Monday, July 18, 2011.
Jude's World At Paramount. I Cook Dinner.
We began the day in the breakfast boofay again. For me, another plate of fruit and a pastry with my juice and coffee. Another massive pile of eggs, hash browns (no grits to be found anywhere around here), and bacon for the Marys, followed by moaning about how much damage these breakfasts are doing to their diets.
I filled the morning with writing one of the three Menu Not-So-Daily-This-Week newsletters I promised my readers. I discovered that I forgot to load the current batch of photos into my laptop. So none of these newsletter will be illustrated.
A much worse work issue came up. After all the hours I spent recording radio commercials to fill in the gaps on the reruns, the radio station didn't get them. I don't have those files with me, either. I spent over an hour trying to figure out how to retrieve them. But not even Jude could figure that one out. Some sixty commercials will be missed between now and the time I get back. The sales staff will be mighty peeved, and I don't blame them.
This is why I approach the idea of vacation with such trepidation. It's much less stressful to just keep on working and to let the Marys go where they want on their own. How did I get myself into that squeeze? Good thing I love my work. (Or is it?)
Jude took us to the Paramount lot, where he has an office. He gave us on a short tour on the sly. (The official tour people look askance at anything more than that.) The most interesting part of the place was a small neighborhood of buildings designed to look like Greenwich Village. It looked familiar, but whether that's because I've seen movies shot there I couldn't say.
We didn't see any stars, even though Jude said that there were numerous productions underway. Nor were any recognizable faces in the main commissary, where everybody who's nobody eats. People like us, for example. It's like a food court. Jude picked up the check. What a big shot!
En route back to the hotel we went to Ralph's, the Rouse's of Los Angeles. We are to cook dinner for Jude and his housemates. I figured we may as well show off, and when I found some nice, thick, well-streaked sirloin strip steaks, I bought five of them, each about twenty ounces.
I seared these in clarified butter, then roasted them to done in a hot oven. (Jude has an outdoor grill, but it's fired with gas and can't work up enough heat for my purposes.) While the steaks were in the oven, I deglazed the pan with Guinness stout. I wanted whiskey or brandy, but these guys apparently only drink beer. Then added reduced cream and a goodly amount of peppercorns. After the steaks were cooked and rested, I cut them each into two pieces--my New Orleans-cut configuration-- creating ten steaks the size of generous filets.
One of Jude's buds is always giving him grief about eating too much fat. (Indeed, when we were there Saturday, I watched him marinate a bunch of chicken breasts. It was all of his dinners for a week.) But he couldn't get enough of my peppercorn cream sauce, which was decidedly fat-laden. How can anyone say no to that French bistro classic?
We dined on the deck, with its great view and the evening's cool breezed beginning. This is the most appealing quality of Los Angeles. This is the California weather that Mary Ann says she has sought her entire life. We only get it on the rare spring and fall day in New Orleans. Here it's around all the time.
One part of the soiree was puzzling. Here were four single, straight men in their early twenties. And two good-looking young women. I saw not one instance of flirtation. Maybe Mary Ann and I were wet blankets. I have no other explanation.
Back at the hotel, around eleven-thirty, all three of us sound asleep, a loud voice shouted from the emergency speakers. It said that there might be a situation in the hotel, and that we should stand by for more details. Stand by? I got my clothes on and Mary Ann and I went down to the lobby. False alarm, the hotel staff said. We returned to our bed and waited for the second shoe to drop. It did. Same ear-splitting volume. An apology for the first uncalled-for alert. How about an apology for that? Maybe a free drink?
On the way back to the room, I noticed an interesting advisory in the elevator. "Should the elevator become inoperative," it said, "do not become alarmed. Please use the button marked 'alarm.'"
It has been over three years since a day was missed in the Dining Diary. To browse through all of the entries since 2008, go here.
