Book Cook Nook: Bon Appe-treat

I'm living proof that you don't have to like cocktails or cooking to love Amy Sedaris's I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence.  This book came out four years before Simple Times: Crafts for Poor People, but somehow I missed it.  I was probably put off by its being a cookbook, which it definitely is.  I know because Sedaris is quick to classify it as such in the Foreword: "This is not a joke cookbook.  I don't like joke cookbooks because I can't take them seriously."  Although it's indeed side-splitting, it includes real recipes too, so, Amy, message received.  Anyway, it's also overflowing with colorful photographs and illustrations as well as zaniness and retro charm.  Also, decorum-be-damned flavor.  I give it an S for salty.

Sedaris goes on to say that she caught the homemaking bug as a child watching cooking shows in North Carolina and hoped to host her own program one day.  Which just goes to show that you lampoon the ones you love.  Or is it you hurt the ones you love?  Or, if you love something, then lampoon it?  Semantics notwithstanding, truTV's At Home with Amy Sedaris (an Emmy winner!) proves that dreams do come true.  Maybe that's because Sedaris isn't afraid to go there or make herself the butt of the joke.

Here are some parts that I especially like in I Like You:

On being an out-of-town guest:

"If you're an out-of-town guest, be classy and find somewhere else to stay.  If you're not classy or you're a family member, here are a few suggestions on how to be a tolerable out-of-town-guest: Don't arrive saying you have chiggers, scabies, ringworm, or lice.  Keep your parasites to yourself.  Don't show up with a pet you need to bury.  Don't dye your hair while you're there.  My mother always said "Don't bother other people."  I think that's good advice." (63-65)

On entertaining the grieving:

" 'We were in the bathtub and I felt a cyst on his good testicle.  I insisted on taking him to the hospital even though he protested, saying it was nothing.  After a thorough exam it turned out he was right, it was nothing.  On the way home he was murdered.'  . . . There is no bigger hospitality challenge than entertaining for the grieving.  They are just so sad. " (122)

On gift giving:

"Giving a gift can express many things -- Congratulations!  Get well soon.  Remember me?  I'm so sorry, it will never happen again.  Happy Secretary's Day!  Happy Graduation.  Happy Birthday.  I didn't mean it, it was the spiced rum talking.  The best presents come from the heart and say something simple: "I like you." " (186)

Sedaris says that she's a better cook than writer (her delightful Foreword strikes again!).  "I can't write good, but I can cook even better and I am willing to share with you my sackful of personal jackpot recipes that, because of their proven success, I continue to make, over and over again."  I know she's kidding.  Still, I called this post Book Cook instead of Cook Book to emphasize that Sedaris is a writer, i.e. someone who "cooked" a book.  Although not in an embezzly way.

So, this spring, treat yourself to a heaping helping of hilarious.  In this time of social distancing, it may not help you entertain others, but it will most definitely help you entertain yourself.  Which is just as well, because in life you're always the guest of honor.   

Don't be coy.  You know you like you.

Cherries and Berries and Mushrooms: A Walk in the Woods With a Fungi

 Fabulous Felt Cheery Cherries Brooch

Fabulous Felt Magic Mushroom Brooch 

Fabulous Felt Sweet Strawberry Brooch

Top: Candie's, Kohl's
Skirt: H&M
Shoes: Ami Clubwear
Bag: Betsey Johnson, Boscov's

Or perhaps I should say "fun girl."  Because when I see these brooches, I think mushrooms, and when I think mushrooms, I think woods.  And when I think woods, I think The Lady Who Lives in the Woods (also, Smurfs, but this is not about them).  The Lady Who Lives in the Woods is Ruth, a recurring character on truTV's At Home with Amy Sedaris.  Remember Simple Times: Crafts for Poor People?  Well, this is the live action version, complete with guest stars (Stephen Colbert!  Justin Theroux!  Chris Elliot!  Did I mention Steven Colbert?).  To be accurate, the show is more like a dysfunctional marriage between Simple Times and I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence, but being a borderline hermit uninterested in entertaining, I never read that one.  Anyway, The-Lady-Who-Lives-in-the-Woods Ruth is a seemingly laidback yet controlling naturalist who lives in a lodge and is always picking passive aggressive fights with her long-suffering, mime-like, live-in girlfriend.  Distinguished by her long, red Earth Mother hair and loden green poncho, Ruth says things like, "Moss -- that's nice" in a soothing yet grating voice that's a cross between Martha Stewart and half of the duo from SNL's "Delicious Dish." (Both of which, fun fact, were played by Ana Gasteyer.  So maybe I'm just saying that Ruth sounds like Ana, in which case, Ana, you're welcome.)  But that's Red -- I mean, Ruth -- for you, bursting the bubble of the myth that the forest is peaceful.  Which is just one of the reasons, I suppose, that she seeks solace in her pet bird, Artemis.  

Anyway, I think Amy would like the brooches.  Because they're weird and retro and could have easily been made by a tree-dwelling seven-year-old.  (No disrespect to tree dwellers.  Or seven-year-olds.)  Also, her show logo is a mushroom.

From one toadstool fool to another, I say: I'm talking to you too, Smurfette.