Author: genenewman

Why is restaurant dining so popular? Think about it. We give up home cooking and the privacy of our cozy dining rooms, we drive several miles through heavy traffic and have our one and only car parked by a teenager.

Then we pay for the privilege of eating unfamiliar food cooked by a stranger in a distant kitchen. If the restaurant isn’t crowded to the point of discomfort, we begin to suspect the quality of the meals.

But here I am at Chez Manieu. I should be grateful my reservation guaranteed prompt seating. There was a crowd of people waiting at the bar. One gentleman seemed to have forgotten what he was waiting for. “After tee martoonies,” he said, “I don’t recognize my name when they announce it over the P.A. system.”

Immediate seating is one thing. Immediate service is another. As it happened, Andre arrived just minutes after I sat down, handed me a four-page menu and asked for my choices. I pleaded for more time and he reluctantly agreed to return later. That was a half hour ago.

In the meantime I’ve enjoyed the visits of the cute little tyke from the next table. He’s here now, chewing on a steak bone and drooling on my best slacks. His little airplane has crash landed in my butter dish.

“No, madam, he isn’t bothering me. I’m enjoying him. He reminds me of when I was an undisciplined little boy myself.” (That usually works.)

But where is that waiter? When he finally takes my order and eventually returns with the food, he will too often ask ,”Is everything all right?” And, with my mouth full of bouillabaisse, I will reply, “Grnxlbmff” and he will say “Bien” in that smug way of waiters and I will have deposited an oily shrimp on my new tie.

At last! Here comes Andre now to take my order, but who is that with him? Oh dear!, it looks like the teenaged parking attendent and I think that’s my mangled license plate he’s carrying!

Bread has been on mankind’s table since around 10,000 B.C. . It’s the first thing we ask for in the Lord’s Prayer and is recognized world wide as “The Staff of Life”.

Ghandi once remarked, “There are people in the world so hungry that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread.” And Julia Child has asked, “How can a nation be called great if its bread tastes like Kleenex?”

So what has happened to all those wonderful neighborhood bakeries where I once could buy a still warm loaf of unsliced seeded rye that smelled so tempting I sometimes arrived home with both ends of it chewed off? I have yet to find a supermarket “Bakery Department” that can match that excellence .

“If you miss homemade bread so much, why don’t you make some?” my wife once asked. I accepted the challenge and my very first loaf turned out quite well, not as food, but as a doorstop or maybe a catapult missile.

It weighed as much as a standard loaf, but was half the size. I realized I had to be more patient and wait out the recipe’s rising time or find a way to reduce it. I remembered my Grandma placing the dough pan on her kitchen radiator. I thought I could do even better by creating a little “rising tent” with a bath towel draped around a table lamp.

This actually did reduce the time considerably but it required more frequent checking than anticipated, especially with two 200-watt bulbs. The dough swiftly rose to record-breaking fluffyness and swallowed the lamp.

I put the whole conglomeration into the oven anyway. Of course it wouldn’t be edible, but it would be a great conversation piece. Recently I noticed some of my male dinner guests took notes when I told this story. I hope they don’t use heirloom lamps.

It seems I’ll never become talented, famous or rich, but someday, somehow, I’m going to become suave. It will be an uphill battle. I’ll have to give up unsuave things like loud cussing and indoor spitting, but it will be worth the effort to have people point at me as I stroll down the avenue, and exclaim, “Did you ever see anyone suaver than him?”

Suavedom is really just an attitude that enables one to fit in and yet, stand out. We unsuave guys don’t stand out. We stick out. Once on a trip to Italy I stuck out like the proverbial sore thumb. As I stepped out of the 747 at the Rome airport I could sense the entire nation bracing for a difficult two weeks. I was about to leave a trail of raised eyebrows and muttered exclamations up and down the Italian boot.

Most people are realistic enough and kind enough to tolerate the millions who will never be suave. But we brave suave trainees, the daring ones who attempt the transition must suffer the slings and arrows of outraged head waiters, hotel clerks and fussy head housekeepers.

I had no idea my Italian was so terribly inaccurate. The people in my tour group said it had a certain ring of authenticity with my arm waving and all. I have since been able to explain some of the painful results of my incompetence as a linguist.

There was the incident in our hotel dining room where I was trying to ingratiate myself with the maitre d’ to get special treatment for my party. To my friends it must have sounded like I was having a friendly chat with Saverio, but after rechecking my “Italian for Tourists” book later, I realized I’d actually been saying , “Good newspaper, Saverio. Please see that my friends get good serpents.” And smiling Saverio was replying, “Sir, you are standing on my foot.” Late the next day a waiter scolded us for bringing sandwiches into the dining room. We had to. We were still unserved and we were starving.

Next, I tried booking my party’s train trip to Venice. The station was a beehive of activity during the commuter rush. I managed to combine my lack of suavity with my poor command of the Italian language and currency plus my abysmal ignorance of their railway system. Things moved less than swiftly.

In just an hour I spent what was probably a small fortune and had six unintelligible tickets. A well-dressed (certainly suave) Italian gentleman offered his assistance. “These tickets,” he said, “are for the special luxury express train to Venice.”

“Bene!” I said. “Just what I wanted!”

“Not so bene,”he replied. “It left ten minutes ago.”

In the next half hour the ticket sellers and I exchanged about five pounds of paper. At one dangerous point we were booked first class on the boat to Sardinia. But, at last, suavely happy and with tickets in hand I hustled my group off to the right platform while I found a porter for the luggage.

The porter and I arrived just in time. Not in time for me to board since the train was pulling out, but I was able to wave to my friends who looked bewildered, leaving without their luggage. “Enjoy Venice,” I called, “Arrivederci!”

The porter tugged at my sleeve. “Scusa signore. No Venezia. Your amicos’ treno goes to Vienna.”

“Oh well,” I called, waving suavely, “Auf wiedershen!”

Thisby Tower, headquarters of the trillion dollar corporate giant, Thisby Thingamabobs Ltd, is a world unto itself. Within its cloud-piercing steel and glass walls modern technology provides a constant climate resembling a pleasant May morning. Well, almost constant.

At 10:32 a.m. last Thursday, August 17th there was a “temporary” disruption when a very special gasket failed in the enormous air conditioning system. This activated a battery of relays and interlocks which turned off the system completely, silencing its soothing purr and causing Thadeus T. Trisby to pause in his speech to the board of directors to ask, “What was that?”

“I think the air conditioner shut down, T.T. ” Gilmore Grovel, his assistant ventured. “I’ll look into it.”

“Do that!” Thadeus barked. “And tell them to turn it back on. I think it’s hot outside.”

As a matter of fact it was 95 degrees on the other side of the tower’s Thermopanes, but Thadeus could only speculate. He’d provided his personal world with an artificially temperate atmosphere. His home, limo, office , the executive dining and board rooms were all blessed with refreshing balmyness. He had also contributed generously to air condition his church in case he might some day attend a service.

By the time Grovel returned, the board room climate had changed from May morning to July afternoon. Jackets and ties had been removed. Thadeus mopped his dripping brow and asked, “Well?”

“The AC’s off,” said Grovel, smiling at the correctness of his original call.

“We know that, Grovel!” Thadeus roared. “Did you relay my order to turn it back on immediately?” His lapel carnation was beginning to wilt.

“They have to replace a very special gasket first, Sir. It’s been ordered and it’s on its’ way.”

“When will it arrive?”

Grovel flinched and edged toward the door. “The plane from Seattle is expected at JFk in five hours.”

“FIVE HOURS!” Thadeus wailed. In the meantime 10,000 employees are going to get very uncomfortable. Pass the word to open some windows.”

Grovel looked at the board members who avoided his stare, busying themselves with mopping their brows and making fans out of the annual report. “None of the windows in this building open, T.T.” he reported. Thadeus was stunned and rose to pace the room not noticing his leather-lined chir had clung to the seat of his trousers.

“A five hundred million dollar building with windows that don’t open!” he shouted, slamming his fist on the table. A half dozen reports stuck to his dripping hand. The board room climate had just left “Houston” and was approaching “Bangladesh”.

“Your secretary gave me a few messages, T.T. : Department heads have been reporting problems. The dispensary staff has been treating heat exhaustion victims…..Someone on the 26th floor opened a window (“But you said..”) with a fire axe….Work on the new Thingamabobs design stopped because of fog in the lab….An elevator operator was fired for working in his underwear…..”

“Anymore?” Thadeus sighed, watching another director slump over the table.

“Nothing credible, Sir. An anonymous caller reported rainfall on the 50th floor. I think we can blame the other reports on hysterics.”

Thadeus was losing his grip on reality. Was that a clap of thunder he just heard in the hallway?

After more than 80 years experience as a photographer, amateur and pro, I’m still a bit under developed. I started when I was eight years old after winning a Kodak Brownie camera as a soapbox derby prize. My Dad said he’d pay for the first roll of film and developing, but after that, he said, I should be making enough money with the camera to cover expenses. I don’t blame Dad for his little fib. It was during the Depression when fifty cents would buy five loaves of Wonder Bread.

My plan was to take shots of exciting neighborhood events, sell them to the Hudson Dispatch newspaper and become famous. But the closest thing to exciting was when Mrs. Bockman, a rather stout young lady, got wedged in her chicken coop doorway. She raised an enormous howl and her chickens went beserk. Her frantic struggle left her house dress a bit askew and when I arrived with my Brownie, she begged me not to take a picture. So I didn’t.

But I’ll bet Mrs. Bockman and some editor would have been bidding against each other for my photo. My caption would have been, “Trapped attractive housewife threatened by fierce roosters saved by young photog”.

In later life, as a freelance reporter, editors soon learned to send professionals to shoot the pictures for my reports. However, sometimes I was handed a reflex camera, given confusing shutter speed instructions and told to do my best.

“Explain this picture!” one editor growled after I’d turned in my copy of a factory fire along with the film. “It looks like the firefighters are climbing over each othe and the highest one has two heads! This is definitely a double exposure.”

“That’s okay, Chief,” I said. “I’ll only charge you for a single.”

I eventually learned enough to turn in films with almost the correct settings, but they often failed to match the drama of the event. Crowd control became my problem.

“Your story’s okay, ” one editor said. “You’ve captured the urgency at the scene of the wreck and the sense of relief with no injuries, but these pictures you’ve turned in…. Every shot shows a group of happy people!”

“Come to think of it,” he said, “all your recent shots have included people smiling and waving like what you turned in last week with the crime penalty panel story.”

“Chief, I wanted to catch them in solemen deliberation. They’d been discussing death penalty sentences for days, but when I raised the camera the old guys started grinning and waving.”

” And what about this County Fair shot of the cooking contest winners? One of the women has a really sour face while the others are beaming.?”

“Chief, that’s Mrs. Bockman, a very old neighborhood friend of mine. She was unhappy because her “Chicken Coop de Tat” entry received only an honorable mention.”

As I look back now at my grammar school class photos I can see the first signs of my inherent awkwardness. From kindergarten on I’m the only bandaged or bruised kid in the pictures. My foot is in a cast in our third grade picture and it appears I have accidently swung it into Agnes Hoffsteader. She is obviously crying while the rest of us are smiling broadly.

I had a crush on Agnes back then and tried to spend a lot of time with her. However, she transferred to a private school early on. I heard a rumor it was at the advice of her pediatrician and the Prudential Insurance Company.

“Will I ever grow out of this clumsy stage?” I asked my father one day. He looked at me strangely and replied, “Before I answer that question, Son…”

“Yes, Dad?

“You’re standing on my arthritic foot and it really hurts!”

Dad tried to be encouraging, saying my fears were exaggerated and I was probably not more awkard than the average young boy. I began to feel better but then he made me promise never to get a job at the Picatinny Arsenal when I grew up. “It wouldn’t be fair to the other employees or to the nearby Morris County residents.”

But Dad had made an important point. I began to plan my future assuming I would probably always be ungainly or at least not gainly enough to handle a precarious career that might have the threat of consequential damages.

My paper route was not a good choice. I doubt anyone has calculated the ballistic potential of a tightly rolled newspaper, but it must be considerable. I found out a large weekend edition can easily break a window at 25 feet. When striking the south end of a stooped north-facing garnener it can send him flying into the tulips.

Then there was the unfortunate incident when my bicycle struck a fallen branch which detoured me into Mrs. Duffy’s lawn party. (You might have read the sensationalized newspaper account.)

All of my subsequent jobs were chosen with safety in mind, but I always managed to defeat the statistics. I lost my soda jerk job when a sudden hot fudge spill caused me to leap back into a stack of sundae glassware. I suffered a similar fate at the Five and Dime with the runaway floor waxer.

I almost got a job on the Palisades Amusement Park’s roller coaster until the manager recognized me. He said he was sorry, but there were lives at stake. “Try the Games Arcade or one of the games of chance stands near the carousel. But stay away from the shooting gallery!” he shouted.

What really decided me on being a work at home writer was the night a mini tornado whipped down our street damaging a couple of front porches and I was called in for questioning.

If you feel, on occasion, you cannot in all honesty say something helpful and encouraging, then by all means say nothing or tell a merciful fib. Unless you work for the Department of Bridge and Tunnel Safety or the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, there is no need for you to point out every little flaw you detect in what you’ve been invited to look at. The owner or creator of the object in question is already aware of its tiniest flaws.

For instance if a woman of advanced age is so hungry for compliments she has to ask, “Do I look okay?” you should realize she’s really asking, “Besides some obvious imperfections, how do I look?” For heaven’s sake, be kind!

The world does not need more “Inspector Generals”. You know the type, the fellow you invited to your barbecue who spends the afternoon commenting on your crab grass and maligning your marigolds. He doesn’t think highly of your barbecue sauce either. If it wasn’t for your wife’s intervention you might have added something to his salad dressing that would have kept him very active for a couple of hours.

Some I.G.’s feel they must call attention to every defect they see or the world will miss an opportunity to get closer to perfect. “Well, you wanted an honest answer, didn’t you?” they ask after giving a devastating opinion. The fact is, most of us don’t want a completely honest answer.

I once spent a sweaty weekend building a toolshed and, in a weak moment, asked an I.G. what he thought of it. Instead of beginning with a complimentary remark or being noncommital, he had to point out, “There’s no doorway in your toolshed. How are you supposed to get in?”

Of course I was aware of the absent doorway. It was one of those bugs I had to work on. I wasn’t looking for his negative comment. I just needed a little encouragement after 16 hours of sawing, hammering, nailing and swearing. Instead I got his unfair criticism.

Unfair, because it wasn’t my fault. I’d missed “Doorways Week” in manual training when I had the Chicken Pox. On the other hand I got a B+ in both “Windows” and “Gutters”.

I.G.’s think they’re the only ones capable of noticing the obvious and will ask hurtful questions like, “Say, do you know you’re getting quite bald?” and “Have you noticed how badly the paint is peeling off your house?”

But enough is enough. I’ll end here. There’s something ironic about a blog that criticizes the critics. By the way, what do you think of this blog?

I’m not a neat eater and that’s putting it mildly. I’ve been afflicted with this condition since birth. The pediatrician had to double my Similac dosage to make up for the spillage. My family tried to improve my table manners over the years but the results were spotty.

Once, in the fourth grade, I traded my lunch for a Lone Ranger Decoder ring. When I got home that afternoon, my mother scolded me. “Just a minute, young man! What did you do with your lunch? Now don’t lie to me,” she said, examining my spotless shirt front. “There’s supposed to be ample evidence here of peanut butter and grape jelly!”

You might think this is a small cross to bear, even endearingly human. So what if my fork hand doesn’t know the exact location of my mouth and I therefore can’t avoid launching food fragments in various directions? Nevertheless it’s been an embarrassing handicap and was once a real threat to my dream of a successful business career.

I was assigned to meet with a very important client to finalize our three-month campaign to land a multi-million dollar contract. All that was needed was the CEO’s signature. Unfortunately she insisted on a lunch meeting.

I tried to get out of it by feigning a temporary illness. “Nonsense! ” Old Ms Finchley barked. “You look as healthy as an ox, half as heavy and you’re less than half my age. Besides, I don’t like eating alone. Now where can we get some good Spanish food? Just bring the contract and I’ll order us their best Jambalayas.”

“What the heck?,” I thought. “I’ll just be extra careful.” But jambalayas needed careful planning to prevent or at least mask the almost inevitable collateral damage. There wasn’t time to buy a Mexican poncho so I decided on a pink shirt and red tie even though they clashed with my magenta sports jacket.

Ms. Finchley didn’t seem to notice when I put my elbow in the butter dish and when I splashed my salad dressing it got less than halfway across the table, but during the gazpacho soup course my thumbs began to get the range.

I thought I noticed a slightly raised eyebrow and Ms. Finchley definitely flinched when our entrees arrived. By then her napkin was raised up to the level of her lowest chin.

Believe me, I was struggling mightily, but the jambalaya had a mind of its own. The centerpiece, a delicate spray of violets, was soon overwhelmed. The waiter removed the dripping vase at arms’ length. I got a look at his apron. It reminded me of the final scene of “Bonnie and Clyde”.

“I’m running late,” Ms. Finchley muttered, wiping the crystal of her wristwatch. I noticed a bright red stripe on her cashmere jacket as she jogged to the exit.

“I tried to reach Ms. Finchley,” my boss said later, “but her secretary said she’s spending the afternoon at a steam bath. How did the lunch meeting go?”

“It went swimmingly, Chief. Here’s the contract, signed on the dotted line.”

“It’s dotted all over the place!” he barked. ” I hope this holds up in court. It looks like she signed in tomato sauce! Okay, you can count on a steady job under certain conditions. Never eat at your desk, not even pretzels, and for Pete’s sake, take off that dumb Lone Ranger ring!”

Life was simpler for the caveman. When he wanted a new garment he would grab his spear and head for the forest. He knew, one way or another, he was going to end up inside a nice warm animal skin. It was dangerous, but it was simple.

Suit hunting is still not completely safe and it’s much more complicated. In some parts of today’s “forest” the stalking can get sticky, like at Herman and Harry’s Haberdashery:

“Herman, there’s a gentleman here who wants to use our phone to report an accident!” Harry called out as I entered the store.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “There’s no accident. I came in to buy a suit.”

Harry eyed me up and down. “You weren’t in an accident…..really?”

“No,” I replied, conceding round one. “I’ve been too busy to keep my wardrobe up to snuff. I guess this suit is a bit out of style now.”

“Not at all, Sir. Not at all. That’s a very unique garment. Would you mind telling me where you purchased it?”

“It was so long ago I can’t remember. I think it came through the mail, though.”

“Ah, I recognize the label,” Harry said, looking inside my jacket. ” “A big name in the industry.”

“Is it really?”

“Yes, but not the menswear industry. I didn’t know they made men’s suits. They’re famous for their hang gliders. I can see now there’s a certain flair to the trousers. Have you noticed a sensation of buoyancy on windy days?”

Harry had me where he wanted me then. Leaving the store was out of the question. I couldn’t walk on a downtown street in this outrageous clothing, especially if it’s windy out there.

Following this demoralization phase, Harry and Herman always get their prospect to to try something on, “just to check the size.”….. “How does this feel, Sir? It looks like a good fit .”

“Fits okay, I guess, Harry, but I don’t like the style and it’s much too loud.”

“Loud, Sir? We don’t deal in loud clothing. Stylishly visible, perhaps, aesthetically conspicuous, to be sure, but not loud.”

“Please speak up, Harry. I can’t hear you. This orange-striped lavender jacket must be over 150 decibels.”

Following round two of this sparring event, the customer is asked to choose a suit from the rack and is led into a small curtained booth. Struggling out of my suit and into theirs was a difficult, strenuous operation. There was also the fear that somewhere in midsuit I would tumble through the curtain into the showroom in my skivvies.

After ten sweaty minutes I emerged disheveled but decently clad. Decently, but not stylishly. The trouser cuffs were turned up halfway to my knees and only my fingertips were visible below the jacket sleeves.

“Almost perfect!” Harry gushed. “Just a few minor alterations.” Herman agreed and they got me onto a platform in front of a bank of mirrors. A small crowd began to gather and a young man took my picture with his cellphone. I hoped I wouldn’t turn up on Facebook.

“Waist 36,” Harry called to Herman and the crowd murmured. “Hold it, Herman!” Harry said. “Sir, unless you plan to hold your breath while wearing this suit, please exhale and relax. That’s better. Waist 40!” he shouted and the crowed giggled.

When this embarrassing event ended, Harry and Herman talked me into one of their “three-piece, double breasted ‘specials’ and then began to suggest suit materials starting with outrageously expensive vicuna and working their way down their list depending on how loud I gasped when they mentioned the final price. I was hoping we didn’t get down to burlap or cheesecloth.

Finally I opted for a fabric I could afford if I gave up lunches and maybe reach my pretended 36-inch waist. I still remember the day I proudly unwrapped my purchase and showed it to my wife. “Behold my worsted suit” I said.

“It certainly is, ” she replied.

Nick and I stood at the crest of the hill, our poles planted in the packed snow, our new ski outfits glistening in the sun. Two girls schussed by and Nick raised a ski pole to wave jauntily. This upset his delicate balance and he fell heavily, taking me with him.

“Nick,” I said, trying to disengage my left ski from his right pants leg, “if we’re going to to impress girls on the slopes, we’ll have to learn to ski.”

“You’re right,” he said. “They might go for ski bums, but not bum skiers.” So we crawled over to the ski school and enrolled. That was many years ago, but the fear, pain and humiliation of that day are still fresh in my mind.

They rang a big bell to assemble our ski class. If you’re ever at a ski resort and you hear the clang of a big bell, run for cover. An assembling ski class can be a dangerous thing. Some accident insurance policies contain waivers for wars, earthquakes and assembling ski classes.

Things settled down after ten minutes of shouting, crashing and tumbling. Two middle-aged men had to be dragged back to the lodge to be separated. Nick and I stood calmly at the edge of this chaos, hoping no one noticed we were lashed to a snow fence.

Soon, Elfrieda, our instructor, rocketed up. She was a tall, attractive blond. Perhaps her tallness was an illusion since I mostly viewed her from the ground. Nick fell for her right away and, since I was leaning on him, I also fell.

Elfrieda began by teaching us eight survivors how to remain vertical. Soon we were upright and schussing around for several minutes at a time. “Now for the snowplow!” Elfrieda announced. “Good!” Nick shouted, “Let’s get the hill scraped right down to the grass before somebody gets hurt!”

But the snowplow, Elfrieda explained, is a speed control maneuver and, before we knew it, we were traversing down the hill with the help of Elfrieda’s warning shouts and gravity.

We were congratulating fellow survivors at the bottom and exchanging accounts of violent falls, collisions and other fun ski talk when Elfrieda told us how we were going to return to the top. Back then the rope tow was quite common, especially for beginners. The wrong way to use the tow, Elfrieda expained, is to grab the moving rope too tightly and too quickly. “You’ll be yanked right out of your boots, ” she warned.

Nick was leading on the tow line followed by Elfrieda who was calling out instructions when a girl skier glided by and Nick loosened his grip to wave jauntily with his pole. This caused him to slide back down the rope and he took out Elfrieda and the rest of us like a string of beads.

Eventually, at the top, we resembled the battered survivors of an unsuccessful polar expedition. Elfrieda gave a pretty speech about how much we’d progressed, pausing frequently to help fallen students up and to prop them against the snow fence where we stood with frozen smiles, torn parkas and bent ski poles.

Nick, the optimist, wanted to stay and challenge steeper slopes. “No, Nick,” I said. “There are a lot of moguls on the expert hill.”

“Moguls, really?” Nick said. “I was hoping for girls. I don’t want to be skiing with a bunch of rich old guys.”