THROAT specialist Dr. Alfred Liu got a call from one of his patients the other day asking if he ever made house calls. He never had, the doctor stated, because he was always so busy with patients in his office. But then the caller, Tom Moffatt, asked, "How'd you like to look down the throat of Mariah Carey?" And so it was that Dr. Liu made his way to the Kahala Mandarin to personally inspect one the most famous throats and the tonsils therein outside of Washington, D.C. The inspection was needed for insurance purposes, Moffatt informed him, since the singer had to cancel one performance in Australia. The doc gave the OK, but was backstage in Carey's dressing room giving her a final checkup before she went on before 30,000 screaming folks at Aloha Stadium Saturday night ... Isle doc inspects
Mariah’s pipes
ALSO at the Carey concert was Frank Day, former manager of Bobby Rydell, who'd flown over for the latter's Valentine's Day show and decided to stay on to see Carey. He had to depart yesterday as he has a big recording session with Lee Ann Rimes and some country folk tomorrow in the L.A. studio he owns ... Meanwhile, as was the case with the Rolling Stones, Moffatt was able to book Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons for March 6 because they're going to be in town anyway for a March 4 private convention appearance at the Hilton Hawaiian Village ...
One winner, one runner-up
THE San Francisco Chinese New Year's Parade went off on schedule, and Hawaii's entrant in the Miss Chinatown USA contest, Jodie Ching, was fourth runner-up. A Bay area girl won the title, not an unpopular decision there. But Hawaii did have one winner: Designer Clarence Lee, who designed the 1998 "Year of the Tiger" stamp as well as previous Chinese zodiac stamps for the U.S. Postal Service, was grand marshal of the parade. He also designed the U.S. Lunar Stamp Series, and an exhibit of his work, "A Lifetime in Design," opened Sunday at Queen Emma Gallery ...GOOD old Brand X ran a correction recently about an obit for Florence Plucard of Waikiki, saying it was "erroneously published." That's an understatement. Ms. Plucard was very much alive when her obit appeared. Maybe she should get together with Grace Guslander, whose obit ran some years back on Page 1 of the morning paper, a story Ms. Guslander read with interest ...
MUSICAL chairs at KHPR: Many staffers have resigned at Hawaii Public Radio including G.M. Anna Kosof, who dropped the bombshell that she's leaving to go to Philadelphia. Before her surprise announcement, she went about filling some other slots: J.P. Muntal has been named news director of all four stations, Mark Wagner has returned as operations director and Judy Neale, most recently head of public relations for the St. Paul Symphony, has returned to the islands and will be handling membership services, p.r. and special events. She'll also be taking on some of the duties of popular Pat Avery, who resigned after 12 years to join the new capital fund project of the YWCA downtown ...
Names make news
THE morning news yesterday carried a story about Foote Gate at Fort Shafter without mentioning that it's a gate you drive through, rather than walk. And one of the authors of a Legislative Reference Bureau report on "Aloha: The Heartbeat of our Land," was Peter Pan ... And finally, Realty Executives agent who's listed the downtown apartment of the late Monsignor Charles Kekumano is Roxanna Faith ...
Contact Dave by e-mail: donnelly@kestrok.com.