Jubilee

My apologies, blogovians. I have been bad. Blame my kids. (There's no actual reason to blame them, no empirical data, so to speak, but blaming the kids is my default mode. It works.)

Anyway, I'm back. A bit worn out, however, from celebrating the Queen's Jubilee yesterday. What Queen, you ask? As did the lovely little girl behind the counter at Baum's Bakery. "THE Queen," I replied. "You know, Queen Elizabeth. She's been on the throne for 60 years!" The little girl was so impressed. "That is so cool! So, how do you celebrate a Queen's Jubilee?"

Silly girl. You eat cake. A $40 Baum's Half Lemon/ Half Chocolate Dobasch Cake (http://www.baumspastries.com/index.php/cakes/specialty-cakes/dobasch-half-and-half.html) which, I'll admit, looks a bit wonky on the website photo but is ecstasy encapsulated in six layers of delicate, moist cake, enfolded by delectable lashings of buttercream and fondant. And then you get the star-struck, lovely, silly girl to write "God Save the Queen" on it. And you combine it with a sandwich and salad buffet and a very last-minute gathering of somewhat mystified Baton Rougeans, and you watch BBC-America with the sound turned off so that you can all shout out questions like, "Good lord, who is that woman?" and "Wait, who sucked who's toes?", and you mix in lots of champagne, and there you have it. A respectable Queen's Jubilee celebration.

But not the best we've done, actually. Ten years ago we were living in Manchester and 7-year-old Hugh's primary school marked the occasion of Elizabeth's 50-year anniversary on the throne with a "garden party." Completely bowled over by the event, Hugh came home from school that Friday afternoon and--unbeknownst to us--invited all our neighbors on the street to a Garden Party that evening. Somehow, we got wind of the plans and were able to convince him to walk round and change the invitations to Saturday afternoon. Keith and I figured most of the neighbors would not come; the few who did, we were sure, would show up, smile fondly at Hugh, eat a small piece of cake, wink at us, and head home five minutes later. So the next morning I toddled down to the local bake shop and picked up a couple of small "Jubilee" cakes--simple single layer sponge cakes with fondant icing and a picture of the queen. We chilled a bottle of wine and made a pot of tea, and set aside 30 minutes.

That afternoon the neighbors poured in, all of them thrilled to be invited and massively ashamed that it took "the Americans" to whip Grange Avenue into shape and make sure that we observed the Jubilee properly. Gobsmacked, Keith and I ransacked the cupboards and fridge for snacks, party food, anything edible, really, and after our embarrassingly substantial wine and beer collection was completely drained dry, the neighbors began making periodic forays to their own kitchens to restock the liquor supply. By the end of that long, glorious, sunny, booze-soaked, cake-filled, amazing afternoon, we felt like we were honorable members of the British tribe. We moved to the U.S. just a month later--and coming back to Louisiana, in many ways we felt like ex-pats, far from home.

So, Happy Jubilee, Liz, old gel.  God save you, luv. You've been good to us.