Keith Richards, regular...

Yeah, there's my choice for president ...of the world. You see Keith and I go back a long way, 1964, Union College, upstate New York. It was a great time to see the Stones, still on a small college campus. I saw them later in large venues, like the University of New Mexico, who's gigantic basketball gymnasium is like a silo. I had gone deeper into hippiedom by then, and manged to get my dog into the concert...don't ask me why. Stevie Wonder opened that one, and rocked himself off the stage. Like I've said, the mid-seventies, they were the sixties on steroids. Back to Keith. In the year two thousand we decided to abandon Florida for a better education for my youngest. She'd been doing well in public school, after years on the Montessori buzz, so we, the family decided she need to go one of those high falutin' New England prep schools instead of the powerhouse football team in Naples, FL. Conveniently a friend of mine was opening "the" restaurant on Martha's Vineyard that summer. I could go and work there while the girls moved the household to Connecticut. This place was something, and staffed by a crew of serious professionals. You know, one of those place where your server pulled a crumber out of his pocket and swept the stray bread surreptitiously off the table. It was on the cutting edge in a lot of ways...like we sold you your water. International staff; Irish, English, Czech, Portuguese, Brazilian, Egypt and , oh yeah, the USA. It was a boon to me when the number two man at lunch quit the first day...I doubled my income by taking that job and schlepping tables at night. It was the hottest spot on the Island. Mike Wallace and some of his Sixty Minutes cohorts were there all the time. Booked full every night. One particularly bizarre night I soloed Happy Birthday to Beverly Sills. Even though it was very late at night she told me not to quit my day job. But hey, this is about Keith Richards. You see, we had this tiny little area in the kitchen that was called the chef's table. This usually went to some high-powered group that wanted to see how the whole show was run...from the back side. It also provided for the celebrity types that wanted to be kept away from the usual island, star-f&%#*@ riff-raff. You were really shielded from the rest of the clientele, right in the middle of a bustling, two hundred dinner-a-night, white table cloth eatery. Each night before service, after setting up, Chef Joe brought the special out to the servers and went over the night's menu. There were usually five servers, and I was often the only natural born citizen, very continental. Four professional waitstaff and one semi-pro clown. So, this one night, Joe says Biff you have the Chef's table. A few invectives went through my head until he said it's Keith Richards and his family. Needless to say the rest of the staff went ape-shit in all sorts of languages I couldn't understand. I was pumped. They arrived at sunset, came in through the back door, Keith with and armload of wine and cognac (Vineyardhaven is a dry town). Patti Hansen, still a four star knockout and their soon-to-be model daughters were very happy to sit in the kitchen. I walked to the table, probably a little too comfortably and introduced myself to the family and told them the specials. Not to drag it out they were surely the easiest celebrities I have ever waited on. Keith ordered the cheapest thing on the menu, a chicken dish, and the girls ate like models. He was the only one to drink, and it was in moderation...and every time I poured he offered me a taste...which couldn't resist, I was still an imbiber then. The best time of my restaurant career came after dinner. Keith said, "Anyplace we can have a smoke and a beer mate?" Since the town was dry the staff always had a cooler of beer on the back porch. It was somehow bottomless, we pitched in and a liquor store in another town kept it full. We were making tons of money, who knows, the beers might have been costing us five bucks a piece...we didn't care. "Sure Keith, follow me." We hit he back porch and he tapped me out a Marlboro Red (I'm not much of a smoker, but hey) and I pulled him an icy Budweiser from the bottom of the cooler. We shot the shit, I told him about Union College and he couldn't believe it! "You must be the last man standing from that show..." we had a couple of beers and smokes and then went back in to settle up. He tipped me about 100%, and invited me out to the Hot Tin Roof to see Burning Spear. Back stage! He was going to sit in with them. But my duties at the restaurant were going to keep me there too late. He signed the check to me wit a nice inscription about Union (I still have it), and headed out the back door. He left me a half bottle of high-end cognac to boot! Yes, I shared.

He was a stand up regular (not Joe, after recent political developments) guy and treated me better than most. The rest of the staff pummeled me with questions after we hit the porch after service. My Irish buddy had the best query, "Who was that ugly guy with Patti Hansen?"

I've already voted, and since Keith isn't a citizen...later, biff