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Weekend Butler: Shower the people you love with love. A rare video. Your next podcast: Anderson Cooper. The show to see in NYC. A comedy to stream. A recipe for a holiday party. And more.
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Published: Dec 01, 2022
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Weekend
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THIS WEEK IN BUTLER
Marcella Hazan: Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking
Frank Costello: A Novel
Between the Folds
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‘TIS THE SEASON FOR… SHOWERING THE PEOPLE YOU LOVE WITH LOVE
I saw this story on Facebook. Like Gertrude Stein, who often said “Very interesting… if true,” I was skeptical. Then the photo of a dog on the grave of his owner (above) convinced me the story wasn’t fiction from Russia. Here it is:
For 6 years, Capitan slept in the grave of his owner every night.
His owner, Miguel Guzman, died in 2006 and Capitan disappeared shortly after the family attended the funeral services.
They searched everywhere and put out flyers to try and find him. But no one had seen him.
A week later, some people who were at the cemetery late one evening spotted Capitan laying on the grave and they contacted the groundskeeper.
The cemetery notified the family.
They picked him up and took him home.
But each night he would cry and scratch frantically at the door to go out, and when they let him out, he wouldn’t return home until morning.
They discovered that Capitan would walk the 3 miles back to the cemetery each night to guard his master’s grave.
For 7 years.
The cemetery learned not to close the gates until he arrived each night promptly at 6 pm.
He slept there all night, guarding the grave until the groundskeeper opened the gate in the morning. Then he trotted home. That is, to his other home.
I’m moved by this story. And I understand that grief can endure. But forgive the cliché: life is for the living. It is possible for the heart to be filled with grief and then expand, without banishing the grief, to hold a new affection.
The Times reports that American men are having trouble forging affectionate relationships:
In a 2021 survey of more than 2,000 adults in the United States, less than half of the men said they were truly satisfied with how many friends they had, while 15 percent said they had no close friends at all — a fivefold increase since 1990. That same survey found that men were less likely than women to rely on their friends for emotional support or to share their personal feelings with them.
It’s not news that there’s a loneliness epidemic. I don’t have a one-size-fits-all solution, but if I were a person who has a lot of “Facebook friends” and not many “real friends,” I’d think about giving some of those Facebook friends an upgrade. For a shot of inspiration, I give you James Taylor.
THE FILM I MOST WANT TO SEE: “LIVING”
I love Bill Nighy. I can’t wait to see him in this. Watch the trailer and you’ll see why.
“EARTH, RECEIVE AN HONOURED GUEST”
Brenda Phipps was the right and left hand of Tina Brown at Vanity Fair and The New Yorker, and then she made David Remnick’s life smooth at The New Yorker. She died recently in Paris. David Remnick hosted a small gathering of New Yorker staffers at his home. A tape was made — a rare tape, for it takes you inside a great editorial engine and shows you the people who make it at their most vulnerable. Watch it here.
IF YOU’RE THINKING OF MOVING TO FLORIDA’S BREVARD COIUNTY
After the Brevard County School Board forced the superintendent the Brevard County Sheriff’s Office announced plans for a new disciplinary policy in the public schools. Flanked by Sheriff Wayne Ivey and State Attorney Phil Archer, School Board Chairman Matt Susin went on camera — at the jail —to announce plans to impose the “most prolific school discipline policy this district has ever had. Ivey said the new disciplinary policy was necessary because teachers and administration were handcuffed by the current student code of conduct from dealing with students. “They know nothing is going to happen to them,” Ivey said. “They know they’re not going to be given after-school detention, they’re not going to be suspended, they’re not going to be expelled, or like in the old days, they’re not going to have the cheeks of their a– torn off for not doing right in class.”
THE SHOW YOU WANT TO SEE IN NEW YORK: ASI WIND
This you-can’t-believe-your-eyes magic show has been extended. Watch this. It’s not a trick he does in the show. Doesn’t matter. You can’t figure out how he does anything. For tickets, click here.
YOUR NEXT PODCAST: ANDERSON COOPER
He tells the Times why he did it. As the Times reports, the response has been massive: The podcast reached No. 1 on the Apple Podcasts charts in the United States on its first two days of release in September. The eight episodes, produced by CNN, have so far been downloaded more than 4 million times.
SIR NICHOLAS WINTON RESCUED 669 CHILDREN FROM THE HOLOCAUST
Some of the survivors surprised him 50 years later. Watch.
A FATHER GIVES HIS TEENAGE SON “THE SEX TALK”
Dad learns: Things have changed. Watch.
THE WEEKEND MOVIE: “LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE”
The dad (Greg Kinnear) is a relentlessly upbeat motivational speaker who is unable to find a publisher. His wife (Toni Collette) is so harried she’s misplaced her femininity and has become the family enabler. Their teenage son (Paul Dano) looks like a Columbine killer-in-waiting; he reads Nietzsche, hates everyone in his family and has taken a vow of silence. Their 7-year-old daughter (Abigail Breslin) obsessively watches televised beauty pageants and dreams of winning a kid contest, although she wears huge eyeglasses and is as round as a Weeble. The wife’s brother (Steve Carell) has been recently displaced as America’s #1 Proust scholar by his ex-boyfriend’s new lover. And just to round out this clan of freaks, there’s Kinnear’s father (Alan Arkin), a grizzled codger who swears like a sailor, snorts heroin and is the talent coordinator for his granddaughter. It’s a delight. To read my review and rent the stream, click here.
THE WEEKEND RECIPE: PARTY FOOD
Give a party? Do you even remember how? Consider this your kickstarter.
Canal House Crab Cakes
from Canal House Cooks Every Day
Ours are small piles of perfect canned jumbo lump crabmeat with just the scantiest coating of batter holding them together, and they are the best Maryland crab cakes we’ve had. There are two secrets. The first is to mix all of the ingredients except the crab together, then fold the meat in ever so gently, and always by hand. The second is to use buttery Ritz crackers instead of breadcrumbs. We like two-bite crab cakes — their smaller size makes them easier to cook.
makes a dozen 2-inch cakes
2 tablespoons butter
3 ribs celery, minced
3 scallions, minced
1 egg
3 tablespoons mayonnaise
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1⁄2 teaspoon dry mustard
2 teaspoons Old Bay Seasoning
1⁄2 teaspoon salt
1⁄2 teaspoon pepper
8 Ritz crackers, crushed into coarse crumbs (1⁄3 cup)
1 16-ounce can jumbo lump crabmeat, drained
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
Melt 1 tablespoon of the butter in a skillet over medium-low heat. Add celery and scallions and cook until soft, 7–10 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool.
Whisk together the egg, mayonnaise, lemon juice, Worcestershire sauce, mustard, Old Bay Seasoning, salt and pepper in a large bowl. Stir in the cracker crumbs and the cooled celery and scallions. Add the crabmeat and mix together very gently with your hand. Don’t break up the crabmeat.
Make 12 small, plump 2-inch crab cakes, gently pressing each cake together in your hands, and arrange the cakes on a parchment-lined tray. It may seem like the crab cakes are in danger of falling apart, but chilling them will hold them together. Loosely cover the tray with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1–2 hours.
To cook the crab cakes, heat the remaining tablespoon of butter and the vegetable oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium to medium-low heat. Fry the cakes until golden brown on each side, 4–6 minutes.
Serve with lemon wedges, tartar sauce and saltine crackers, if you like.
