I would like to thank you all, quite sincerely, for your kind words. You are a generous folk.
I told Adriano that he was following in the footsteps of his mentor Rafael Herrera, a long, long time editor of the Listin Diario. Adriano once edited his editorials for publicationl.
He is, without a doubt, one of the nation's leaders of public opinion and worth learning Spanish for so you can read his A.M. column.
One of the anecdotes from Jose Leon's little talk;
He was playing baseball while at Babson College and they were playing Boston College and there was a Red Sox scout at the game. He asked Jos? if he had thought about playing baseball professionally. Jos? said "No, I have other plans." and eventually went home to Santiago.
Once there, he said, he talked to his big brother Eduardo, and said (this was before Marlboro and Presidente), "Eduardo there was a guy who wanted me to play baseball professionally, what do you think?>
Eduardo thought a moment and said: "Think about it Jos?, the cigar business is not so good now."
Of course the house came down with that remark!!
HB , still grinning.