The Season Three Premiere of ‘Downton Abbey’ Lasted Two Hours Therefore It Took Me Five Days To Finally Write This

On Sunday, Lindsay and I joined the roughly 7.9 million people in the former colonies in welcoming the return of Downton Abbey and the fact that no one still likes Lady Edith, even the 90-year-old Sir Anthony Strallan because he too knows that he is WAY TOO DAMN OLD FOR HER, and I’m one of those people who fully endorses the 70-year age gap marriage for money idea.

Lady Edith’s existence aside, there’s something about this British export that has completely captivated us here on this side of the pond.  It’s almost ironic to think that so many people in this country are fascinated with a show that celebrates the idea of good manners, being proper and social order despite us living in a world that has increasingly rejected all of these things.

More interesting, though, is the fact that in a world in which the Kardashians have become global superstars because their oldest daughter made a sex tape with a rapper and her family mother chose to celebrate it, we’re captivated by a show that has had, until this past Sunday, only THREE romance scenes in two seasons (and two don’t really count because Anna & Bates are only shown the morning after and then Ethel & Major Bryant get caught, ending anything inappropriate immediately).

That said, I’m so glad it’s back.  Nothing makes me happier than seeing the Dowager Countess and Mr. Carson fighting back the ever-changing world outside of Downton.  The only thing better than Mr. Carson comparing Mrs. Levinson’s idea of having an indoor picnic to the “chaos of Gomorrah” was Lindsay’s reaction to every scene of the two-hour season premiere; she even cried just watching Laura Linney introduce the episode!  Here now, just some of Lindsay’s comments from last Sunday’s premiere:

Sybil is stinking up my screen.

MATTHEW AND MARY JUST STOP IT I AM THROWING MYSELF OFF A BRIDGE MY LIFE WILL NEVER MATCH UP

“I’m looking forward to all sorts of things.”-Matthew Crawley, God’s gift to me that I merely have to share with Mary.

“Can I kiss you, because I need to.”-Matthew Crawley, as I scream into my pillow out of sheer need to be with this engaged fictional character.

“I’m so happy, so very happy, I feel my chest will explode.” I. AM. DYING.

Shirley MacLaine serenading the Dowager Countess. I cackled.

Lindsay, please know that I’m looking forward to another six weeks of this.

Now can we please talk about how annoying Lady Edith and Branson are?  Lindsay and I hate them; we have hated them since Season One.  We know you don’t like the aristocracy and “British oppression” over the people of Ireland and all that fun stuff, Branson, but just SHUT UP!  Also, you’re the son-in-law of an Earl so even though you don’t believe in any of their traditions, but you need to get over all of that and wear a set of tails to dinner!

Speaking of appropriate attire in certain settings, there was an article in last Friday’s Wall Street Journal about how in Silicon Valley, the same place that gave us that awful movement we call Casual Friday (or Casual Everyday in most places now), the youngest members of the tech set are swapping their hoodies and dungarees for suits and bow ties on Fridays because they want to be different.

It makes sense to be honest.  I read somewhere last week that men are trying to dress more like their grandfathers and less like their father who are to blame for all of this casual work clothing and the book I received for Hanukkah, The Gentry Man: A Guide For The Civilized Male, came out just in time for this to occur.

This collection of articles from what had to have been the greatest magazine you’ve never heard of, because it only lasted from 1951-1957, is the new inspiration for my life.  In addition to being told that ascots were very much so “in” during the magazine’s six-year run, I learned how to build my own golf course (because we all have eight acres of cleared land just lying around) and how to carve a turkey in eleven easy steps, which should be very useful when I recreate that Norman Rockwell painting of Thanksgiving.

Also, believe it or not, English country homes owned by bachelors have the best-run houses  and “have no trouble getting servants.  Probably it is because a man does not chivvy the servants in the same way a woman does.”  This is an actual sentence.  If any magazine published a sentence like that today, it would be deemed extremely sexist.  We lived in much simpler times back then.

There is, sadly, one thing I can’t follow according to Gentry and that is what they suggest for a round-the-world trip.  They claim I can do it with only 88lbs of stuff.    I can’t even travel for a week and a half without nearly 50lbs of luggage.  The philosophy that one should be packed for any situation is the same regardless of the decade.

It does have some surprisingly useful information, though, like proper times for grilling and broiling every type of food imaginable, even mutton chops.  There’s also an eleven-page guide to drinking; did y’all know there are four different types of Scotch whiskey?  Neither did I.  And apparently, if you drink coffee, tea or tomato juice before a meal, you can prevent yourself from scarfing down all the food on the table, including the food on the plates of other people, because one should never go hungry to the table.

I even learned how to play “new tennis” in proper tennis whites, of course, and watch a football game, which could have been useful when I was still at school because Grace and I had NO damn clue what we were watching.  But most important, I read a full page article by Robert Paul Smith entitled “In Praise of Booze.”  It’s probably the epitome of the 1950s stereotype of the three-hour, six-martini lunch that will only come back in movies and at the homes of WASPS who still summer in Newport, but it’s still wonderful to read, specifically the line:

It [booze] has made me friend, it has made me brave, it has made me gentle and comic and kind of loose-lipped and maudlin.  It is a product of civilization, and it civilizes me.

This book is probably the best $20 anyone ever spent on me and I highly recommend it to anyone who longs for the 1950s.

Well until next time, when I will have hopefully left 1953 and entered this still “new” year…

JD

I Have Discovered Something Even Paula Deen Hasn’t and It Involves Bacon

On Friday night, I went to dinner at Brookville Restaurant here in Charlottesville not really expecting to have anything beside a simple dinner that wouldn’t even be worth mentioning to anyone.  However, it would be a shame to not talk about what I ate for dessert.  Yes, my roasted flank steak was delicious and cooked perfectly and my glass of 2009 Xavier was so smooth and perfectly spiced; the cornbread was…well I’ve had better (it fell apart the second I touched it).

However, the reason I’m going back is because of one thing: Bacon, Chocolate Chip and Heath Bar Cookies with a shot of milk!  Yes, bacon INSIDE the cookie!  It was a moment of euphoria made even more wonderful because I didn’t have to share with anyone!  And it wasn’t just some bacon bites that were sprinkled into the dough.  Oh no, there were delicious pieces of bacon inside each of the five cookies on the platter; I could feel my teeth sinking into crispy bacon that was partially covered in chocolate and while already a huge fan of the salty-sweet dessert combination, but this taking that to a whole new level!  These five, very tan (yes, I’m using the word tan to describe a cookie) circles of joy melted in my mouth; they were so warm that the bottom of each cookie had that buttery feeling they have that leaves a little stain on the piece of parchment paper on which they’re baked.  Yes, I know I’ve devoted 250 words to a cookie, but this was unlike anything I’ve ever had before in my life!

Trying to move on, I finally got my Birthday present from Mother and Scrooge (four months late, but whose counting?) and here’s what I know: it has a lot of buttons that make absolutely no sense to me!  And Justin’s response to this is that I should have gotten a simpler camera, but it’s just so much more aesthetically pleasing to look at in contrast to some of the other cameras out on the market today.

Yes, I’m admitting that I bought a camera simply because I thought it looked nice.  Look, I like to take a pretty picture, that’s it.  I will never even try to act like I’m the next Henri Cartier-Bresson; I simply want to take a decent photo and as much as I love and adore my Konica Minolta, I want better quality photos.  That, and I’m sick of Andrew calling me out for having a camera made by a company that no longer makes cameras!

My new Leica X1 arrived when Mother and Scrooge came to visit at the beginning of the month for his birthday.  On that Sunday that they were here, we drove about an hour away from Charlottesville to the town of Orange to have brunch at the Inn at Willow Grove.  It was beautiful to say the least, but what I had for brunch was so good, I’m actually salivating at the very thought of it!  I had what was described as a French Toast Brick!  That was the most beautiful, most delicious brick I’ve ever seen or had in my life!  It was coated in a layer of sugar and accompanied with mascarpone cheese, blueberries, the most decadent maple syrup I’ve ever had, and bacon.  I finished it so quickly that Mother only got half of one bite!  Needless to say, I cannot wait to go back there.

As much as I love my new Leica, Grace and I really love the piece of software that accompanied it: Photoshop!  Finally, after years of bad hair, bad teeth, poor lighting, you name it, I can finally show photos of certain member of my family that haven’t been seen by anyone else in years!  Now, of course, because my life just happens this way, it didn’t come with the “right” version of Photoshop, according to Andrew and Justin, who of course have the $999 version I apparently need to have.  Fortunately, there’s a $199 student price that I might end up getting when my 30-day free trial ends.  But I already know that the second I buy it, Andrew, like he just did when I told him I signed up for Netflix on Friday, will tell me not to keep it because there’s something wrong with it even though he has been telling me to get it for months.

Speaking of Andrew, I’ve come to the realization that he and I have something in common with Oprah and her best friend (and much more entertaining person), Gayle and that is that while Oprah just did the shows and never watched them, Gayle was just like every member of the audience; she watched the show and tuned in to see it every day even if she was on that day’s show.  Well, I am Gayle and Andrew is Oprah.  He would rather watch a show months before it airs on a DVD and know what happens before anyone else whereas I am the ultimate viewer; I follow shows on Tweetie Bird, I do my homework during the commercial breaks.  There is something about the experience of watching the show on TV with the rest of the country that can’t be replicated on any early copy release on a DVD.  This became most obvious a few weeks ago regarding the show I have declared to be the most intriguing show of our time, Downton Abbey.

Andrew doesn’t understand why I haven’t just watched the DVDs of the original ITV show to see what happens instead of having to wait until tonight to see what happens with Lady Mary and Matthew.  I, on the other hand, have never been this excited about Sunday nights in my entire life!  OH MY GOD!  The suspense is killing me!  First, he was told he would be incapable of activity of any kind below the waist, then he started feeling “tingly” feelings down there and then he starts walking again!  And of course, the second the feet (and other things) start working again, the Dowager Countess immediately starts pushing Lady Mary on Matthew just like any good and proper Jewish Grandmother would!  And then Lady Sybil with the chauffeur!  In an understatement, I was plotzing when he burst into the salon before dinner (wearing a day suit, no less) and broke the news that they were in love and moving to Dublin, not caring about losing all her money and worldly possessions!  Do y’all wanna know why she didn’t care about losing her money?  It’s because she has no concept of what things cost!  I can’t wait to see how she turns out in Season Three (which started filming just a few weeks ago!).  Then, that… thing, Lady Edith.  Well, let’s be honest, no one really cares about her anyway.  And the plotting to get rid of cousin Isobel is the best part of the show; I’m completely for sending her back to whatever hell hole she came from!  I mean really, offering up a house that isn’t even yours to be used as a nursing home!  That’s almost as tacky as Mr. Pamuk dying in Lady Mary’s bed after taking her virginity, if not solely for this line:

And of course, one can’t forget Mr. and the new Mrs. Bates!  And the newly departed maid’s attempted romance with his Lordship (scandalous!) or O’Brien’s sudden change of heart over her Ladyship.  Thomas, however is the one person I think we’d all like to see just go somewhere (like back to playing with the overly hairy chest of Duke Crowborough) and never return!  He deserved to get taken for all his money regarding that beyond stupid deal he made with the black market grocer!

As y’all can see, I am OBSESSED with this show on a slightly disturbing and possibly unhealthy level, but it’s simply unlike anything else being offered on television today in our world of Snooki and Teresa Guidice.  Andrew thinks I’m insane because I could already know how the season ends and not have to wait just a few more hours to find out.  Sadly, Andrew just doesn’t understand.

Well that’s all for now because I’m off to go play in the snow that has been falling for the last few hours and then get ready for the season finale of Downton!  Until next time…

-JD