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$750 brunch
Sunday, May 2 1999
After we made it back to Lindsay's house from Lisa L@tter's place, the plan was to meet up for brunch with Ed Nel$on, his wife Susan, a friend named Walter and this friend's date at a restaurant in the Garden District of New Orleans. It wasn't just any restaurant, mind you, it was Commander's P@l@ce, reputably the best restaurant in all of New Orleans and thus all the United States as well. Not just anyone can dine at Commander's P@l@ce either. You have to have reservations, and getting reservations sometimes requires a little traditional New Orleans good old boy politics. Ed Nel$on might be fully hip and modern, but he's also thoroughly schooled in the soft science of New Orleans good old boy politics. He's a regular at Commander's P@l@ce, preferring the upstairs dining room, which is (among other things) a prime spot for celebrity sightings.
A guy can't simply waltz into Commander's P@l@ce in a tee shirt and jeans; he must come "dressed for success" as they say in the job fair industry. I didn't have any appropriate clothes, of course, so Ed loaned me some of his. I lost the tie somewhere along the way, who knows where. It might have had something to do with all the drugs I'd been taking for the past three days.
Kim and I caught a taxi cab down to Commander's P@l@ce, stopping at a money machine to pick up some "bank" along the way. Kim suggested I get $200, so I withdrew $160, if that indicates anything interesting about the nature of the power dynamics in our relationship.
At Commander's P@l@ce, guests are encouraged to walk through the kitchen, so of course Kim wanted to do that. As one would expect for a kitchen where tours are encouraged, the place was immaculate and perfectly organized. Other fine restaurants, the C&O in Charlottesville, Virginia comes to mind, would never allow guests into their cramped, dingy, vaguely medieval kitchen. They have a reputation to uphold, and the food is going to have to do it all by itself.
An unexpectedly romantic picture of Kim and me before we set off for brunch.
Something vaguely funny happened I suppose.
The jazz band with (from left): Ed's friend Walter, me, Ed, and Ed's wife, Susan.
Kim hanging out with the jazz band in Commander's.
Typical white boys at Commander's, from left: Ed's friend Walter, me and Ed, complete with Commander's chef's hats.
Kim and I in Ed Nel$on's hot tub. I tried to get the lipstick off Kim's teeth with Photoshop and kind of fucked up.
Drunk and nude after bathing in Ed Nel$on's hot tub.
The food appeared in multiple courses, all with clockwork precision. The waiters, all of them middle-aged black men, were extremely dignified and courteous in an impeccably admirable sort of way. And they probably make more bank than many of the lawyers in this city. The food was excellent of course, but I'm not a good judge of such things. I can't even remember what I had.
Ed saw to it that a continual flow of wine found its way into our glasses. And there was never any need to pour; the waiters handled everything. I found out later that the wine was costing something like $50 per bottle. Ed kept track of how many bottles of Jordan Cabernet we were going through by maintaining a collection of corks at his place.
There was a small jazz band over in the corner playing various numbers. Towards the end of their show, they came to each table and did a little private performance, even taking requests if I'm not mistaken (and, owing to the wine, my memory grows fuzzy at this point).
Towards the end of brunch, those of us at my table were getting pretty crazy. The balloons that had been serving as decorations soon became a target. I used a candle flame to burn through their tethers so I could float matchbook payloads about the room (as one of Ed's relatives once did at an earlier, similarly crazy Commander's brunch). When one manhandled balloon started hemorrhaging helium, I salvaged the situation, inhaling the precious gas and addressing everyone in the dining room in a loud Donald Duck voice. Unfortunately, no celebrities were present to behold the spectacle that was me, no Sean Penns, no Madonnas, no Monica Lewinskis, no Arnold Schwartzeneggers, no Billy Corgans. We all goofed around with the jazz band, which, like the waiters, had no detectable issues with our merriment. When Ed requested chef's hats, we got chef's hats. The only thing I remember clearly beyond that was the bill coming to $750 dollars, give or take a twenty. As outrageous as that might have been, in some way it seemed worth it. Kim, it seems, could well be gradually converting me into some sort of high roller. I'll have to spend more than seventy five cents next time I go to Vegas.
The rest of the day was a blur. We went back to Ed's place, and Kim and I got naked and climbed into the hot tub. I'm sure we took more drugs of some sort, but I don't really remember.
By the time evening came around, I was in a mellow mood. Lindsay and the others all went out to some sort of power dinner with the various rock stars and sub-famous film geeks they know while Kim sacked out on the couch and I improvised a power cord for my laptop so I could download pictures from my digital camera and prepare to take another memory card of photographs.
And that was the day, or what little of it I remember. The thing is, if you remember New Orleans, you must surely have been dreaming.
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