Joe Biden Is A Toucher, Always Has Been

I have been telling this story for years. Back in the late 1980’s I worked for General Foods in Dover Delaware. I was the designated Rotarian on the staff. This meant that I had to go to a monthly Rotary meetings with local business people. Back then, Biden was the US Senator from Delaware and once or twice per year he would come speak to the group. He would walk around the room and randomly touch people, put his hand on your shoulder, touch your arm…He did it to me all the time. It gave me the creeps, still does*. It was like some political consultant had told him that the way to connect with your audience is to touch them. Yuck!

This is not a politically driven story. It has absolutely nothing to do with sexual harassment or the “me-too” movement. It just means that Biden is a toucher. The other thing that was a little creepy about Biden back in the 1980’s was his hair implants. Little did he know back then that being “follickly challenged” was a good route to the presidency. He had opted for the implants (then they were more like wounds) versus the artful comb over that looks so creepy in orange. My father, who was a modified comb-over guy, used to say: “God only made a few perfect heads. The rest, he put hair on”.

Have you ever been to a dinner or cocktail party where someone violates your space? You don’t know them too well and they just get too close. I put that in the same category of Biden. My buddy Urs from Switzerland was the same way. He would corner you at a dinner party and talk right into your face. It didn’t help that he was a pipe smoker. You could try to move away, but he would follow you. It is just one of those things that happens at parties. There is no real solution, you just have to keep on moving.

If you ever see Joe Biden heading your way, just keep moving.

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PS For the record, my best friends, my best an at my wedding is gay. The day he came out, or as he put it: “switching teams”, he said I was somewhat homophobic. He also told me not to worry since he was: “The butchest gay I would ever meet”. The good news is that we are still best friends and he is a great Uncle John to my kids.

Photo credit: The feature photo was found on the girlsaskguys website

What To Wear?

Every wife will ask her husband: “What should I wear to the party?” Of course it depends. My cousin in Florida says “In Florida it’s simple it is either casual or formal. Casual means shorts. Formal means black tie.”

My experience is that Supper Clubs are pretty casual. The season is more a driver of what people wear. Closer to the holidays the ladies will dress up. The warmer the weather is, the more casual the attire.

One of the classic stories about what to wear goes back to a corporate event we hosted In Montreal years ago. Kraft hosted a Culinary event at the Research Chefs Association trade show. It was dinner for 200 people. It was winter. It was a corporate event that was pretty formal. During a prep meeting for the event the subject of attire was being debated. Discussion was going in all directions. Amanda our sous chef walked up to a flip chart and jotted “The attire for the event should match the elegance of the evening”. Wow!

(RCA: Above are the ladies who voted for more formal and a few guys working hard)

A few weeks later my mom was visiting and I showed her the invitation for the event. She immediately focused in on the attire description and asked who wrote this: I told her about Amanda the sous chef. To which she said: “chef – she should be writing advertising copy”. Some people can really write. Amanda can cook and write.

Getting back to what to wear for Supper Clubs, casual, and comfortable works.

Je Me Souviens

The beauty of supper clubs is that people connect. There is nothing much more fun than socializing and connecting with people over a meal. Every once in awhile, you meet someone you know you will remember.

Sometimes in life you meet people and have an automatic connection. That happened to me a few years ago at a friend’s son’s wedding in Quebec City. I met Jean Avard, an uncle of the groom, at the rehearsal party and we just talked. For two hours straight. At some point our wives simultaneously asked each other: Does someone need to be rescued? They quickly came to the conclusion that we were just two peas in a pod.

We mostly talked about family. I knew Jean’s middle son Doomie from his golfing trips to Memphis. The first year I retired it just happened that Doomie and I were alone together on the golf course for three days straight. You get to learn a lot about a person playing an empty golf course in March. Doomie is a great guy and we just had fun. Jean got to tell me about his other two boys Charles and Philippe. How they were all different and unique. Most of all he made it clear how proud he was of all three.

I got to tell him about my undergraduate thesis in Canadian studies. My thesis was that the separatist movement in Quebec would go the way of other radical movements in North America and that over time it would be assimilated. From 1976 to 2015 I couldn’t have been more wrong. Montreal, in particular, is more French today than it was in my college days. Jean and I agreed that while I was wrong to that point, I have time on my side.

After the wedding Nancy and Jean hosted a brunch at their wonderful lake house outside of Quebec City. Jean got to show everyone the trophy 24 inch trout that he had caught. Truth was he wasn’t much of a fisherman, but he caught the trophy. Their lake house in Quebec reminded me of my grandfather’s lake house in Connecticut. The lake house were miles apart, but the importance to our respective families were the same.

(Nancy and Jean at the lake)

Tragically, we lost Jean a few months after the wedding in a bicycle accident. Jean is gone, but his stories live on. Doomie and Estelle’s baby named Jean, after his grandfather, has helped fill the void. My guess is that baby Jean will grow up to be a great story teller.

(Baby Jean and his father Doomie)

If a supper club can be a venue for people connecting, that is a good thing.

Living in Tennessee we don’t see many Quebec license plates, but when I do I think of Jean: “Je me souviens” (I remember).