Miss Manners and the Art of Crumb Removal

I reallly, really don't mean to brag or anything, but once upon a time, waaaaayyyy back in my former life, when I used to plan big-ass recognition events for Corporate America, I used to eat in some pretty swanky places. I’ve planned dinner parties aboard The Britannia, Queen Elizabeth’s former yacht. I’ve carefully tasted Haggis at an ancient Scottish castle amidst antiques from the Elizabethan age.

I’ve licked sorbet from little, bitty, silver spoons, aboard The Concorde, jetting my way to London. I discovered the joys of goat cheese alongside the Mayor of Monaco at the Hotel de Paris in Monte Carlo. I’ve sipped vodka and noshed on potato blinis overlooking Moscow’s Red Square.

Dinner on-stage with the cast of “Phantom of the Opera”? Been there. Champagne and strawberries on the summit of a glacier, only accessible by helicopter? Done that. A moonlit bbq on a private Caribbean island, surrounded by nothing but coconut trees and stars – well I’ve done that too.

Through all these adventures in fine dining I’ve had to learn my way around a dinner service. I no longer use the fish fork for my salad. I know the spoon at the top of my plate is for dessert, not for stirring my coffee. I know that the dinner roll is placed on my left and I also know that proper service is always done from the left, and so, always obligingly, I shift right when a server approaches. If you’re having a luau, I know the only way to eat is traditional style, on the ground, using your hands, licking poi off your fingers. I always put my napkin directly in my lap when I’m seated and if I ever drink from the water glass on my left, it is simply because I have lost both my mind and my manners.

So imagine my chagrin yesterday when, for lunch, I was eating a toasted tomato sandwich made with bread so fresh and flaky it disintegrated into a cloud of crumbs with every bite. Imagine my mortification when I had to stand up, and in order to achieve the best position for the task was bent over with my head below my knees, t-shirt over my head and boobs hanging in the wind to dust the crumbs out of my bra’s cups because I was wearing more of the sandwich than I had actually consumed.

Betcha can’t wait to have me at your next dinner party, huh?