They came to celebrate a life and left exclaiming that they had been a part of the celebration of a lifetime.

A reported 530 guests filled a glistening Tavern on the Green in Central Park Monday night in memory of the renowned chef Pierre Franey, who died at the age of 75 in October.

The restaurant had been closed all day as more than 20 chefs, who came from as far as Paris, 11 culinary arts students from three schools, and the house staff worked in preparation for the event - five hours of extraordinary food and wine, tributes and toasts, screenings, and music and dancing, which climaxed with the singing of "La Marseillaise," and a burst of sparklers from each table's floral centerpiece.

LeRoy The Host

The host was Warner LeRoy, Tavern on the Green's proprietor, one of Mr. Franey's many longtime friends and colleagues. And, although speaker after speaker described Mr. Franey as a person of simplicity, who, for example, preferred to say he was a "cook," the fireworks seemed entirely appropriate.

In his spoken words and reminiscences in a memorial program, Mr. LeRoy described a stuffed striped bass that he once had helped Mr. Franey prepare. "Then he decided wouldn't it be fun to bake a souffle on top, which he proceeded to do to an absolutely dazzling effect," Mr. LeRoy said.

Family, friends, and colleagues described Mr. Franey repeatedly and with feeling as a man who, in the words of Jean Vergnes, a chef and Springs neighbor, was "unselfish with his enormous talent."

"Lucky Pierre"

The three Franey children and the producer of his Public Broadcasting System show, Charles Pinsky, touchingly described how simplicity and skill combined to make Mr. Franey a happy man whose life and work were one.

"My father was a man content with himself," said his daughter Diane Schaldenko. "He focused on what was in front of him," said his son, Jacques Franey.

Mr. Pinsky, whose edited film clips of Mr. Franey, screened on television monitors throughout the rooms, brought sighs of recognition from the crowd, called Mr. Franey, "Lucky Pierre."

"Lucky Pierre made his own good luck. [He] was the master of serendipity. He became a TV star at the time most people think of retiring," he said.

Natural Teacher

Pierre Franey lived in Springs for more than 40 years, and took an active part in the community. He steamed, sauced, and served mussels and clams at the annual Springs Fisherman's Fair and spoke or gave demonstrations for the East Hampton Historical Society and Guild Hall.

In one of the written tributes, the chef and author Michel Gueard said Mr. Franey's "warmth and courteousness were allied with a rare knowledge of that science, a minor art, to which he was devoted. In his work he had the gift, which denotes the natural teacher, of bringing out what was essential and understandable to his audience."

Edward Gorman, a part-time East Hampton resident who was among the speakers, said Mr. Franey would answer every one of Mr. Gorman's culinary queries with, "All you do is. . . ."

Claiborne's Kitchen

For many years, he and Craig Claiborne, the food writer for The New York Times, had spent leisure hours cooking in Mr. Claiborne's East Hampton kitchens. Coveted invitations to their Saturday night meals mixed celebrities, family, and neighbors at the dinner table.

In more recent years, the men had had a falling out and Mr. Claiborne had been ill. He received an ovation on Monday when Mr. LeRoy, noting his presence, praised his work as having "revolutionized the way Americans think about food and eating."

As for the menu Monday night, it was created by the French chefs Paul Bocuse, Gerard Boyer, Alain Ducasse, and M. Ducasse's sous chef, Frederic Vardon, by Paul Prudhomme and Roger Vergnes, and by:

The List

David Bouley of the eponymous Bouley,

Daniel Boulud of Restaurant Daniel,

David Burke of the Park Avenue Cafe,

Patrick Clark of the Tavern on the Green,

Sottha Khunn and Jacques Torres of Le Cirque,

Jean Louis Palladin of the Rio Grande in Las Vegas,

*Charles Palmer of Aureole,

George Perrier of Le Bec Fin in Philadelphia,

Jean-Jacques Rachou of Le Cote Basque,

Andre Renard of the Essex House,

Andre Soltner, formerly of Lutece, and

Jean-Georges Vongerichten of Vong and JoJo.

(All of the restaurants are in Manhattan unless otherwise noted.)

To Die For

Among the dozen hors d'oeuvres served, this participant exclaimed over tuna spring roll with soybean coulis and fried Belons oysters. She also was ready to go to heaven over the soup course, a consomme with fois gras ravioli and black truffles and Mr. Franey's own recipe for a coulibiac of salmon, which was included in the program with Mr. Franey's own remarks about it.

"I have spent countless hours in restaurant kitchens assembling this glorious dish. Craig Claiborne once called it 'the world's greatest dish.' . . . It requires the preparation of several different recipes before it can be assembled and baked, and it cannot be completed in one day. . . ."

The evening ended with what was called Dessert Storm, a loose translation of La Tornade de Desserts.

Among them was a confection in the shape of a stove in black and white chocolate with two small pans on the burners and a backsplash with a line drawing of Mr. Franey.

And, the champagne and wines, which were contributed in part by Amagansett Wines and Spirits, were Perrier Joust Flour P Champagne, 1989, Trimbach Riesling, 1994, Louis Jadot Chassagne Montrachet Blanc, 1990, and Chateau Grand Arose, 1988.

The evening's proceeds will benefit the College of Culinary Arts of Johnson and Wales University, the Culinary Institute of America, and the French Culinary Institute.

The results of the American Dialect Society's annual vote for Word of the Year - the one most representative of 1996 - are in. "Mom" beat out "alpha geek" by a hair.

That's not apple-pie mom, mind you, it's soccer mom, the woman whose vote all the politicians are scrambling for. An alpha geek is who you go to when your computer crashes, the one highest in the techie pecking order.

Members of the learned Dialect Society - Ph.D.s from all across the nation - also voted on the year's most "useful" word. The winner in a walk was again computer-related: "dot," as in easthamptonstar-dot-com.)

The word voted most likely to succeed, meaning stick around more than a year or two, was "drive-by," in the sense of a brief visit or hospital stay. Drive-by labor, drive-by viewing, drive-by laparoscopy. Speaking of staying power, it's illuminating to note that 1990's Word of the Year was "bushlips," meaning insincere political rhetoric.

Bushlips???

We bet though that you can guess what 1996's most controversial word was: "Ebonics." Some of the votes were close, but that one was unanimous.

Guild Hall, East Hampton's long-established cultural center, is reportedly planning to give a boost this year to one of the newest educational undertakings in town - so new, in fact, that it does not even have a home of its own as yet.

Talks have been under way between Henry Korn, Guild Hall's president, and founders of the fledgling East Hampton Children's Museum, for the new venture to run a pilot program at Guild Hall in October. It will likely focus on genealogy and family legacy.

The children's museum has been seeking suitable space to settle down in for some months now. It had hoped to take over the Cedar Street space vacated this year by the East Hampton Day Care Center.

"A Place To Start"

However, the East Hampton School District, which owns the property, has decided to reclaim that land for its own use.

There is no question of the museum's establishing itself permanently at Guild Hall, which does not have enough space.

However, "Guild Hall is a place to start," said Jorie Latham, one of the Children's Museum founders. She confirmed meetings with Mr. Korn but was reluctant to provide details.

A possible summer outdoor program, run by the museum on the grounds of Guild Hall, is also under discussion.

Other founders of the Children's Museum, which has a proposed operating budget of $160,000 a year to begin with, are Beatrice Alda, Bridget Leroy, Lucy Muhlfeld, Kari Lyn Sabin, and Jacqui Leader.

Street Meets Beach

Guild Hall has other innovations up its sleeve this season as well. Mr. Korn confirmed last week an arrangement with Manhattan's venerable 92nd Street Y, a mecca for hot-topic speakers and headline entertainers, for a new series: The 92nd Street Y Goes to the Beach.

It is early days yet, and only a few of the evenings have been set. On Aug. 11, Joy Behar, the radio personality, will interview the controversial cultural critic and essayist Camille Paglia. Later in August there is talk of an appearance by Charlie Rose, Channel 13's popular interviewer.

Music through the Y will include two Dick Hyman concerts, one on July 7 with Derek Smith, a jazz pianist like Mr. Hyman, and the other on July 14 with Ruth Laredo, a classical pianist.

Carol Woods, a vocalist, and the Barry Levitt jazz trio are also slated to perform, with the Manhattan Rhythm Kings, dancers.

The summer lineup will also feature some intriguing art exhibits and appearances by well-known writers.

Expected to be of special interest is a show by the famed Russian artist Ilya Kabakov, who will exhibit paintings, furnishings, and documents in an interactive display. At the same time - June 21 though July 27 - Alice Aycock, a sculptor, will show a large performance sculpture that can "map out" or "draw" inscriptions with a spinning top, Mr. Korn said.

Ms. Aycock's mechanical sculpture, "Waltzing Matilda," will create a series of drawings based on the World War I song, a popular Australian tune.

Writers And Poets

Guild Hall's 51st annual Clothesline art show will be held on Aug. 2 this year, and from Aug. 9 through Oct. 12, the galleries will feature a major Childe Hassam exhibit, "Long Island Summers."

The cultural center's popular writers' series will return on June 17, featuring Dava Sobel of Springs, the author of the best-selling "Longitude." Ed Klein, a biographer of Jacqueline Onassis and others, will speak on June 22, and the poets John Ashbery and Kenneth Koch on July 27.

E.L. Doctorow will appear on Sept. 14, and Fran Castan and Tamara Tiska on Oct. 12.

The H.R. Hays poets' series will include Gerald Stern on June 1, Anthony Hecht on July 13, and Naomi Shilab Nye on Sept. 28.

Guild Hall will again offer a 12-evening series of musical entertainment through Ron Delsener. As of press time contracts were still in negotiation.

For a quiet game, golf is generating quite a bit of noise on the South Fork. Sag Harbor golfers are teed off about the state's plan to overhaul the Sag Harbor course. Montauk golfers are teed off over the eternal wait to play at Montauk Downs. Environmentalists are teed off about the plan to put sand traps where salamanders thrive behind the Bridgehampton Winery and, as The Star reports today, at the notion of clearing in Hither Woods to make room for another public course.

Racing fans are teed off that fairways will replace the speedway at the Bridgehampton Race Circuit. And neighbors of the proposed Bistrian family golf course are teed off over threats to their drinking water. The list goes on.

Nothing seems to mobilize neighbors, planners, environmentalists, and lawyers quicker these days than what has become a dreaded planning issue: a proposed golf course. Every other week, or so it seems, a golf course - existing or proposed - makes front-page news. It's not surprising, given the land-use implications, environmental questions, and, on the other side, the recreational desires of the populace.

Golf is in demand, especially affordable public courses. The State Parks Department is responding to pressure in contemplating a new course on public parkland in Montauk, and others proposing golf courses on private land are within their rights to pursue them.

But consider this: In the roughly 40 miles between the Shinnecock Canal and Montauk Point, we already have 11 golf courses, comprising 153 holes. Using a conservative figure of 50 acres for nine holes, that means about 850 acres of land are already devoted to the pursuit of golf.

If all five golf courses being considered come to fruition, the South Fork will boast 225 holes of golf on over 1,250 acres. That may seem a drop in the bucket compared to communities such as Palm Beach, Calif., which has about 50 courses in a 10-mile radius, but for the conservation-minded South Fork, it's a whopper of a statistic.

These figures seem worth keeping in mind as the review of each new course progresses.

"Not Waving . . . ," Gen LeRoy's first play, takes its title from a poem by the eccentric British poet and confirmed spinster Stevie Smith:

I was much too far out all my life

And not waving but drowning.

A drama about a released mental patient's campaign to galvanize her aging mother into a life of radical politics, it's pretty far out itself - often thrillingly so.

How gratifying to see a mother-daughter play that doesn't end in a cat fight, and isn't the least bit sentimental, either.

Confront The Truth

We open in a sanitarium, where Gabby (Sloane Shelton) is waiting to spring her problematic daughter, Nicole (Kyra Sedgwick). "I don't get her," Gabby admits to the doctor (Tim Michael).

He's not terribly reassuring: Nicole is a suicidal depressive who jumped out of a window because she was too impatient to wait for her wrist-slashing to work.

Confront this, he counsels. "Truth is power. Denial weakens the healing process."

Cut to a restaurant, where Nicole confides over lunch that she likes shock treatments even though they "take the fun out of dysfunctional."

Confrontations

She tells her mom to lose a little chub and become more assertive, setting an example by raising a ruckus with the restaurant manager (Nancy Jo Carpenter) over the failure of the pizza primavera to live up to its menu blurb.

On to a bus, a day care center, City Hall - mounting confrontations that make Mom long for a little sleep and some quality time with the Weather Channel. Nicole's "one slice short of a loaf," as her ex, Mark (Mr. Michael again), points out, and it's getting to her.

And yet, as her daughter's liberal passions propel Gabby off her couch and onto the barricades, she blossoms into a marvelously gutsy, straight-talking, butt-kicking citizen.

Role Reversal

As Ms. LeRoy says in the program, it's a case of role reversal: Nicole becomes her mother's teacher. Watching the terrific Ms. Shelton's transfiguration is one of the enduring joys of this quixotic evening.

We eventually learn that at the bottom of Nicole's crusade for justice is a deep personal grievance against Mark for getting custody of her cat, Isabella, during their divorce.

With his current wife, Helen (Ms. Carpenter again), he's exploiting Isabella in TV commercials, and Nicole's lawsuit to regain custody has failed in court.

Battle For Isabella

It's the derring-do battle for Isabella that drives the play to its wildly farcical climax and surprisingly moving denouement: a triumph for Gabby that may come too late for Nicole.

An ideal foil for the excellent Ms. Shelton's reactivated Gabby, Kyra Sedgwick is a bundle of charismatic but recklessly hot-wired neuroses. Her dashing Nicole at first is day to Ms. Shelton's night. In a subtly shaded performance, she fills us with sadness.

Ms. Carpenter is also impressive in the roles of "Helen and other women," particularly in the scene where, as Helen, she calls Nicole's bluff.

Tragedy Or Farce?

Mr. Michael, except for a brief, hilarious appearance as a karate instructor, leaves something to be desired as "Mark and other men." So does Chris Smith's rather hit-and-miss direction.

"Not Waving . . ." is a very funny, often moving, but uneven play. Despite many wonderful moments, it can't seem to make up its mind to be a tragedy or a farce, and the emotional battle lines aren't clearly drawn until quite late in the evening.

What's at stake finally comes into focus halfway through the second act in the confrontation between Helen and Nicole, when the play leaps to life, but we need to be hooked much earlier.

Therapy For Two

The performance this reviewer saw was a preview, however. Meanwhile, the rewrites go on, and by tonight, opening night, the problems may well have been solved.

Even if they haven't, "Not Waving" is still a feisty work with lots of heart and some great laughs. It's beautifully acted. It's about offbeat characters we can really root for and deals with an important subject: the mutual rehabilitation of the mentally disturbed and their loved ones. It's well worth seeing for these reasons alone.

"Not Waving . . ." will play at Primary Stages in Manhattan through March 23. It won the Carbonell Award for Best Play at the Pope Theatre in Palm Beach last year, where Ms. Shelton won the award for Best Actress.

The playwright, Ms. LeRoy, is an author of children's and young-adult books and wife of the Tony Award-winning Tony Walton, who designed the clever set. They live in Sag Harbor. Ms. Sedgwick used to spend her summers in East Hampton.

As County Executive Robert J. Gaffney, in his recent State of the County speech, pleaded with East Enders to drop their quest to secede from Suffolk, we suddenly had an image of a man trying to woo back a wife seeking a divorce after years of feeling neglected.

East End: Look, Bob, we've been trying to make this relationship work for years, but let's face it, we're just too different. You've gone suburban, and I'm a country girl at heart.

Mr. Gaffney: But after all I've done for you, how can you just walk out? Look at the money I've spent on you - preserving farmland, buying pine barrens, acquiring open space.

E.E.: I'm not saying it's been all bad. We've had some good times together. But you just don't pay enough attention to me. You're always so wrapped up in your UpIsland affairs. I'm tired of playing second fiddle. I'm going to do what's right for me.

Mr. G.: What do you mean, I don't pay enough attention to you? All I do is pay - millions and millions of dollars for those damn preservation programs you want.

E.E.: Yeah, with my money. That's all you're interested in. If I were from Hempstead instead of the Hamptons, you'd dump me in a second.

Mr. G.: You think it's so simple to walk away. Well, I bet within a few months you'll realize just how much you depend on me and how you can't live without me.

E.E.: Right, I don't know how I'll survive without you and your friends' Southwest Sewer District and other brilliant ideas. I'm sick of being a trophy wife, a rich, pretty appendage you can trot out when it's convenient and ignore when it's not. Well, this trophy is trotting right out of the door.

Mr. G.: Please, please don't go. Look, I've got a new matching-grant program for acquisitions for you! And, and. . .

E.E.: Too late, Bob. I've been talking about leaving for years, and this time I'm dead serious. I'm outta here.

Along with the flag and the hot dog, one of the things that binds Americans together is a great criminal trial.

We scan our newspapers and glue ourselves to our radios and TV sets, lusting for coverage of what may be the most gripping form of entertainment since they threw the Christians to the lions: everyone remembers where they were when the O.J. verdict was announced.

But cameras have only recently been admitted to state trials - they are still banned from Federal courts - and for years we have relied on the courtroom artist to bring us the faces of the defendant, judge, jury, prosecution, defense, and - if still among us - the victim.

High-Profile Dossier

Marilyn Church, who lives in Amagansett, is perhaps our foremost courtroom illustrator. For the past 23 years she has covered the East Coast's most sensational trials for The New York Times, the Associated Press, ABC-TV, and for magazines including Newsweek, Time, and Mademoiselle.

The catalogue of cases she has sketched reads like a rogue's gallery of crimes that have forged a fascinated nation into an unempaneled jury.

Under the heading "High-Profile Cases" in her dossier we find Karan Anne Quinlan, David Berkowitz, Baby M., Hurricane Carter, John Hinckley, Jean Harris, Amy Fisher, Katie Beers, Bernard Goetz, Robert Chambers, Joel Steinberg, the Central Park jogger, Leona Helmsley, and Sheik Rahman of the World Trade Center bombing, to name but a few.

Mobsters And Politicos

Her "Mobsters" file contains such cases as the Pizza Connection and the court appearances of John Gotti, Carlo Gambino, and other Mafia figures.

"Political" trials include the Watergate-related Mitchell-Stans case and the Abby Hoffman and Abscam cases. Her "Show Business" gigs have starred Brooke Shields, Jackie O., Mick Jagger, Billy Joel, Yoko Ono, and Woody Allen.

And - despite the presence of cameras - she drew the O.J. trial for Ladies Home Journal.

Something Darker

"I'm absolutely fascinated by criminal trials, and love drawing these crises-in-progress," Ms. Church said. "What makes these characters step out of their ordinary lives and do these extraordinary things?"

"The Jean Harris case, to me, was the most gripping. How could a functioning headmistress of a girls' school with her background drive all the way from Virginia to Scarsdale, N.Y., to kill her lover?"

"Maybe she was in drug withdrawal, or high on speed. Maybe Robert Chambers and O.J. were high, too. Maybe it's all about drugs and sex, but I don't think so. I think they're driven by something darker."

Tentative Studies

The artist usually sides with the prosecution, she said.

"I think there's generally a good reason the defendant is where he is. I was totally caught up in the Robert Chambers trial. I really thought he was going to get off; it hung by a hair. What a travesty that would have been, almost as bad as O.J."

Ms. Church was born in Flushing, the third of five children of a Protestant urologist and a Catholic nurse. Perhaps rebelling against her conservative upbringing, she decided to become an artist, and compromised with her security-minded mother by entering Pratt Institute's School of Fashion Design.

She lasted one semester - fashion design was "too constricting." Another compromise led to an equally suffocating semester in art education.

Nine To Five And After

Finally she achieved her goal by completing Pratt's fine arts program (Robert Richenburg of Springs was one of her professors). After studying at the Art Students League, she went on to graduate work at the University of Indiana, where she married a writer bent on producing the Great American Novel.

When they moved to Greenwich Village in the '60s, "One of us had to work," Ms. Church said, "so I got a 9-to-5 job in fashion illustration, and nearly went crazy."

She quit after six months, became a freelance illustrator for various publications, and continued painting in her free time.

The First Trials

Ten years went by. A son, Zach, now an environmentalist in Washington, was born. The Great American Novel languished, the feminist movement came along, and when Ms. Church acquired an agent to reshape her career, the assertiveness of the gesture broke up an already shaky marriage.

In 1973 a lawyer friend suggested she might like drawing courtroom scenes. The feminist fought her way into a mercy-killing trial in Mineola, using every feminine wile at her disposal.

Next she tackled a high-profile trial in which the Queens District Attorney was under indictment, with a future Police Commissioner, Robert McGuire, acting as his defense attorney.

"I had no training, and was scared out of my mind," Ms. Church said. "It was an off-day of jury selection, so I was able to walk in and get a seat behind the other artists. Working with colored charcoals, I kind of copied what they were doing."

"I was hooked in a minute. It was an absolutely mesmerizing dream, after the strictures of fashion. I immediately took my drawings to all the TV stations, and because these two big trials were going on simultaneously, they needed back-up artists."

"I started work right away, and a month later was drawing the Mitchell/Stans case for The New York Times. It was fascinating. I had a front-row seat at the best drama in town."

Memory And Emotion

A courtroom artist must be blessed with split-second eye-to-hand coordination and a photographic memory, said Ms. Church. Arraignments and sentencings may be over in three minutes, the defendant's back to the artist the whole time. She has to capture his expression as he leaves the court.

"I had less than a minute to draw David Berkowitz. He walked in, exploded, started screaming, and was led out. I had three sketches to do, and I'd drawn maybe 10 lines. I filled in the rest from memory."

"I also try to put my emotions into my work. There I was, sitting three feet away from the 'Son of Sam' killer, with all this heavy security in the court. There was fear in my heart and hand, and it shows in the sketch. Artists can synthesize in one drawing what it would take many photographs to convey."

Fighting The Clock

A video of Ms. Church shows her working on a long shot of the jury hearing testimony read back during the Robert Chambers trail. She has sketched the jury and the courtroom audience and is filling in the drawing with black watercolor paint, her brush racing.

"I was always fighting the clock," she said. "The picture's finished when the camera crew comes to shoot it and pulls it out of my hands. I usually have less than an hour."

"If it's a long trial, like the Johnson family will case which lasted over a year, I get to know not only the defendant's complete wardrobe and range of facial expressions, but also the judge's, the jury's, the attorneys', and the audience's."

Vanity, Thy Name Is Gotti

People are surprisingly vain about the way Ms. Church portrays them. Gene Gotti, brother of John, the Mafia boss, complained she was giving him a receding hairline.

"Facing 40 years to life, he was worried about a sketch," she said in disbelief, adding that she lowered his hairline at once. Even in court, when a Gotti speaks, people listen.

Ms. Church has had solo exhibits of her court drawings at Cafe des Artistes in Manhattan and at the Harvard Law School and the New Jersey Bar Association, among other venues.

Her drawings are in many collections, and were on view last month at Art Expo in the Javits Center.

A New Direction

After also sketching wars, disasters, shipwrecks, and fires, Ms. Church hung up her illustrator's hat two years ago to live in Amagansett year-round and devote herself full time to painting. "I don't miss the pressure of the court work," she said. "I did it for 23 years and I'm burned out."

Her paintings were first seen locally at the Bologna Landi Gallery in 1986. Since then, she has exhibited at Guild Hall, Ashawagh Hall, the Millennium Gallery, and the Elaine Benson Gallery, where a show is planned for July. She has also been in several group shows in New York City.

"The past two years have been everything I wanted: the peace and solitude to work very hard and just see what happens. Of course there's the pressure to get a show together that makes sense, but that's a constructive pressure. I want my work to be something very different, and I'm looking for a breakthrough."

Inspired By de Kooning

Willem de Kooning has been one of Ms. Church's biggest inspirations. "My works have often been described as Expressionist," she said, "but now I want to put the gesture, energy, and passion of Abstract Expressionism, which you can see in my courtroom drawings, into my new paintings."

"Art is so cool and laid-back these days, I really feel out of sync. But one of the most moving paintings I ever saw was a de Kooning."

Now into her second year of spending four days a week alone here - her second husband, Alan Applebaum, a distributor of olive oil, comes for long weekends - she feels she has made the right decision.

"It's an exhilarating struggle, and I can't not do it.

The isolation may be hard at times, but it's good for my work. And when you finally get something right, well, there's no feeling like it the world."

AMAGANSETT

Schrenko estate to Arthur and Kathleen Sylvie, Leeton Road, $208,000.

BRIDGEHAMPTON

Osborn to Arthur and Stacy Ludlow, Paul's Path, $245,000.

Adriance estate to Gordon and Deborah Bennett, Church Lane, $385,000.

EAST HAMPTON

Shanholt to John and Renata Rigney, Montauk Highway, $166,000.

MONTAUK

Ambrosio to Anthony and Carol Ambrosio, Duryea Avenue, $180,000.

NORTHWEST

Alewive Woods Assoc. to William and Lisa Bittner, Terry's Trail, $167,500.

SPRINGS

Roth to Leonard and Marsha Charney, Longwoods Lane, $267,500.

WATER MILL

Pierce to Leighton Candler, Mill Pond Lane, $375,000.

Sherwood to Diane Flynn, Westminster Road, $485,000.

Carl Icahn of Nichols Lane has sued the East Hampton Village Zoning Board of Appeals, its building inspectors, and Nathan Halpern, a neighbor. The suit, filed Feb. 12 in State Supreme Court, Riverhead, seeks to set aside a Z.B.A. ruling directing Mr. Icahn to remove the concrete patio he built in November 1994 on a dune in front of his property.

A building permit was issued for the structure at the time, but the Z.B.A. overturned it following an impassioned appeal by Mr. Halpern.

Mr. Icahn, the former head of Trans World Airlines, claims Mr. Halpern's October 1996 appeal was "untimely," that the board's ruling was "arbitrary and capricious," and that the patio was built according to a duly issued permit.

At its meeting on Friday, the East Hampton Village Board voted to retain the law firm of Pachman, Pachman, & Brown of Commack to defend the suit.

Gingerbread Congestion

The board, absent two members who were away on vacation, took care of other monthly business in short order.

Among its actions, all completed within 15 minutes, the board scheduled a public hearing before its March 21 meeting on changes to parking regulations on and around Gingerbread Lane Extension.

Congestion there has been a problem since September, when the new John M. Marshall Elementary School entryway and the new Learning Center opened on that street.

Traffic is expected to increase still more this week with the return of some 100 kindergarteners to their new digs.

New Parking Laws

The proposed new regulations include:

No stopping, standing or parking on the south side of Gingerbread Lane from 20 feet west to 138 feet east of its intersection with Church Street.

No stopping, standing, or parking on the south side of Gingerbread Lane Extension 20 feet west and 207 feet east of its intersection with the Learning Center driveway.

No stopping, standing, or parking between 8 and 9 a.m. and 2 and 3 p.m. Monday through Friday from Sept. 1 through June 30 on the south side of Gingerbread Lane Extension at the Gingerbread Lane intersection and 555 feet east.

One-hour parking between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. on the south side of Gingerbread Lane Extension from 20 feet to 240 feet west of the Learning Center driveway.

Sag Harbor Breakwater

Mayor Rickenbach welcomed Ina Garten as the newest member of the East Hampton Village Design Review Board. Ms. Garten will complete the term through July 31 of John Cataletto, who resigned.

The Mayor also welcomed Dr. John Kavanaugh, an East Hampton chiropractor, as a new member of the East Hampton Fire Department.

The board passed a resolution which was sent to Senators Alfonse D'Amato and Daniel Patrick Moynihan, asking the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to repair and restore the breakwater at Sag Harbor for the "continued protection of public and private property landward . . . and the safe and protected passages of vessels in the vicinity" of that village.

The Corps constructed the Sag Harbor breakwater in 1908. The resolution, the Mayor said, was to "reinforce" a similar request by Sag Harbor's governing body.

Enforcement Officers

In other action, the board:

Resolved to review the Village Code in connection with building construction administration and fire prevention, and to officially create two positions of code enforcement officer to replace the positions of building and zoning inspector and fire marshal.

Hired Sue Ann Glogg as a public safety dispatcher in the emergency services department at an annual salary of $27,316, and Bonnie L. Brady and June C. Lugowe as part-time dispatchers at an hourly rate of $9.75.

Approved course and travel expenses for Kimberly R. Harden and Layla K. Bennett to attend a municipal bookkeeping course in New Hyde Park in April.

Before its next meeting, the board will hold a public hearing on permits, bonds, and insurance coverage required for moving buildings over the village's streets.

Charlie and Lisa Schell were walking along Indian Wells Beach in Amagansett when they came upon a seal that appeared sick. They hiked back to call the Riverhead Foundation for Marine Research and Preservation, formerly the Okeanos Ocean Research Foundation.

The staff of the stranding program there reported on Tuesday that the seal was eating fish and antibiotics, doing fine.

The Schells may have been surprised to have encountered the seal in that location, but should not have been surprised to have encountered one at all. Several species of seals, in increasing numbers, have been seen in East End waters in recent years.

Relatively close encounters with late winter and early spring populations is the goal of a series of guided walks just announced by the Coastal Research and Education Society of Long Island. The society is vying for a state contract to run the marine mammal and sea turtle stranding program with the Riverhead Foundation, which runs the program now.

The society plans a series of walks in search of seals. The first, about three miles and three hours long, will be on Saturday, starting at 10 a.m. from the Montauk Point State Park concession stand. Others are planned for March 16, April 5, and April 27. A contribution of $5 per person will be asked.

Sam Sadove, former research director for Okeanos and a founding member of Coastal Research and Education, spoke this week about the dead dolphins that have washed up since Jan. 1 on Long Island beaches, including the East End beaches. Five of the seven were of the common dolphin species, Mr. Sadove said Tuesday.

Kim Durham, his former colleague, now a marine biologist with the Riverhead Foundation, told him about the dolphins, which were recovered by the foundation. It is not yet known what killed them.

"It's not the number, but the fact that it was five commons that's more of a surprise," said Mr. Sadove, explaining that the species is not unusual here but normally stays far offshore. "If in the next 30 days this continues, then there's something to look at."