Parking in Sag Harbor

I’m not exactly sure what the parking laws are this year in Sag Harbor, but I can tell you this.

Last Thursday just before 5 p.m., my wife and I drove to Sag Harbor because at 5 p.m. I had to be at Sag Harbor Books to read from my new book, Hamptons Private.

The town was packed and people were trying to park all over the place.

We drove round and round and it began to look like she should drop me off and continue with the search when suddenly, a parking space opened up right in front of the Big Olaf’s ice cream store on Long Wharf. And we got it.

This is probably the most treasured of all parking spaces in Sag Harbor. It’s right in the middle of everything.

I got out of the car first to look at the signage. There was a one-hour parking sign behind our car, but it was pointing to further behind our car and did not include our car. There was no other signage preventing parking. And the striping was white in our spot, so that was okay too.

I think you’re supposed to download an app to get a maximum of three hours parking in Sag Harbor, but I saw nothing anywhere that tells you how to do that. Someone else told me that it costs $10 to get the app, even if you don’t drive or have a car. I really don’t know.

Anyway, I went to the reading, read from the book to a waiting crowd and answered some questions.

All together 15 books were sold (at $95 each), and I signed my name and wrote a dedication to each of the buyers. Afterwards, I signed five more books.

After that, my wife and I had a nice dinner at Page at 63 Main, then walked back to our car fearing the worst. It was 8:45 p.m., three hours and 45 minutes after we had parked. No ticket. Unless, heaven knows, something will show up in our email, which so far hasn’t happened.

We are at the mercy of the parking gods, I guess.

All this happened three days before President Biden met with Russian President Vladimir Putin privately at a hotel in Geneva, Switzerland where they talked about, according to the press release afterwards, the computer hacking of American institutions by Russian operatives. I wonder if they talked about Sag Harbor. Probably not.

But I do wonder why we don’t hack Russian utilities and businesses. Why do we let them do it to us while we don’t do it to them?

The world wants to know