I’m totally mortified by the water dripping from the ceiling onto the grand piano!
I walked around the old club today and was relieved to see that the grand piano was moved and the finish appears fine. That piano is probably the most valuable single item in the entire ca 1913 clubhouse, which itself is a Roaring 20s time capsule, musty smell and all.
It’s comical how much maintenance needs to be done. The owner is a neighborhood millionaire but it would be quite helpful to the membership if the next owner is a billionaire. There’s hardly any water pressure, the lockers are rust buckets, you don’t want to look in the corners too closely, the tiles are coming off and everything needs paint. Yesterday I got set for a sauna and, of course, it’s out of service. When the amateurish staff actually knows a piece of information I request, or otherwise manages to help me, I thank them and they respond with the massively-irritating, “no problem,” which causes me to put my hands in my pockets to keep from strangling them and forcing them to their knees until they reply with, “You’re welcome.” In my recurring etiquette lesson fantasy, I would then smile, loosen my grip and say, “Namaste.”
On the bright side, membership is only $129/mo and I am enjoying the in person yoga classes in an elegant old room, which is the reason I joined. That’s actually a good price in my neighborhood for unlimited yoga, plus they offer a bunch of other benefits a regular yoga studio doesn’t, like wine, travel, book and other classes I’m interested in, an outdoor pool, pickle ball, a few restaurants and bars and an elegant reading room with a fireplace, with a WSJ subscription. And I’m going to use the reciprocity they have with a club in Savannah when we go there soon for the rest of the winter, assuming someone eventually replies to my email about it. So, my strategy is to enjoy what I can from it, remember the cheap price, and laugh off the rest.
