Real Music & Real Estate . . .

Yiddishe Cup’s bandleader, Bert Stratton, is Klezmer Guy.
 

He knows about the band biz and – check this out – the real estate biz, too.
 

You may not care about the real estate biz. Hey, you may not care about the band biz. (See you.)
 

This is a blog with a gamy twist. It features tenants with snakes and skunks, and musicians with smoked fish in their pockets.
 

Stratton has written op-eds for the Wall Street Journal, New York Times and Washington Post.


 
 

CALL ME COLLECT

by Bert Stratton

The downtown jail has narrow windows.  The jail, from the outside, doesn’t  even look like a jail. It looks like an office building with narrow windows.

Across the street, on West 3rd Street, is a law office with a sign in the window: “Inmates, call collect.”

I was at the county board of revision nearby, trying to get my property taxes lowered.

I liked the downtown government scene. When I was young, I drifted in and out of trials at the Justice Center for fun.  I liked the crying and screaming, and the lawyers picking on each other. (This was before cable and reality TV.).

I would like to be a county prosecutor someday and put away bad guys, but I don’t want to go to law school.

I once sneaked into the jury assembly room to get a list of jurors’ names for a trial.  (I was a reporter.)  I got in some trouble with the authorities and my editor.

Now I spend my time far away from the Justice Center. I miss the action down there.

Inmates, call me collect. Not a good use of your one call, but I’d like to hear from you.

—

Yiddishe Cup is at Klezmerpalooza  7:30 Sat. (Nov. 16) at The Temple, Beachwood, Ohio. 

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3 comments

1 Ken Posner { 11.13.13 at 9:24 am }

Is it still possible to make collect calls? How do you get a human operator?

2 Ken G. { 11.13.13 at 9:46 am }

Okay, I’ll ask my inmate friends to call you collect, just to see how you’ll handle them.

3 Irwin Weinberger { 11.13.13 at 9:50 am }

All I can say is the guy across the street is quite resourceful.

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