Remember, Remember...

...The sad story of poor, ill-fated Juror Number Eight. Fashion's edicts are ignored at your peril.

Café PSA: A Timely Reminder

While I know that such Gentle Readers as regularly pass by here hardly need such basic information, once again I feel obliged to remind a broader cher publique...

A Word to the Wise

When dining out, sometimes it's just as well not to know what's going on in the kitchen...

Shameless Saturday Camp Explosion: Mind Your Manners

This 1947 gem from no less than Mrs. Edwin Main (Emily) Post actually contains a great deal of very useful advice - little nuggets that, judging from the dinners I go to, not a few persons in comparatively lofty positions could learn much from.

I particularly enjoy the several things that many would now think likely to be the height of gaucherie that Mrs. Post reminds us are quite correct:  drinking from one's soup cup, for example, or the almost entirely forgotten fact that bread plates are not used at a formal dinner, and the bread (if any) is simply deposited on the tablecloth (for sopping purposes only, please, no butter).  I'm also quite taken with the parade of horrors committed by Mrs. Inexcusable Cigarette, who was clearly unused to human companionship of any kind, poor thing.

And wasn't American food plain?  Those cubed potatoes look to be strangers even to a little pepper, and you just know that Mrs. Post's cook had never heard of cilantro, fenugreek, or hoisin sauce.  At least she rose to exotic little touches like that challenging ethnic treat, SPAH-ghetti, and bravo to attractive Virginia Hopkins for managing it so deftly.

This missive from the Emily Post Institute (Emily Post, President) may have been filmed a decade or two before my time, but this was the world I was raised in.  There is not a little resemblance between Mrs. Post there in her garden and my sainted Grandmother Muscato, who actually did serve whole poached fruit for dessert and expect one tidily to cut around the stone, at a table that was never less neatly set than here, three meals a day.  Under her expert guidance, her Alice (She's a Treasure)* put out sauces no less drenching than Mrs. Post's Hollandaise, not to mention a creampuff in syrup that I'm sure would give Mrs. P's a run for its money. Even now, all these years later, I still feel a twinge of guilt, a cool draught over one shoulder, when I eat a bowl of cereal, milk poured directly from the fridge, perched on a stool, sans underplate, sans placemat, sans any of the things that "separate us from the savages, dear.  Sit up."

At a time when we may need more than a little reminding of the basic rules of civilization, on levels even more significant (if such were possible! cries the shade of Grandma M.) than table manners, they do remain a place to start. Tonight I think we'll eat in the dining room, and while we may not rise to finger bowls, we can at least be more Virginia than Inexcusable.  It's a start.

*  I actually for a little while thought that might be the housekeeper's last name...

A Memorial Day Reminder...

Whatever the temptations you may face heading into this holiday weekend, keep one thing in mind:  white shoes really ought not to be worn until the morning after the traditional May 30 celebration of this important holiday.  Better safe than sorry.

This has been a public-service message brought to you in memory of Grandmother Muscato, a strict observer of all things Decoration Day.  She might not have approved of each and every one of Mrs. Sutphin's methods, but she would have found her motivation irreproachable.

Pearly King

Mr. Valentino proves that while it may be possible to wear more pearls at one go than the late Queen Mary, it is probably not aesthetically advisable to do so.

Public Service Announcement: Mother Nature

Now, I'm admittedly not the most ultragreen person around.  Living in one of the most hellish climates on earth, we use way too much air-conditioning, and recycling is a concept that is, as yet, still a glimmer in local government's eye in these parts (we now have separate bins, one black, one pointedly green - but they both get dumped in the same trucks).  I'd be a flat-out liar if I said that I turn out every light, that I'm reconsidering my carbon footprtint, or that I have any intention of swearing off raspberries flown half-way 'round the world from New Zealand or worse just for my delectation.  Count it as yet another area in which I'm hopelessly spoiled.

Still, who better to start me and all of us on the path to more thoughtful living than the Divine Miss M.?  Her high-profile work over the past few years to re-green New York's blighted parks has been yet another reminder that I'm far too far from home - she even tweets about hanging out at the park café near my old place!   I could meet her while volunteering! (Even though, now that I'm hitched, it's something I'd no longer need to do - everyone knows that people in Manhattan only volunteer to either find a partner, spend time away from a partner, or find a new partner.  It's a rule.)

Drat.  Even trying to be all noble and altruistic can make me grumpy...

A Timely Reminder

Back there in the world of Saturday-starting weekends, I know, you're heading into a last, langurous long weekend before the autumn. We at the Café hope that you will take a moment from saying farewell to summer to heed this hint from our domestic engineering consultant, homemaker extraordinaire Beverly Sutphin:

You can't wear white

after Labor Day!

And none of this whining about how fashion changes, and don't try to sneak by over the next few months in any so-called "winter white." Beverly has some firm opinions. Which we share. Put that stuff away!

Bed Head

Oh, I suppose we've all woken up a few times feeling exactly like this. I find that strong coffee and a glass of Champagne help, but that time is the only cure...

An Incontrovertible Truth

Arguments to the contrary will be entertained, but will not be given much credence. We've seen too many, on top of being one ourselves.*

*That royal-first-person-plural never quite works out when used at length, does it?

Everybody Cha Cha!

Ah, yes. As opposed to all those dirge-tempo cha-cha-chas out there, dragging down the radio waves with their droning horror.

I've lived long enough to know better than to make too many blanket statements, but I think this is a safe bet: "Shine On Harvest Moon" is not, should not, and never really will be a cha cha, no matter what Manuel Rivera, his orchestra, or his excitable cover model try to do to it.

The March of Time

The passing years are a challenge for even the greatest stars. One moment you're Queen of the Lot, at the top of your game, and the next you've started that long, slow slide that takes you through memoirs, TV movies, and appearances at increasingly obscure film festivals to oblivion.

It can start without warning. For example, I believe that Dame Elizabeth, whatever else happened thereafter, experienced the Movie Star equivalent of Jumping the Shark the moment she donned that headdress.

For many, the next step is an ill-advised return to the stage, all too often playing against type. Is there anything in the world less hard-boiled than Claudette Colbert, drooping cig or no?

Suddenly, you find yourself wearing unfortunate jewelry and biting nervously at the centerpiece...

Some few, in the end, achieve a rare grace; Miss Lillian, luckier than most, seems never to have made a wrong step (except perhaps that hat) during the last three decades of her long, long life, holding her own even against Miss Davis and coming out smiling.

But most are not so lucky, as evidenced by frail, sad Lucy, apparently attempting a slo-mo slap at the hapless (and for the moment, unsuspecting) Dorothy Lamour impersonator to her left.

Beyond that, draw the veil; you don't want to venture into the final stages, the time of This 'n' That, the Motion Picture Country Home ("Irving! Where is Irving? We'll be late for my premiere!"), and moments like the ghost of Mary Pickford appearing live, more or less, from Pickfair on the 1976 Oscars.

It's no surprise that Ruth Elizabeth said it best: old age is no place for sissies. Ironic, though - given that it's mostly sissies that are paying attention...

Life Lessons

Constance Bennett found it out the hard way: smart women don't make pictures at Monogram. Even if it's pretending to be Allied Artists.

Diva Paraphernalia

Shoes? Too many is simply not possible. When accessorized with a poodle and housecoat? Perfection.

Diva Paraphernalia

Only the most extreme of divas should attempt a scenario involving so many key accessories: fur, feathers, chaise, and hunky stud. For most, any two at most is enough of a challenge.

For Mae, of course, it's just another day at the office. And baby, it's hot inside...

Diva Paraphernalia

Number One: Matching lapdogs are a must.*

* Frequently offset by a third, in human form: male, married, and generous.

Reminder: Dainty Does It

Rule Number One of Faux-Dating: the Beard should never be butcher than the Boy.

All the ermine jackets in the world couldn't turn Mavis there into anything but a linebacker...