"...attached is a pdf of an announcement for a NYC auction of property from city residents who die without a Will or for some reason die owing the City money and have no other financial means of paying the debt.  I went to view the apartment at 64 Barrow Street, (minimum bid $550,000).  All I could think about was that if you were 20 yrs younger it would be your dream apartment, I only mean younger because of the 4 flights of stairs.  The building is one of three or four joined together on Barrow between Hudson and Bedford near Chumleys restaurant (currently under renovation).  The apt. (one per floor) was on the top (5) and the living room w/fireplace (complete with marble surround or maybe stone but painted white) faced onto Barrow so a Southern exposure.  Going from this front parlor room there was a little room off to the left with small pocket doors (painted shut) which possibly had etched glass on the upper portion.  This small room would have made a perfect writing or office area for you and had a window too.  Leaving this room through its hallway doorway you passed the bathroom.  Then on to a medium sized dining room with late 19th Century cabinets and drawers still intact.  From this room there was a vestibule about 4ftX4ft, with three other doorways or doors to contend with, one to the right being the old dumb waiter for hauling up items to this 5th Floor (it was now a broom closet).  The doorway directly in front went to the rear of the apartment into a small kitechen and the doorway to the left was a small bedroom.  The bedroom had two windows and the kitchen had one which faced the back courtyard and the rear of many other buildings (like Hitchcock's REAR WINDOW).  Of course the apt. needed a complete redo of the kitchen and bath but I believe you would have performed a miraclulous restoration on the rest of the apartment.

My guess is the deceased lived there for at least 40 or 50 years, possbily longer.  When you opened the front door to the actual apt. you were confronted with an enormous amount of daylight because you were under the skylight for the entire stairwell.  I could just see how Grand this Apt. could look and probably did when it was new in 1890 and how happy you and your portrait would be in it today.  Yours, B"

See?  He does thinks I'm a little retarded, doesn't he.

Luckily, my dear friend Justin has kept me fully apprised of the Chumley's situation, how it didn't just fall down never to reopen.

And is it just me, or does a minimum bid of $550,000 seem cheap?