"Good Morning"

It's weird when you're up working so late that the AOL welcome screen says "Good Morning." It's okay. I'm grateful for my work, my writing assignments.

This story was about the third home I've toured that is selling for around six million dollars. I'm writing about them for Aspire, a newish NJ magazine for affluent readers.

Learning so much in the process. It's a whole new set of facts that I would never have known before--about private in-ground pools [one even shaped like a B, for the owner's last name], gazebos, rare trees, big kitchen gardens, famous architects, sweeping stairways, art lighting, built-in sound systems that extend, sleekly, even to the patio. Equestrian paths, guest cottages that are bigger than my home, etc.

President Richard M. Nixon once looked at the house I wrote about tonight--it's in horse country, along "Millionaire's Row," the name for a line of mansions from Morristown to Madison, NJ. But he needed housing for his security detail, I heard, and I think the guest cottage at this estate was too close to the main house....

I have to go to sleep now.

But I did want to say that the mansion I wrote about tonight is a "showhouse," open to the public for tours from May 1 through May 31. It's a giant fundraiser for Morristown Memorial Hospital's Emergency Department, and the tickets are $25 to $30. Top interior and landscape designers bid on the spaces at Fawn Hill Farm and are making them over...one bedroom is named "A Place for Grace," inspired by Grace Kelly, another is called "Edith Wharton's Retreat." Really evocative. There will be an Alice in Wonderland Garden, etc. You can also buy the things you really like, from window treatments to garden pots. I'm inviting my friends to go, but even if they can't, I'm going alone.

The website is: MansioninMay.com.

Good night.