Eva's Wine Cellar

Oh wow, that is delicious! <digs in>

Wait. We really should cut this into slices. I'm sure some of the other guests would like some, too.

Really, Stuge, there are almost NO good onion rings. Au point matters.
Not that I know what that means.

I don't understand. Do you mean that you don't like onion rings, or that you can't find any good ones*?


*we can fix that!

I adore onion rings, even some portion of the horrible ones, but I rarely find some I think of as good (unless I am being polite, a failure of mine).

I wouldn't know how to eat a hot dog without onions......and mustard.

Okay, Sturgis and Osso. Try these. I like mine crispy, but not too greasy. These look just about perfect to me. (Thanks, FS!)

Wow! They look yummy.

Keep 'em coming, FS! Looks like everybody wants more!

I dunno, sort of like chopped carrots.

It's true, I'm a brat.

Jacques says it's time for new table linens. So I'm off to the shops to see what I can find.

Right after I finish this coffee...

HEY!
I just looked in the refrigerator for a piece of the left over steak from last night. There are three Everything Bagels in this bag(two to share) and I was going to slice that meat real thin, add a transparent hunk of red onion and a dab of horseradish.....but now I can't find it amongst all these containers of ----what the hell is this???!--some kind of hummus, I hope.

Hmmm. Yes, garlic and red pepper....

What else is in here? Two hard boiled eggs, shelled, in a container that says:
Nature's Own Imitation Butter. (Is that not the most ironic name for... .) Oh, and here's another container with the same label but this one is full of pitted black olives.


Huh. I guess I'll just swipe a couple of these Brooklyn Dark Matters and eat whatever I find in here. ...


Joe(the steak was in a Tupperware container marked "Poison")Nation

I was hoping to have that leftover steak in a salad today. That's why I marked it "Poison" -- so nobody else would eat it!

But, hmmm...your idea sounds better. That gives me an idea.

I'll take one of those bagels, some of that hummus, and I'll chop up some of the olives (they're kalamatas, Joe.) Since you sliced the steak real thin, there'll be enough for both of our sandwiches, and then some.

Anybody want a bagel? There's one left!

They are not strictly onion rings.

They are fat rings which is the reason they are so good to eat.

As you bite into them with your mastication kit, natural or moulded from plastic, with gold inserts for the pirates, and grind them up prior to transferring them by a series of muscular wriggles, which I know there's a word for but I feel it impolite to use it before a well brought up non-scientific audience ( it's horrible ) into the eosophagus and along it into the stomach, which only has only one compartment to prevent us chewing the cud for otherwise we would philosophise too much and nothing would ever get done, or regurgitating the food for our young, which doesn't bear thinking about from a tit-man's point of view, and thence 0n a progress through the descending, transversing and ascending colons, and into a system of colons with less ridiculous names, the ileum, the jejunum, bypassing the appendix most of the time, and the sigmoid (is this a Freudian joke spendi? Ed.) from whence to the rectum, the bulk of the liquid from the pre-dinner drinks, and the soup, being drained off into the bladder, where, in both, there is a build up to avoid any uncontrolled movements of the anus or micturation apparatus which befits the last stage before the sanitation engineers take over after not so much of a wiggle as a nip and a flick of the wrist--as this process begins, as I said, and you're are biting into to these fat rings, try onions without fat, lubrication ducts in the mouth flood forth a salivating juice which combined with the fat pressed out produces a wave of pleasure which needs an explanation.

It is that during our earlier states of being fat was not easy to come by and was an extremely valuable food being high in energy. Hence our evolutionary conditioning to absolutely love it. And here we are with as big a supply of fat available to us as we can eat. And an industry eager to supply any level of demand and not unwilling to stimulate it.

Hence the pornography of the other end. Or, the biology class of a quality atheist school-marm.

"Hello, Restaurant Linen Supply? This is Eva. I need to place an order. We need everything -- two dozen regular tablecloths, a half dozen banquet tablecloths, four dozen napkins, two dozen each of kitchen and bar towels, and I'm thinking three or four cook's aprons. And the same number of chef's jackets. Can you add the name of the Wine Cellar to those jackets? Good. In black, please. Yes, that's right, everything in white linen. And sign us up for the cleaning and delivery service, by all means.....You'll have them out later today? Sounds good. Thank you so much!"

There, that's done.

Now for the fun part. I spotted a great shop down the street that carries French jacquard linens. I want some to overlay on the banquet tables for events. Or maybe just everyday, to add some color.

You see right there gents. Your wages down the pan and on the wall.

It's easy to see that a turn back to good old Christian asceticism might be in order because it has to be admitted that gratuitous, self-indulgent pigging out in tasteful settings simply has no limit. We need to turn back at some point. It ruined Rome.

Besides being conditioned by evolution to avidly seek out sources of fat we are also conditioned to eat it as if we might not get another chance for weeks. So we have a natural urge to eat as if we might not be able to do so for a while and we have what looks to be as many opportunities to eat as anybody could ever wish for. In Homer when the sacred cows were captured they were roasted there and then. In those days they either didn't know, or were too hungry, to have bothered about how much more succulent roast beef is when hung for a few days to go off a bit.

It is the control of these natural urges that Freud called neurotic. The slim well-to-do lady of a certain age is as neurotic as a Carmelite nun. The difference is only that of intake and that it is not as easy to be sure with the nun.

Will you not be needing some mops and buckets and swabbing cloths Madam?

Why, thank you for bring those, spendius! How nice of you to offer to stay late and clean up!

You know, you've given me an idea. All this talk of Rome and Homer and controlled urges being "neurotic" and all...

I think we shall have a Mediterranean feast tonight!

What do you all think?

Ulysses had something to say about such things when he finally arrived home.

LEt's have some Moroccan mint tea for starters...

This Southern girl always likes mint tea! We have always had a patch of mint growing in the backyard just for tea.

Oh! And I see we still have some of ehBeth's figs!