June 9, 2008
The Table of Contents gathers again
The Table of Contents met for our monthly luncheon today at Ryan’s Grill at Ward Center in Honolulu. It’s all about books, friends and food. Purple58 and Islevampir kicked off the literary discussions.
Ghir completed the most recent NaNoWriMo with a hilarious book about a series of murders and mishaps at a BookCrossing convention in Honolulu. BookCrossers killing each other off? Okay, not likely, but very funny stuff, especially since she used real BookCrossing members as her characters. She’s on the left above, with Hyphen8 in the foreground.
Dustyflint brought her daughter today. We’d met Rose before, but I didn’t remember how much she looks like her mother until I saw this picture. She’s witty and charming and will be warmly welcomed anytime she wants to come around.
We always try to get the books sorted out first thing so we can clear the table to make room for food. We never succeed. I forgot to take a picture of my meal. I ordered a pupu intstead of an entree because I was saving room for dessert. The Kobe Beef Sliders with Taro Strings were delicious and the portions so generous that I had to bring half home with me. I still ordered dessert, of course. More about that later.
It was a little disappointing to find out that Chaz no longer works weekends. He’s been “our” waiter for several years. We know his taste in literature and several of us brought books designated for him. Trevor (above) is our new guy. He likes fantasy books and is remarkably skillful at figuring out how to position massive quantities of food into the minimal amount of space that’s available when we gather. We’ll miss Chaz, but Trevor segued neatly into our routine, so I think we’ll keep him.
The books we exchange at our gatherings are all registered with BookCrossing, where we make journal entries each time a book changes hands. After everyone in the group has had a chance to read whatever comes around, it gets released into the wild. We leave them in public places for strangers to find and adopt. In keeping with my efforts to declutter my life, I try to leave with less books than I take to our meetings. Today I took ten or twelve books with me and most of them were taken home by the other gals. I carried seven home with me, so I’m ahead of the game, though not by much.
Books I brought home:
Magic Mirror: A Fable for Adults Orson Scott Card
Alone in the Trenches: My Life as a Gay Man in the NFL Esera Tuaolo
After Hamelin Bill Richardson
Heart-Shaped Box Joe Hill
Agatha Raisin and the Haunted House M.C. Beaton
The Fran Lebowitz Reader Fran Lebowitz
Earthborn Sylvia Waugh
Books I released into the wild:
Sweetwater Creek Anne Rivers Siddons
The Singing Fire Lilian Nattel
Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer Steven Millhauser
There’s one more feature to our gatherings. One thing we never discuss when we meet is diet pill reviews. It would be rather pointless, since none of us is planning on changing our ways. See, we have a thing for dessert. There are a lot of good reasons why we return to Ryan’s again and again, but an important one is the Chocolate Caramel Ganache Cake, sometimes called The Chocolate Volcano. It is the epitome of chocolate decadence and comes with an amusing but embarrassing story. The first time I had it my reaction was … unexpected. The cake itself is dense and rich. It could stand on its own, but that’s not Ryan’s style. The hollow core is filled with an even richer chocolate ganache, a hot bittersweet chocolate sauce is drizzled across the top and a bit of caramel sauce and whipped cream provide the finish. With my first bite I experienced a - let’s call it a physiological response. There was no way to hide it. My face was red and flushed and I gasped right out loud. There was a lot more than just endorphins coursing through me, as was obvious to everyone at the table. That was several years ago and gets mentioned whenever we go to Ryan’s and any other time we discuss chocolate (which we do with disturbing frequency.) Several of us have it every time we go to Ryan’s now. The others love it, but if it effects them as it does me, they’re better at hiding it. We always have to stop and think of the real name before we order because in our minds it will always be Chocolate Orgasm. Um, yeah - it’s that good. Every time.
Technorati Tags: books, BookCrossing, chocolate, friends, Ryan’s Grill
Posted by skeet @ 12:51 am • Books, Society & culture
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June 9th, 2008 at 1:51 am, Denise Says:
Ghir!!!! I want to read her book, damn it.
June 9th, 2008 at 2:40 pm, skeet Says:
It’s possible that can be arranged.
I couldn’t believe that you, of all people, read this post and didn’t comment on the chocolate O, but then I remembered the three paragraph rule. Since you’ve already read the first three paragraphs, maybe you should come back & pretend the rest of the post is a whole nother post. You’ll like the chocolate O story. Trust me.
June 9th, 2008 at 5:53 pm, Whim Says:
Looks like you scored some good books.
June 9th, 2008 at 8:40 pm, Emsxiety Says:
Heart Shaped Box is a really good book. Enjoy it.You made out good, especially with the chocolate cake.
June 14th, 2008 at 12:21 am, hyphen8 Says:
I *try* to leave with fewer books too, and I’ve been doing pretty well this year. But then I got to work this morning to discover that a co-worker had volunteered me for *four boxes* of books from another co-worker who is moving back to the mainland. 75 books in one day is a lot, even for me. Not going to have a net decrease in books this week; no way. Not that I’m really complaining….
June 14th, 2008 at 8:50 am, Alice Says:
Looks heavenly. And I miss you ladies so much!!!!