exaggerat-ing but just then on Ritchie's blouse he caught a glimpse of a ribbon he had previously overlooked the Order Or-der of the Purple Heart. Advice: Hildegarde, the glamorous glamor-ous singer who is aways exquisitely groomed, shortly before she concluded con-cluded her Persian Room engagement, engage-ment, was strolling in the downtown section of the city when a rainstorm came up. As she was wearing a new hat, she ran into the nearest store to purchase an umbrella and thus protect her precious and costly creation. The counter wai crowded with bedraggled and bedrenched women who all had the same idea and in the mob scene, the elegant chanteuse found herself pushed against another shopper with no little lit-tle violence. So Hildegarde, in her cultured voice, said: "Pardon me." With that, the lady turned on her, in wrath, and exclaimed: "If you're so damn' perlite, why doncha shop on Fiff avenoo?" Splinter: Bidu Sayao, Brazilian singer of the Metropolitan Opera association, as-sociation, was explaining to a visiting visit-ing Rio friend that by changing from a subway local to an express, she saved two minutes . . . "And what do you do with the two minutes?" asked the easy-going Good Neighbor Neigh-bor . . . Xavicr Cugal, the rhumba king, says he knows a guy so dumb he carried a stepladder to a cocktail cock-tail party because he'd heard the drinks were on the house. j st |