(Reworked from a July, 2013 post with all new cartoons.)
Many years ago
(in the early 60's) there was (alas, it is no more) an excellent restaurant on
Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles. It was called Perino’s. It was
the epitome of fine dining. It was very near my husband’s law
office. He was a regular there. They knew him by name & the
parking lot attendants never bothered to give him a parking ticket—they
recognized Mr. F------ & his Buick. This was back when Cadillac’s had
tail fins. The attendants would line up all the fins in a row, visible
from the street, & next to them would be Bud’s Buick. I would join
him there whenever it was possible.
Eating
there was not cheap. My mother-in-law
was arranging a luncheon for a coworker who was about to retire. She called Perino’s & asked if they could
give her an approximate cost for about 30 people. She was told, “Madam, we are not interested
in people who are interested in price.
Goodbye.” (I thought that was
totally out of character. They were
always very nice to me.)
The
food was always first rate--& very fresh.
I don’t believe they had a freezer.
If some food wasn’t available at the produce market in the morning, they
simply didn’t offer it that day. One
evening we were there for dinner. I was
reading the menu & couldn’t decide what I wanted. Harvey, the maître d’, said, “Mrs. F------,
just tell me what you’d like. I’ll have
the chef make it for you.” I told him I’d
like Veal Oscar. (That’s a veal cutlet
with shelled crab legs & asparagus on top, with a dab of béarnaise sauce. Yummy!!)
Harvey went in the kitchen & came back to our table. He said that the chef didn’t know what Veal Oscar
was, but that it would be no problem to prepare if I could explain it to
him. I did, & it was the best I ever
had—made to my exact specifications!!
Bud’s
clients would often take him to lunch there.
I asked one why & was told that it was the only way he knew how to
get Bud’s uninterrupted time & a fantastic meal for less than my husband’s
hourly fees. One day Bud called me &
he couldn’t stop laughing. He told me he
had just had lunch at Perino’s with some clients. One of them was saying that it just wasn’t
fair. HE always got a ticket from the
parking attendants. HE always picked up
the check. The maître d’ didn’t know HIS
name. Harvey then came to their table,
telephone in hand. He said he was sorry
to interrupt, but there was an urgent call for Mr. F------. Bud answered the phone, laughed & handed
it to his complaining client. It was for
him. It seems the caller wanted to be
sure he would be able to reach him, so he had asked to speak to “the gentleman
at Mr. F------’s table.”
Talk about
class: My friends picked me up & we drove to Perino’s to meet Bud for
dinner. By the time we got there I had developed a headache, so I
discretely asked Harvey if he had any aspirin. He said he did &
brought me an aspirin bottle wrapped in a linen napkin. He peeled back
the napkin to show me the label on the bottle, as if it were Dom
Perignon. I could visualize Harvey saying, “Bayer, ‘61. Will that
be satisfactory?”
We
weren’t always able to live on that lovely scale. When we got married Bud had about $200.00
& I had the huge sum of about $500.00.
(I think he might have married me for my money.) We lived in a TINY one bedroom apartment
& I worked while Bud was in law school.
Our “dining room” table (in the living room—there was no dining room)
was a small drop-leaf that my handy husband made from an old bedboard. When fully opened, it seated 4. We had a brown & white tweed sofa, which
he sat on while he studied. He spilled a
bottle of ink on it (this was before ballpoint pens) & cleaned it with soap
& water. This left a clean spot in
the middle of the sofa & made the rest of it look very dirty. No way could we afford to have it cleaned, so
we did the next best thing. Each evening
when we got home, we would wipe our shoes on the “clean spot” until it blended
in & the whole sofa looked like new again.
Something like this:
“I’ve rich & I’ve been poor. Believe me, rich is better!”----Joe E. Lewis
(& fishducky)
*William
Inge wrote the hit play, “Come Back, Little Sheba” in 1952. If you weren’t so young, I wouldn’t have to
explain these things to you.
