Conjugating Some Irregular Verbs

As travel posters go, it was succinct: If you love life, you'll love France.

And if I want to see a classic Hitchcock movie for the first time, the Byrd is the place to see it. But the starting point for tonight's outing wasn't a movie, it was a lecture, "The Art of Jewelry through the Ages," which just happened to be at the Byrd Theater and just happened to include a screening of Hitch's "To Catch a Thief."

Since I've only been wearing jewelry for a just over a year, you can bet I wasn't the one who noticed the lecture was happening. But Pru did, rounding up her jewelry-making mother, Beau and I for an evening devoted to personal ornamentation and sparkly things.

Naturally, she planned for the evening to begin with dinner, which is how we landed at Spoonbread Bistro for a butter and bacon-soaked meal not long after they opened their doors. Early enough that the piped-in music didn't even come on until after we were seated.

The happy couple was feeling autumnal and wanted a bottle of Bouchard Pere et Fils Reserve Pinot Noir, but I'm still lamenting summer's recent departure and instead opted for Treveri Sparkling Gewurztraminer. By itself, it was underwhelming but once the amuse bouche of creamy crab and salmon on an edible spoon showed up, it showed its true colors as a lovely food wine.

It had been six months since I'd last eaten there and the menu was identical, so choosing what I wanted took some time. Our meal was obscene, as meals at Spoonbread tend to be, with Beau and I each starting with a special of roasted beets over greens in a blood-orange vinaigrette with a golf ball-sized round of cashewed goat cheese.

My seared scallops over corn pudding with bacon drizzle were as rich as I remembered, while I also managed to score bites of Pru's steak and lobster and Beau's sea bass. As for the jewelry maker's rockfish with butter-poached lobster tail, well, that never made it to my side of the table, not that I needed it.

Dinner conversation revolved around #me, too because Pru had noticed my status and reminded me of a conversation the four of us had a year or so ago when Beau had been surprised to learn that all three of us had been sexually harassed or assaulted.

We discussed men's role in all this and Beau stated for the record that he did not want to speak as a representative for his people. I can't blame him.

After sipping, eating and gabbing so long - Pru insisted I taste the Pinot Noir -  we were suddenly in a hurry to make it to the Byrd in time for the lecture and film, both part of Artober, a month-long celebration of art all over town.

The womenfolk were barely in our (comfortable, wide, new) seats while Beau parked the car when we struck up a conversation with the woman two seats down. Pru explained that we were waiting for a man to buy us sweets and the woman, already munching on Snowcaps, sniffed and said, "Usually I make more money than the men I date, so I buy my own."

Lucky for us, we didn't have to because Beau was so gracious as to supply us with buttered popcorn and Milk Duds to tide us over, not that any of us were the least bit hungry. It's more about a Pavlovian response to being in a movie theater.

Tonight's event was sponsored by Carreras Jewelers and cards were handed to each attendee for 10% off a purchase - as if I ever bought any jewelry new - and Bygones, next door to the Byrd.

A Carreras jeweler took us through a fascinating slide show on the history of jewelry, tracing it from the Neolithic period to Greek and Roman times through the Egyptians and the Renaissance, while stressing why jewelry was so desirable: it was made of precious things, it was decorative and, early on, rare.

I was fascinated to learn that originally, jewelry was worn only at night when the light of candles made it look extremely sparkly. He told us about sentimental jewelry (with human hair woven into it...blech) and mourning jewelry (and, by the way, in the 19th century, women were expected to mourn for 2 years while men got off with 6 months...the gender disparities go back to the big bang, apparently).

He got us up to the 1920s and Art Nouveau before the owner of Bygones took over, sharing the history of costume jewelry in the 20th century, notable because it was then that jewelry began to be thought of as art rather than as a sign of wealth.

Whew, otherwise I still wouldn't be wearing it.

Coco Chanel helped turn the tide on that. And, in a nice segue to the film, she told us that the jewelry shown in "To Catch a Thief" had become available in department stores once the movie came out. Not that any of it would look like it did on Grace Kelly, but an Eisenhower-era woman could hope, couldn't she?

Then it was time for the film and, to our amazement, half the audience left because the lecture was over. Who walks out of a chance to see a free Hitchcock movie set in France on the big screen?

Neanderthals, that's who.

Manager Todd introduced the film, reminding us that Hitch filmed his murder scenes like love scenes and his love scenes like murder scenes. "Story of my life," Pru whispered. The woman cracks me up.

I'd been under the mistaken impression that I'd seen this movie before, but not long in, I realized it was all new to me. From the opening shot of a travel agency window full of wonderful mid-century travel posters (talk about art!) to a woman's cotton bathing suit that zipped up the back, it was an ode to another time.

In fact, all the costumes were fabulous because Edith Head designed them and what doesn't look good on Grace Kelly? Even her roadster was beautiful.

Of course, the best part of the story was the budding romance between the one-time jewelry thief and the gorgeous rich girl with attitude. Well, that and seeing Cary Grant in swimming trunks. Oh, yes, and the banter, that was excellent.

You're here in Europe to buy a husband.
The man I want doesn't have a price.
That eliminates me.

Only after the movie came to its logical 1955 solution - love with the promise of marriage - did I share with my posse that it had been my first time. Hell, after the spate of jewelry robberies when Cary Grant's character had said he'd been a reformed thief for 15 years, I wasn't sure if he was lying or not.

That's how clueless I was.

Not only did I enjoy that kiss last night, I was awed by its efficiency.

If you love life, you'll love edible spoons, nerdy art lectures and classic Hitchcock movies on the big screen. Kisses, efficient or otherwise, are also high on the list.

Story of my life.

Flirt, Swoon, Use Your Womanly Devices

When your evening begins somewhere luxe, you don't anticipate it ending in an industrial corridor.

Our quartet arrived in the rain at Spoonbread Bistro, were shown to a table in the center of the room and immediately began social intercoursing, at least until we noticed the restaurant steadily filling up. Pros all, we knew it was best to order before the masses did.

The Four Graces Pinot Blanc wet our whistles and amuse bouches of spicy pimento cheese tarts whet our appetites. My companion's order changed once our ginger-bearded server announced that softshell crabs were in the house, while I stuck with a gift-wrapped salad and scallops with corn pudding and bacon drizzle.

The scared and profane part of the discussion began when the friend eating frogmore stew admitted he had shown up for Easter dinner with nothing more than a bouquet of flowers and a cherry pie, completely unaware that Easter was a gift-giving holiday.

Au contraire, he discovered, as we heard tell of Easters past with presents as varied as a BB gun and a Matchbox racetrack because apparently not everyone celebrates resurrection simply with black jellybeans.

And P.S., if anyone's going to bring me flowers and pie, please make it blueberry.

Tonight, mine was the rare case of dessert remorse because the 24k gold leaf carrot cake with maple icing my companion ordered was downright spectacular, certainly more alluring than the chocolate I'd opted for. Will I never learn?

We had no remorse about our choice of entertainment with "Something's Afoot," a murder mystery musical spoofing Agatha Christie's "Ten Little Indians" that, according to director Tom Width, Swift Creek Mill had produced 25 years ago. Not to point out the obvious, but I did a lot of things in 1992 that I'd just as soon not repeat now (one incident involved lemon drops and that's all I'll say about that), but Swift Creek had no such compunction.

Adding drama to drama, he also told us to check out the creek because the water coming down from under Route 1 was battling with the roiling water from the rain on this side, making for some mighty agitation. Of course I trooped outside during intermission with my willing accomplice to see nature's churning spectacle.

The story of guests being invited to an English lake country manor house for a weekend was all kinds of fun with French malapropisms ("Quelle fromage!"), a maid with a pitch-perfect Cockney accent, multiple unlikely death scenarios (poison dart, missing step, falling shield) and near-constant laughter at the top-notch cast's delivery.

Jacqueline Jones was made for the role of Miss Tweed (in a tweed suit, natch), all efficiency and suspicion, while it was impossible not to keep an eye on John Mincks' every move (casually at the fireplace adjusting his junk after fondling a fellow guest) as the crafty nephew trying to secure his inheritance.

Not for a second did the play let us forget it was all one big device, never more evident than when one guest tells another, "We'll leave as soon as it's climatically possible."

The four of us left once the play was smoking its metaphorical cigarette, only to get right back off the highway when we saw a sign for a crash ahead. The nearest exit took us on a soul-less stretch of road that put me closer to Philip Morris than I'd ever been, involved some screaming at a perceived dangerous moment (it wasn't) and, at one shoddy point, was described as resembling a cow path.

Big deal. Once you've been serenaded about getting a rash from a man with a ginger mustache, it takes a lot more than Commerce Road to sour your night.

Besides, no one wants their evening to end before it's climatically optimal.

And We're There

While it wouldn't be fittin' not to tie dinner to the evening's entertainment, we proved that anything goes afterward.

Waiting to be scooped up by friends, I admired the remains of my garden, still amazingly colorful in December despite the recent spate of cold weather while noticing that the birdbath was filled to the brim after yesterday's day-long deluge.

I don't want to brag (nor do I deserve to given how long it's been since I gave my handkerchief-sized garden any attention), but interspersed with ferns and Gerbera daisies still surprisingly lush were blooms of all kinds: pink dianthus, fuchsia snapdragons, pink and white geraniums, purple and pink vinca, miniature lavender petunias, one pale pink blossom on the clematis hybrid that looks like a dahlia and hips galore on the pale pink miniature rosebush.

Considering I saw footage of snow falling on the Japanese Garden in Portland today, the colorful array felt like a near-winter gift.

Taking a cue from tonight's film, ours was a southern-themed evening, beginning in the understated brown and taupe interior of Spoonbread Bistro, where the flatware is golden and the vibe is luxe.

Pru and Beau faced me in a booth that sequestered us away from the restaurant's activity, while I grilled our server about the origins of her name, correctly having guessed her parents were inspired by a flame-haired movie star.

The subject of not responding to a person's texts came up (clearly not in reference to moi), with Beau mentioning one sent today to Pru, who'd been too busy to answer. My question was, if a compliment falls on a tart's ears and she fails to acknowledge it, did the text even happen?

Discuss.

The amuse bouche was a blue crab arancini, setting the meal's decadent tone from that first perfect bite.

What followed only got more obscene. As proof, I give you exhibits A) a lobster "Pop Tart" with Hollandaise sauce for icing, B) shrimp scampi with possibly the creamiest Cheddar grits I've ever swallowed, surrounded by chunky tomato "fondue," C) Cesar salad that tasted like the dressing had been made tableside it was so freshly egg-y, and D) scallops over caramel corn pudding with applewood bacon drizzle.

And that's just what I ate, never mind the sea bass Beau inhaled or the foie gras and spoonbread with Smithfield ham that Pru managed to disappear with not a bit of  assistance from us.

As she took the last succulent bite, she looked at us with only mild regret and said, "To be honest, I wanted to share with you two, but I literally could not stop myself from eating it all."

Luckily, Beau and I are not the judgmental types. But when she pronounced having had "an elegant sufficiency" and they both opted for coffee over dessert, I alone was left to order tonight's dessert special, a Gran Marnier chocolate mousse.

Just for the record, both their golden demitasse spoons touched down in my mousse more than once, despite earlier assurances that they had no room for sweets.

Tonight's conversation was particularly notable because it was the first in the two years of our three-way friendship that Beau actually heard it all.

After years of missing out due to ears damaged by heavy machinery when he was in the Navy, and despite being a man (so stubborn for no good reason), he'd gotten corrective devices so he could stop reading lips (only a slight exaggeration), a challenge given that  Pru and I talk a lot (both loudly and sotto voice) and he used to miss 85% of it.

No more. In fact, when I commented early on in the meal that he could finally hear us, he smirked and said, "I've already turned the volume down on you. You two are loud."

What his new hearing aids mean is that now when we ask him something, we needn't repeat ourselves. So it was that when Pru was discussing with him who he should conjure when mulling how to handle a situation, she asked who he admired and he came up immediately with Cary Grant.

"So do or say what Cary Grant would do or say," she explained, a point that somehow led to him admitting that if push came to shove and if he were to swing both ways, he'd have little problem swinging with Cary Grant.

The things you learn once everyone can hear the conversation clearly.

Walking out of Spoonbread feeling full as ticks and fully indulged, Pru turns to me and asks, "Remember the Jefferson?"

It took me a moment to get her drift, namely a long-ago December night as we were leaving Lemaire when she'd "appropriated" a poinsettia or two on our way out.

As I mentioned, I try not to judge but I know I left Spoonbread's poinsettia sitting on the table as we exited, stage right.

This month's classic film at the Byrd was "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof," a film that is as much about looking at two superior physical specimens - 26-year old Elizabeth Taylor and 33-year old Paul Newman - as it is about a dysfunctional southern family, especially in a Hollywood adaptation that all but scrubbed the homo-erotic elements from Tennessee Williams' script.

I wouldn't have even thought that was possible. Ditto the seemingly innocuous subject of the Sweet Tarts Beau was enjoying devolving into taking vitamins and minerals, which somehow led to the inner workings of Beau's, er, plumbing before, as Pru so eloquently put it, "And we're there."

TMI, that's all I'm going to say. Fortunately, the movie began.

Why is it so damn hard for people to talk?

Praise be that the film at least kept the setting, a stately house with screen doors opening to the veranda from second floor bedrooms cooled by constantly whirring ceiling fans. You could almost feel the humidity plucking on everyone's last nerve.

A drinking man's someone who wants to forget he isn't still young and believing.

Although I've seen "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" produced as a play multiple times, I'd never seen the 1958 movie version (shh, I didn't tell Pru so she wouldn't give me crap about it), so I was pleasantly surprised at the strong performances of everyone involved - scenery was chewed with real skill - although I was ready to smother those annoying child actors every time they came on screen.

Ain't nothin' more powerful than the odor of mendacity.

After leaving the Byrd, I suggested a nightcap and film discussion but was voted down because Herself was tired, at least for the first block we drove east, but suddenly she reconsidered.

Our southern theme went out the window as easily as cigarette ashes, but now at least she was up for anything.

In no time, we were at the bar at Amour, complimenting the owner's new goatee, drinking and swooning over digestifs of Plantation Barbados 5 Year Rum aged in French cognac barrels and taking topics from all four participants.

Sure, some people want to dish about annoying foodies, but others only want to covet swing coats and plan pre-concert parties. To each his own.

We covered a mutual friend's Studio 54-themed party, a planned trip to Antibes next summer, a formerly gawky teen morphing into a handsome young man aboard a yacht (with photos) and Pru's hippie chick Mom recently dying her hair green.

Digressions included Trump's excellent Blanc de Blanc, the grace notes of Willamette Valley wine and tastes of the latest Beaujolais Nouveau.

Marveling at the number of years Amour's been open, Pru wanted to say that she'd visited it first, but the owner corrected her and I won that round.

Not that I hadn't already had dessert, but since my partners in crime had not, we over-indulged in chocolate sea salt caramel creme brulee, followed by the wonder of Beaujolais Nouveau sorbet (hints of orange on the front, anise on the finish), just the kind of delight you'd only get at Amour.

In the blink of an eye, three hours were gone and Beau had some wee concerns about his meetings tomorrow, so we thanked our host and departed.

This time, it took less than a block to realize that we'd not uttered a single word of discussion about the film, ostensibly the point of a third stop.

'We're done. There will be no do-overs tonight!" Pru announced firmly as Beau wisely kept the car moving eastward, knowing we'd made the same gaffe another time and then spent another full hour finally having the discussion we'd lost sight of.

The real question is, what would Cary Grant have done? Go home after a mere seven hours together?

Not likely. As I always say, ain't nothin' more powerful than conversations not shared.