The Great Boston Lobster Bake

Forget about the Boston Tea Party -- there are tons of steamed lobsters right outside my office at this very moment. Where are the vats of drawn butter?

The most excellent Hook family owners vow to rebuild after blaze destroys landmark seafood business. And I believe they will, and quickly. Better, stronger than before even. Behold, the next-generation bionic lobster company!

What particularly saddens me at the moment is that something "devoured 60,000 pounds of lobster...", and it wasn't me.

I'm guessing arson. That lobster pound sat smack in the middle of some prime waterfront real estate, in the hottest development area in town. And the Hooks have fought to stay there before.

There's another possibility, though, one too terrible to believe. Could it be my fault? Could this be another one of my mystical powers?

You see, I recently gave up lobster. (Yes, I know that report says I can have it as often as three times a month, but considering the massive quantities I've eaten in my lifetime, I figure I'm probably already way over my personal quota. I mean, it's not like the mercury ever leaves your system.)

So, I give up lobster, and then my fave lobster place burns to the ground. This would be merely a coincidence, if it weren't for the Raven bar in New York. I used to celebrate my birthday at the Raven every year, and there were many other messy celebrations. But right after I accepted the job in Boston and prepared to move, the Raven burned down and was shuttered.

Honestly, what kind of superpower is this? Nothing I love can live on after I leave it? (wait, don't ask any of my ex-boyfriends about that one...)

Well if the Raven has hopes to rebuild, then maybe we can still hold out hope that the Hook family will persevere. In the meantime, any intrepid souls with scuba gear in the mood for some smoky lobster bisque?

My last days of disco

Y recently asked me if I'd ever gone to Twilo during my crazy New York club days, before I became an old boring suburban lady. It got me thinking back on those days a bit, which perhaps I never talked about much here.

There was one night that the Cokehead Alcoholic took me to either Twilo or Tunnel, which were near each other on West 27th Street in Chelsea, so I honestly can't remember which one it was. It was fun, but it was also kind of strange for me, because I was more used to the fetish/goth scene of the meatpacking district, which was a much different kind of club scene. The clubs I most often went to, Mother and True were smaller, with a tight community of regular attendees. They definitely did not have a metal detector or pat-down at the door, like Twilo/Tunnel did.

Anyway, the night we went to the T club in Chelsea (whichever one it was) we were dressed in Edwardian fetish/goth attire, having stopped at Hellfire first (an underground sex club in the meatpacking district that was closed down when they built the hotels and gentrified the place). All our velvet and corsetry didn't exactly fit in with the ecstasy-fueled club-kid vibe of the place, so we did get searched upon entry, which was strange. Lots of raver kids, lots of drugs, we didn't stay very long. But I did think that, had I gone with someone else, and were I dressed appropriately and in a different mindset, it would have probably been fun. Sadly, I never made it back to check it out again before it closed.

I'd clubbed in Boston, LA, DC, Spain and Italy before I moved to New York, so I had a pretty good sample for comparison, and I think I caught the New York scene at a perfect moment. Before I got there things were nuts, with Michael Alig killing his drug dealer and club kids appearing on Oprah. By the time I got there, things had mellowed a bit so that it was a nice creative community without too much evil craziness.

To be fair, I didn't just sit on a balcony and watch, I threw myself into it pretty deep, so maybe I had a better experience because of that. I was friends with organizers, I danced in a cage (god I wish I'd saved that picture; they used it for promotion), I worked the door and decided who could and could not come in. I was going out four nights a week, doormen recognized me and I rarely paid to get in. I was fully invested, until I retired from the scene. (And it took a few tries, like Michael Jordan, before I really did retire.)

A few years later, clubs started to fall prey to the triple-whammy of Giuliani's quality-of-life/cabaret law crackdown; the inflated rents of the real estate boom; and the sobering climate of post-9/11 New York. Most of the clubs and parties I went to closed down around 2000-2001, and were replaced by gentrification and high-priced bottle service.

Which is now itself dying, so maybe we're on the edge of another golden age of clubbing. These things do tend to come in cycles. Of course, I'm also pretty old now, so maybe my opinion is for shit.

Vintage morning wood

This here is a classic old story, which I recently discovered was never posted up here, even though it won me a "Best Celebrity Chef Encounter" contest. Since as many people as possible should be informed of this incident, I post it here as a warning, a public service, and of course, for your amusement.

Breakfast

While at the bar in the front room of the Tribeca Tavern, I saw Mario Batali standing talking with a small group. As I rejoined my friends in the back room, I mentioned this spotting to my foodie compatriot.

"Did you talk to him?" he asked.
"No, I've heard he's kind of a jerk. Also, rumor has it that he doesn't bathe often enough, and he smells," I replied.
My friend pulled out his wallet. "I'll give you a dollar if you go sniff him."
Since Batali was standing near the top of the stairs to the bathrooms, and in direct sight of my friend's table, this would be an easy task to pull off and have witnessed, so I took the dare.

As I tried to squeeze past Mario, I put my hands on his shoulders, leaned in for a sniff, and said "excuse me." Mission accomplished. But...

He took my hand and called me beautiful, and asked my name.

"Hi, I'm Ma.. actually, since you can probably pronounce it right, I'll tell you my real name: Maddalena."
"Mario," he said, still holding my hand. "So, you speak Italian?" he said, in Italian.
In better Italian than his, I explained that my parents were born there and we go back almost every year. He cut me off, in English.
"You were headed to the bathroom. Go do what you have to do and then come back and talk to me." He finally let go of my hand.

When I came back upstairs, he was talking to another young brunette. She slipped off (relieved?) as he turned his attention back to me.
Now, Batali the man may be a smelly philanderer, but Batali the chef has some fine restaurants that I love. At the time, Otto was still serving breakfast, and I used to go every Friday. A really great guy named Dennis worked that shift, so I decided to take the opportunity to praise Dennis to his boss.

"Oh, yes, Dennis is a very important member of my team. But let's talk about us." He leaned in a bit more.

"Excuse me?"

"Well, now that I know you like my breakfast, we just have to decide when you and I are going to . . . make love."

I suppressed a laugh at this incredibly cheesy and out of the blue pick up line, and considered reminding him that he was wearing a wedding band, and had named pizzas after his kids. Instead, I decided to laugh it off.

"After breakfast sometime, apparently." I shrugged.

"That's good, since morning wood is the hardest, after all. Especially mine, as you'll see."

!!!
I couldn't take any more. "I'm sorry, I really should be getting back to my friends," I said, tears of laughter forming. I pulled away and rushed to the back room.

"So, did he smell?" my friend asked, a dollar in his hand.

"How much will you pay me for getting him to offer to show me his 'morning wood'?" I asked.

Speechless, he just pulled out his wallet and started counting off bills.