An INGTET Story: The Bridal Shower

ut(Before I say anything else, I feel that I should mention that I love that the acronym of this blog, INGTET; it sounds like a musical group with ING number of people... quartet, septet, ingtet. In fact, I may use that for a music-related something-or-other in the future. That is all.)

Several years ago, a good friend of mine got married. Let's call her JJ. By some lapse of judgment, all of us close friends of hers thought that it would be just fine to have JJ's bachelorette party the night before the very properly Martha Stewarted-out bridal shower being thrown for JJ by her mother's friends. We, of course, got tanked and sang karaoke at the party, and ended up all sleeping at our friend KB's house. We woke up with horrible hangovers, and there wasn't enough bathroom or hot water to allow us to all bathe that morning. We all left KB's house together (looking like hags and likely smelling we had vomited on each other all night) and headed for JJ's mother's suburban and perfect house, and to JJ's mother's friends' very perfect and proper bridal shower.

The kicker to the situation was that none of us had really eaten that morning. We thought that we'd arrive at this very lovely bridal shower and all would be put right with brunchy type fare. When we walked in the door, we were handed mugs of some kind of tomato soupy stuff that tasted quite good... but there was only about half a cup of it for each of us. I can't speak for anyone else (maybe I can, really), but I was so desperate for food that I was on the verge of passing out.

When we finally sat down for brunch, I was so happy that I was almost drooling.

And then it was put in front of me.

Egg soufflé.

One version of egg soufflé with mushrooms, one version of egg soufflé with cheese.

I was so disheartened by this that I almost started crying at the brunch table... the brunch table where sat all of my friends, JJ's mother, JJ's mother's perfect friends, and where a little river of kosher salt flowed down the middle of the table. With very watery eyes, I began to perform my well-practiced push-the-food-around-the-plate-because-it-makes-it-look-like-you're-eating-it routine.

Then I saw them. In a basket nearby were dozens of mini-muffins. "Mini-muffins," I thought. "These mini-muffins are what will save me."

I had a momentary relief as I reached for the basket. I pulled it closer to me. I saw yellowish muffins with little flecks of brown in them. Some kind of corn muffin? Hm, ok. I pulled one onto my plate. I tore it in half. The brown flecks were walnuts. I sank down into my seat.

I pushed the eggs around my plate some more. Their aroma hit my nose and swirled my stomach. And then the icing on the cake rolled around. (Heh, cake would have at least been something.)

KB, who was sitting sort of diagonally across the table from me loudly said, "PR! Are you not going to eat your eggs, 'cause I'll eat 'em!"

The room went sort of silent, and all eyes turned to me. All the Martha Stewart perfect eyes. Someone asked, "Are you allergic?" I can't honestly remember what I said. I may have said yes. I think a few of the other friends who knew what was going on deflected the topic somehow. KB reached over to switch plates with me. I yielded. At least the eggs wouldn't go to waste.

Lesson learned: If you're throwing a party and aren't publishing the menu, don't assume that everyone will like it. If you're attending a party and are super fucking picky, eat something small first and then whatever you like on the menu will be a bonus. Assume nothing, save face.