JENNIFER CORR

It’s almost the day of love, Valentine’s Day! It’s time to grab a card, some flowers, chocolate or whatever your significant other, or friend, would like to feel loved. But Valentine’s Day, or the week of, also makes for a great time to spend with your favorite person.

Here are some date ideas within all different price ranges:

Valentine’s Day dinners and brunches: Glen Cove Mansion: Enjoy a four course dinner, complete with a cocktail hour, open bar and entertainment for $110 a person. Dinner goes from 6 to 10 p.m. on Feb. 14. Buy tickets at themansionatglencove.com/.

The Milleridge Inn: Join the Milleridge Inn in Jericho for a romantic brunch. Enjoy all you can eat prime rib, crab legs, shrimp and more. This event is on Sunday, Feb. 12 from 11:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Brunch is $65.95 for adults ($75.95 for bottomless mimosas) and $39.95 for children. Visit the milleridgeinn.com for tickets.

The Red Salt Room: Enjoy a Prix-fixe menu by legendary chef David Burke at the Red Salt Room at the Garden City Hotel on Feb. 14 from 5 to 9 p.m. for $135. To see the menu and learn how to get tickets, visit gardencityhotel.com/redsalt-room. There will also be a brunch on Feb. 12.

Oheka Castle Hotel & Estate: Have dinner in a castle with this prix-fixe menu at Oheka Castle in Huntington. Seating is from 4 to 8:30 p.m. on Feb. 14, and is $175 a person. To see the menu and reserve a table, visit oheka.com/upcoming-events. htm. There will also be a brunch the prior weekend.

Valentine’s Day scares: Bayville Scream Park: Go for a very untraditional Valentine’s Day date and head over to Bayville Scream Park, otherwise called Bayville Adventure Park, on Feb. 10, 11 and 14 for three Valentine’s-Day themed haunted houses and three themed bars, as well as a three-course dinner. Deals range from $29.75 to $79.75. Visit bayvillescreampark.com for tickets and more information.

Cooking and art classes: What’s Cooking?: Book a private cooking class for $175 with What’s Cooking? in Oyster Bay. Learn how to make steam, shrimp, fish and vegetarian tacos as well as guacamole, vegetarian slaw and super festive toppings. Reserve on whatscookingny.com.

The Well Seasoned Chef: Learn how to make creamy organic tomato soup, pan seared steak with horseradish sauce, garlicky stir fried brussels sprouts, rosemary-Parmesan roasted potatoes and chocolate covered strawberries with homemade ice cream at The Well Seasoned Chef on Feb. 13. The class is $120 and it books fast, so reserve your spot at thewellseasonedchef.com.

ClayNation: Paint and sip in a tranquil, creative alternative to a bar scene at ClayNation in Glen Cove. There is a variety of art projects to choose from and you will never get bored. ClayNation provides everything needed to complete your art project, so feel free to bring your own snacks and drinks. There is an $8 studio fee, plus the cost of your project. This class is on Feb. 10 from 6 to 10 p.m. Sign up at claynationonline.com.

Pottery on Wheels: This studio in West Islip offers pottery wheel classes for adults. For an hour, adults, who are beginners at pottery, will have the opportunity to work on the pottery wheel or hand-building tables with close instruction. Participants will choose two of their pieces to be fired, glazed and ready to be picked up about 3 to 4 weeks later. The class is $65. Sign up at potteryonwheelsny.com.

The Art Guild: Learn from artist Steven Vando at the Art Guild in Manhasset from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Feb. 16 and create “Experimental Florals in Loose and SemiAbstract Watercolors.” This class is $75 for non-members and $60 for members. Sign up at theartguild.org.

Pinot’s Palette: Get creative at Pinot’s Palette, a paint-and-sip studio, in East Meadow on any day, including Valentine’s Day. On Feb. 14, there will be classes “Love In The Horizon” and Blossoming Moonlight Love.” Sign up for these $46 classes at pinotspalette.com/eastmeadow.

Wine and beer tastings: Garvies Point Brewery & Restaurant: At this brewery in Glen Cove, enjoy one of Garvies Point Brewery’s flights right from the brewery with any appetizer for $20. For more information, visit garviespointbreweryandrestaurant.com.

Lithology Brewing Co.: At this brewery in Farmingdale, get your first flight for $13. For more information visit lithologybrewing.com.

W A Meadwerks: Taste various craft honey wines here in Lindenhurst. There are $12 flights, $3 samples and $8 glasses. Visit wameadwerks.com for more information.

Spa Day:

Glen Cove Mansion: The newly opened MYW Studios Mansion Spa is designed for your enjoyment and relaxation. Services including massages, facials, body scrubs and wraps, treatments, and even a salt cave. Day passes for guests start at $20 and for non-guests $45 and include fitness center, indoor pool, hot tub, sauna and steam room. To reserve, visit themansionatglencove.com.

East Wind Long Island: Spa packages at this hotel in Wading River start at $569 per couple. The starting package includes luxury overnight accommodations, $70 voucher towards dinner, champagne and chocolate strawberries and a hot stone massage or hydro-lifting facial per person at The Spa & Salon.

The Rockaway Hotel and Spa: Enjoy the Winter Pool House at The Rockaway Hotel and Spa in Queens. Included in the day pass, which starts at $30, there is access to the pool house, the sauna, lounge space and outdoor heated pool as well as towels and robes to use. There are other spa services at the hotel as well. Book online at therockawayhotel.com.

Winter Hikes (Free!): Garvies Point Preserve: Five miles of marked nature trails in Glen Cove.

Muttontown Preserve: Five hundred and fifty acres of fields, woodlands, ponds and estate grounds in East Norwich.

Cold Spring Harbor State Park: Forty acres of hilly terrain that offer scenic vistas of the Cold Spring Harbor.

Norman J. Levy Park and Preserve: The preserve’s highest point of 155-feet produces tremendous views of the Jones Beach Tower, the New York City skyline, and numerous coastal treasures. It’s located in Merrick.

Mill Pond Park: This long and narrow 54-acre preserve, located in Wantagh, includes a large pond that draws numerous native waterfowl, along with nature trails that wind through a wet woodland with red maple, coast pepperbush and skunk cabbage.

Caumsett State Historic Park Preserve: Caumsett State Historic Park Preserve, situated on a scenic peninsula extending into Long Island Sound in Huntington, offers miles of bridle paths, walking, jogging, hiking, biking, cross-country skiing and nature trails over acres of woodland, meadows, rock shoreline and salt marsh.

Word Find

This

HOROSCOPES By Holiday Mathis

Horoscopes

Holiday Mathis

International Word Find

INTERNATIONAL WORD FIND INTERNATIONAL WORD FIND HOROSCOPES By

By Holiday Mathis

ARIES (March 21-April 19). You’d love it if you didn’t need attention from others and were only doing what you do to ful ll your own curiosity and passion. Alas, attention is a basic human need. It’s woven into the fabric of humanity, and however ne or coarse the thread may be, there’s no shame in it. It’s part of the human connection.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20). People decide how to interact based on the limited information they know of you at any given moment. Your self-knowledge is deeper but still incomplete. is is the value in long relationships with people who have experienced you in many scenarios. is week, you’ll bene t from seasoned insights.

GEMINI (May 21-June 21). Just when you think you’re working in isolation, or having an experience all your own, things shift. You’ll understand that you’re operating in a shared world, a co-creation. All that happens is a function of the group. Although there are more or less in uential people present, no individual is in control of the outcome.

CANCER (June 22-July 22). When the job places demands on your skill, grace and creativity, you feel happier for it. It’s when the job taps on your patience or acting ability that you feel the burden of work. It will still build and improve you, as long as you take it in small doses, lifting intentionally and methodically like a weightlifter in training.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22). ere are those who are happy to see you explore, have adventures and learn what you’re good at. ey’ll celebrate you when you do well, and you won’t ever have to worry about them being jealous or trying to keep you in a certain role. is is what real love is. Soak it in.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22). While learning involves duplication, it’s not all there is to it. You’re not a robot following a program; you’re an organism who learns through your senses and experience. You can’t learn in an environment that won’t let you take risks and make mistakes. Success will be a function of choosing your “classroom” well.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 23). What attention do you owe people in your life, your community and the world at large? How much can you give and still have plenty left for what matters to you? You’d rather tend to small, lovely things than let big, impersonal entities grab your focus. With intentionality, quiet and mindfulness, you’ll make it happen.

SCORPIO (Oct. 24-Nov. 21). While you can never pay certain people back for all they’ve done to make your life better, your respect makes a di erence. You’ll model this for those too immature to understand the reasons and ways our forebears sacri ced for our daily world to run smoothly. You pay homage in both playful and solemn ways.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21). You have a foggy fantasy about how a project will go and what it will entail. You’re about to nd out. Give yourself credit for having the rare courage to jump in and nd out what it’s really like. Even if the reality doesn’t quite live up to the dream, the vividness of experience is still the preference of the brave.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19). Clear-headed action is seldom associated with the storms of passion. In poetry, drama and song, too much romantic fervor often signi es doom. You’ll wonder if you’re too crazy about something or someone to make the right moves. Even the slightest detachment gives the bene t of healthy perspective.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18). Must it always be work before play? e animals are doing play rst, just as you did when you were small. It’s the natural way, and you never want to lose the ability of being excellent at the games that make existence sparkle. So you’ll practice and prioritize your fun -- an ordering of life you won’t be sorry for.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20). ere will be exaggerations and overreactions to contend with this week and the equivalent of children crying for ice cream, infusing urgent emotion into nonessentials. You’ll acknowledge the emotions of others without taking them on as your responsibility and your days are made peaceful.

THIS WEEK’S BIRTHDAYS ere was a time in your life when you thought peace was the opposite of an exciting life, but now you understand the fullness of experience that can happen from a foundation of deep peace. Feeling satis ed, connected and c alm allows you to go into the wilderness of life and creativity and have vividly felt adventures. You continue to resolve problems and settle into a serenity from which lovely relationships and projects will blossom. It will be among your top years.

COPYRIGHT 2023 CREATORS.COM alternative theme of the puzzle.

All that glitters

Solution: 22 Letters

Word Find

This is a theme puzzle with the subject stated below. Find the listed words in the grid. (They may run in any direction but always in a straight line. Some letters are used more than once.) Ring each word as you find it and when you have completed the puzzle, there will be 22 letters left over. They spell out the alternative theme of the puzzle.

All

Solution: 22

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Solution: Baubles bangles and beads

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CONTRACT BRIDGE — BY STEVE BECKER FOR RELEASE WEDNESDAY, FEB. 8, 2023

Date: 2/8/23

Contract Bridge

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By Steve Becker

Big swing on a small deal

South dealer. Both sides vulnerable.

Declarer then collected the rest of the tricks. He cashed the A-K of trump and the K-J of clubs, then crossed to dummy with a trump and discarded both his hearts on the A-Q of clubs to finish with 10 tricks and a score of 170 points.

At the second table, the defense functioned far more efficiently. Here East played the deuce of diamonds on the king to discourage West from continuing the suit, so West shifted to the jack of hearts at trick two.

East cashed the A-Q of hearts and reverted to diamonds by returning the nine. West won with the jack, cashed the ace and continued with the seven. When dummy ruffed with the nine, East overruffed with the queen.

Opening lead — king of diamonds.

Consider this deal from a teamof-four match. Only a partscore was involved, but even so, the hand is highly instructive.

At the first table, West led the diamond king, East signaling with the nine to indicate a doubleton. West continued with the ace and another diamond, which East ruffed. East could now have saved a trick by cashing the ace of hearts, but instead he returned a trump.

Then — as if declarer had not already suffered enough — East heartlessly returned a heart, promoting West’s jack of spades into another trump trick.

So, the declarer at this table went down two — 200 points — which was four tricks and 370 points worse than his counterpart had done at the first table. It was not that South had done anything wrong — he didn’t. It was simply that his opponents did everything right.

Tomorrow: A futile gesture.

Weekly Sudoku Puzzle

Enter digits from 1 to 9 into the blank spaces. Every row must contain one of each digit. So must every column, as must every 3x3 square. Answer to last issue’s Crossword Puzzle

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Pro Piano Man

Letter To The Editor

The Real Deal Behind Lirr East Side Access To Grand Central Madison

There is more to how we got to the public boarding the first Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) train to Grand Central Madison (GCM). Even with the opening 15 years late on March 25, MTA Chairman Janno Lieber and Governor Kathy Hochul refuse to acknowledge that the $11.6 billion cost for construction of LIRR East Side Access to GCM is misleading. It does not include $1 billion in debt service payments for borrowing costs bringing the price tag to $12.6 billion. Debt service charges are buried under a separate agency operating budget. There is also $4 billion-plus for indirect costs known as LIRR readiness projects. They took place east of the Woodside Harold Interlockings, carried offline from the official project budget. These include the $2.6 billion Main Line Third Track, $450 million Jamaica Capacity Improvements, $387 million Ronkonkoma Double Track, $120 million Ronkonkoma Yard Expansion, $44 million Great Neck Pocket Track, $423 million for rail car fleet expansion and others that are necessary for successful full implementation of ESA. Without these projects, the LIRR would have lacked the expanded operational capabilities to support both promised 24 rush hour train service to GCM and a 40 percent increase in reverse peak service. Any honest transportation project cost accounting would include these expenditures. This would bring the actual cost of ESA to $16.6 billion.

One significant failure under the late LIRR President Charles Hoppe was a future fatal flaw in purchasing both dual-mode locomotives and double-decker passenger cars. Those responsible for the design, engineering, and bid specifications to support the procurement of dual mode locomotives and double-decker passenger cars should have taken into consideration height clearances for the 63rd Street tunnel between Manhattan and Queens. Construction on this tunnel began in 1969. This was designed to be used at a future date to provide the LIRR with a direct connection to Grand Central Terminal. As a result, the LIRR fleet of 23 diesel-electric and 23 duel-mode locomotives, along with 134 double-decker passenger cars, will not be able to utilize ESA for service to GCM. Diesel locomotives are also unable to be used for the removal of stalled electric trains stuck in the tunnel as well. The M3 MU electric cars may have operational difficulties accessing GCM. Due to multi-year delays in the completion for delivery of all new M9 MU electric cars, there are a limited number of spare electric cars. This may result in some previous 12car trains being reduced to 10-car trains for those traveling to GCM.

The tunnel boring machine created two storage tracks under Park Avenue south of 38th Street. Advancing beyond 38th Street could have provided a direct connection between GCM and Penn Station. The estimated cost for this ranged between $1 to $1.5 billion. The MTA was unable or unwilling to find additional funding or come to a cost-sharing agreement with NJ Transit to pay for this work. A simple change order to the on-site tunnel boring machine contractor would have done the trick. It will cost far more today for the same work. You would need a new tunnel boring launch pad for the machine and a disposal system for excavated underground materials. Construction of this extension would benefit LIRR, NJ Transit, and Metro North Rail Road riders by providing additional operational options for all three agencies.

Promised travel time savings of up to 40 minutes daily for those with Manhattan midtown east side destinations doesn’t apply to many riders who would switch from Penn Station to GCM. This new LIRR facility is fifteen stories below ground. Riding escalators alone require up to two minutes each. More time is needed to exit to reach street level versus Penn Station. Validation of time savings depends on how close your final destination is walking from GCM. With the initiation of full-time service to GCM, the LIRR will suspend virtually all direct one-seat ride thru services between Jamaica and Atlantic Terminal, Brooklyn. Travel time for thousands of LIRR riders bound for downtown Brooklyn or downtown Manhattan via the LIRR Atlantic Branch will now have longer commutes.

Your Valentine’s Day gift from MTA & LIRR in 2023 may be a fare increase of up to 5.5 percent. Another gift from Governor Hochul later this year will be introducing a 24/7 city ticket. The result could be thousands of new riders boarding in Queens, resulting in overcrowding, significantly when trains are delayed, combined, or canceled due to periodic service disruptions. Finding a seat on eastbound evening rush hour trains may become more difficult.

—Larry Penner