sundries

[rm]

My jet lag always gets worse before it gets better. Oh god.

Am I a bad person because when I see a headline that reads "Romney takes swing at Palin" it takes me a minute to realize that there wasn't actual brawling in the streets?

Isaac Mizrahi has five rules for a good dinner party. Since I suspect most of us have never hired a waiter, what are yours?

Has anyone else been following Disunion on The New York Times? It's a blog on the Civil War period, and it's pretty interesting. I thought their piece on Lincoln and Joshua Speed was particularly good for not introducing anachronistic labellings of sexuality and acknowledging the different physical and emotional lines of the period, while also not doing the "of course the president wasn't gay!" thing either.

Argh, one day I will get to see this production. Why is it that the only opera that does this televised at the movie theater thing is opera I have access to right here? Argh argh argh.

So Sherlock... Thank god I found Torchwood (among other things) between this and Harry Potter, or else I know who I'd be identifying with.

I'm not, thankfully, like Sherlock at all. I'm not that smart (and I'm pretty fucking smart). My propensity for pattern recognition, while extreme, makes me creative, paranoid and really clever, but not so much with the accurate. I don't have (nor want) the type of focus Sherlock demonstrates. I'm not that mean. Or petty. And connecting to other people is a reflex for me, even if sometimes I wish it wasn't.

But....

But, but, but, but....

The way my brain works does make it sometimes more than a tiny bit hard for me to live in the world the way I'm supposed to. I blurt out weird things at weird times, their relevance clear only to me. I get frustrated with others. I can be petulant and childlike. I can demand that people play not just at my speed but in my way. I can be pretty fucking hard to be around, and the diplomacy I do have is a cultivated skill because of just how awful I think I can be.

And I adore Sherlock because even if I am not remotely that guy, it gives us someone who struggles in the world because of the ways in which they are exceptional. Someone who doesn't apologize for it. Someone who is weirdly vulnerable, but isn't interested in that vulnerability, because of it. Someone who is funny-looking, magnetic, joyful, inappropriate, and challenging enough that other people like to try to shove him in boxes that aren't quite right. He is ambiguous and contradictory, with a face that both seems not fully formed and too sharp.

I watch Sherlock and I honestly feel better about the ways I'm not so good at people, the ways people misread me, the brutalities I inflict on myself, and the fact that no matter how smart I am, I'm not nearly as smart as I want to be and that's probably a good thing.

I'm not Sherlock, and Sherlock's not me, but I feel a little realer for this portrayal of him. Most others have been so much colder and so much more assured (this one is certain, but not so assured), so even if people tell me (not infrequently) that I should cosplay one of the older portrayals (because I'm thin and sharp and, I suppose, unsettling), it's this one that I feel like I actually get.

And the coat is amazing. Maybe I have a thing (Snape, Jack, Sherlock... there's a pattern, ne?)

Comments

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

Wow. Mizrahi's rules are awfully...pretentious. And I've thrown multicourse dinner parties with china and crystal candelabras and flower arrangements. I love formal dinner parties. I've never hired a waiter.

My rules:

1. If it's a sit down dinner (not a cocktail party with lots of munchies), make either the menu or the guests your primary goal. These days everyone has some kind of food restriction--this person won't eat fish, that one's allergic to nuts, the other keeps semi-kosher. If your goal for this party is to invite X, Y, and Z, don't plan your menu until you know who's coming and then pick a menu that everyone will eat (almost) everything from. If you're dying to serve beef stroganoff, don't plan a guest list that includes a vegan, an observant Jew, and someone who refuses to eat any sauces. If that doesn't include person X who you're dying to have, have another party in a month with a different menu, but don't make people sit down to a main course they can't touch.

2. If you're making something ambitious, make a schedule for the day. Make sure you've included time to set the table and put the pots away, and include a buffer for when you suddenly realize that you have no ice in the house and have to send someone on an emergency run.

3. If something goes horribly wrong, laugh about it. If your guests can't find the humor in your setting fire to the turkey or dropping the souffle and will judge you and hold it over your head, they are not appropriate people to invite for a dinner party. The real goal in the end is to enjoy the company of your friends. If the souffle falls...I have found very few people who will turn down box mix brownies straight out of the oven. Even if they're not quite as elegant.

4. Be a gracious host. Take compliments well, don't fret too much about perfection, try not to have an argument with your partner in front of your guests even if said partner forgot to defrost a critical ingredient. Be as perfectionist as you want before anyone gets there, but once people arrive, the most important thing is for everyone to have a good time and be comfortable. Roll with the punches. And don't spend so much time fussing that you can't enjoy yourself. If you don't relax, your guests won't, either.

5. Don't feel too pressured to serve host gifts if they don't fit what you're serving. If you've planned out elaborate wine pairings for each course and someone shows up with a random bottle of something else, thank them very graciously and then put the bottle somewhere to be used at a later point.

I can see how Mizrahi's trying to make a point about not consuming yourself so much with preparations that you don't enjoy the party. It's really important to actually enjoy the party. But rules like his make it sound like you can only throw a dinner party if you're old school old money. I've been to lovely dinner parties thrown by people who didn't even have enough chairs for everyone, let alone the money to hire waitstaff. But there was plenty of food and plenty of good company and plenty of laughter, and that's all you need.

[missysedai.livejournal.com]

If your guests can't find the humor in your setting fire to the turkey

This actually happened to me last Thanksgiving.

Typically, I will brine the turkey on Tuesday, smoke it on Wednesday, then put it in an electric roaster, set low, to finish overnight. (Because of some family and friends' work schedules, we often have Thanksgiving dinner early in the day.)

Last Thanksgiving, at around 5AM, my smoke detectors started shrieking. The entire main floor of the house was filled with smoke and my turkey was merrily burning. The temperature control on the roaster had shorted in the night, jacking the temperature up to something unreasonable.

My husband FREAKED OUT. Me, I put out the turkey, dragged the whole mess into the back yard, opened all the windows, woke Elder Monster and put him to air out the house, yanked on my boots and cloak, and went off to buy another turkey. I found a fresh one of reasonable size, took it home, smoked it for half the usual time, and finished it off in the oven at a higher temperature, just in time for my guests to arrive.

It gave us a HYSTERICAL story to tell at dinner, and no one minded that the turkey hadn't been brined and was not smoked for as long as usual. This year, a guest brought a toy fire extinguisher as a gag, and the entire assembly laughed their asses off. I will never live down the burning turkey (and I'm glad of that, because it was FUNNY!)

number 5

[newwaytowrite.livejournal.com]

agreed.

After all the gift is for the host. As a thank you. To be enjoyed later. Much later even. Unless it is flowers..then find a vase and display them...or better yet...the guest could bring the flowers in a vase.

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

That's awesome. Actually, the most I've ever set fire to was the appetizers. We've had turkeys come out half raw, though, and a whole series of dessert related disasters. (I tend to be a pretty ambitious baker, and sometimes those experiments just do not pan out.)