My Fair Lazy - Jen Lancaster [72]
“You’re going to stop eating beef?”
“Pfft, what am I, Gandhi? No. Consider My Fair Lady for a minute.”
“Certainly, guv’nah.”
“What did Eliza Doolittle have to do to pass herself off as a lady? Think about it. She had to shake her accent, right? But remember when she’s having tea for the first time with Henry Higgins’s mom and friends? She had the accent down, but her conversation was way inappropriate. She kept talking about her dead aunt and how someone had ‘done her in.’ ”
I pause so Angie can drink in the genius of what I’m saying.
She neatly fills in the gaps. “And then they all went out for tandoori chicken. And had their eyebrows threaded before getting hair extensions. The new version’s a smash hit on Broadway. People say it’s better than Cats.”
“Shut it, smart-ass. I wasn’t done. I said I wanted to include a fine dining element as part of my whole cultural Jenaissance, but that may be shortsighted. Sure, I’d like to use the right knife when buttering my bread in public, but that won’t resolve how picky and narrow-minded I can be about food. With a couple of notable exceptions, I ordered the same exact meal in restaurants until I was eighteen years old—a cheeseburger, fries, and an orange soda.”
“Kids like burgers. They prefer simple. That’s why you see fish sticks on the little menu and not smoked salmon.”
“Yes, but eventually they grow out of it. I’m not sure I did. I just upgraded my love of burgers to steak and of fries to au gratin potatoes.140 But I don’t want to be Miss Mayonnaise McWhitebread of the Connecticut McWhitebreads, getting all grossed out or throwing a fit if I don’t go to a steakhouse. I don’t want to be the asshole ordering chicken fingers when everyone else is having chicken tikka.”
“Makes sense. You can only claim that you’re ‘allergic’ to food that scares you for so long.”
I love how Angie gets it even when I’m not sure I can explain it. “Exactly, and from what I’ve seen, dining’s becoming more of an art form. With food, the envelope is perpetually being pushed. I mean, people watch shows like Top Chef and No Reservations and a million other programs on the food networks, and they’re constantly trying new stuff. Me, I’ve always been so afraid to taste anything I haven’t already had, but really, what’s the worst that can happen? I miss a meal? I’m a little hungry? I get food poisoning? Not like that hasn’t happened before.”
I hear her trying to muffle a giggle. “Yeah, weekly.”
I’d argue but she’s not really exaggerating. “My plan is to open my mind and palate to different cuisines exactly like I’m trying with the arts and literature. So . . . I’m going to EAT THE WORLD!”
I wait for her to shower me with kudos for this breakthrough. She doesn’t. “Meaning?”
“I’ve looked up every kind of ethnic restaurant in this city, and I’m going to hit them all. Do you know how much I’ve never tasted? I mean, there’s Serbian and Colombian and Malaysian and Afghan and Armenian, and I have to look at my list for the rest of them, but you get the gist. And maybe this isn’t keeping with My Fair Lady word for word, but it definitely is in spirit. The bottom line is, if Eliza hadn’t learned to dance at some point offscreen, she’d never have sold her total transformation at the ball. So, what do you think? Sublime or ridiculous?”
“Sublime. Definitely sublime.”
“Cool, because first up, I’m slated to go out for Ethiopian food with Gina and Stacey. Which is weird because, not to be an asshole, but it didn’t even occur to me that they had food.”
“Is it too late to change my answer to ridiculous?”
ALTGELDSHRUGGED TWITTER:
Never in the history of ever has one person stuffed so much crap in a single carry-on bag.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Wickedly Imperfect
World, prepare to be eaten!
When I ran my “eat the world” concept by Fletch, he was not without questions. Or doubts.
“You’re going to write