Sybil Bruncheon's "My Merry Memoirs!... He's not heavy! He's my... uh... brother(s)!!

Did I ever tell you about my brothers? You already know about my identical twin sister Dagmar, but I also have other siblings including two younger brothers; Szilvestre and Ivor… Do you have a younger brother? Well, there’s nothing worse than having him tease you, hide your stuff, play with your personal things… or perhaps even try them on!… well, multiply that by TWO!

Yep! That’s them! Szilvestre on the left and Ivor on the right! Dagmar and I weren’t sure which one was playing which of us, but it was one of the few times we were ever united on anything! And fortunately, our legs are much prettier… although I still maintain that Dagmar has a little… um… mustache problem!… sort of like Ivor’s… or is it Szilvestre?… whatever!

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Sybil Bruncheon's "Aren't People Funny?"... The Forlornly Almost-Famous...

Top row – left to right…

1)   Kiki Karloff - distant great grandniece twice removed from Boris Karloff: She became famous (among Iowans!) as the Vegan Jams & Jellies champion at state and county fairs across the state. Her specialties involved taking any green vegetables and fruits and turning them into nutritious and faintly appetizing spreadables for her own gluten and flavor-free pastry “Non-Bakeables”! Her latest foray into licensing?... a facial mask, exfoliator, and make-up line made out of kale and peas… two unfortunate side-effects; an almost permanent green tinge to her users’ complexions… and severe gas…

2)   Skip Colgate - nephew, endlessly removed, through court interventions from his ancestor William Colgate (January 25, 1783 – March 25, 1857) founder of Colgate soaps and personal care products: Skip decided, after several unfortunate cases of tooth-extraction, often involuntary and during tricycle and dunking booth accidents, to develop the actual packaging of toothpaste. He felt that it could be more easily stacked in rectangular cardboard boxes. Sadly, the famously fresh Colgate flavor was adversely affected by damp, brown corrugated paper pulp… though it WAS more easily squeezed… if one didn’t mind minty hands…

3)   Wanda Wright – possible(?) great grand-niece of Wilbur and Orville Wright, pioneers of aviation and the airplane: Wanda had attended the Muriel Purt Academy of Fashion and Tasteful Accessorizing. After graduating with a straight C- average (with an emphasis on the word “average”) Wanda tried to honor her famous ancestors with a line of “Fly-able Fashions”. She designed an entire Fall line of flowing capes, big-sleeved cable-sweaters, chiffon trench-coats, helium-filled puffer parkas, and winged hats and shoes. Sadly, during her first outdoor fashion review, while modeling her own “Let’s Fly Away Chapeau”, a passing breeze lifted her off the literal “runway” and dropped her 40 yards away… into oncoming traffic. The critic from Vogue snarked that it was a “FALL” fashion review after all…

4)   Clint Chanel – claimant (unsuccessfully!) to the Chanel fortune: Clint spent most of his college years at the Hillsboro Institution of Advanced Pet-Grooming in partying, hosting marathon “keggers”, and annoying small dogs… and possibly rodents. He was introduced to the world of fashion by his older sister who happened to be a roommate of Wanda Wright at the Muriel Pert Academy (see above). Wondering out loud if there might be connection (and a lucrative one at that!) to a “Coco Chanel” he heard about, Clint gave up his animal grooming major and explored textile design and manufacture… first with animal clippings, lint, and dust bunnies and finally on himself. He was particularly focused on turning himself into a bouclé jacket… but without the itch factor. It seemed like a brilliant idea, and a solution for all the women who adored the aesthetic beauty of bouclé but were allergic to it… Unfortunately, poor Clint was mocked by his fraternity brothers and Lacrosse mates as being a “big mo”, and he gave up fashion innovation completely. His idea was later stolen and patented by Beth-Ann Versachi, a bearded lady in the Hepplemeyer Traveling Novelty Carnival. She netted about $111.89 from it… as wearable placemats… for picnics.

 

Middle row – left to right…

5)   Billy-Joe Tell – probably no relation to William Tell, folk hero of the Swiss legend and much-satirized cartoon overture. Billy-Joe nevertheless would sit in open spaces during lunch-breaks from his office-drudgery to invite other office workers in Akron, Ohio to throw fruit at his head for a small fee. He would charge them $5.00 for three chances with any fruit of their choice… tragically, while he was temporarily distracted by an agent for clowns and dunking booth careers, a semi-professional pitcher from the Toledo Mudhens hurled an over-ripe pineapple at Billy-Joe… he was killed instantly, hideously pricked and juiced to death.

6)   Oscar Mayer – (NO! REALLY!)… this Oscar Mayer claimed that he was somehow related to someone in the company and spent weeks camped out on the corporate headquarters steps in Chicago trying to get an appointment in the marketing division. Riffing on the company’s brilliant early idea of the Wiener Mobile (a giant hot dog and bun vehicle) driving around the country to major sporting and social events, THIS Oscar offered (for a fee!) to simply walk around the country promoting Oscar Mayer pure beef hot dogs. He suggested that he could invite himself to ball parks, shopping center openings, highway ribbon-cuttings, and 3rd grade birthday picnics… It seemed like a great idea, and the board of directors began to actually draw up the contract (with INDEED a hefty fee!) until the Summer of 1983… when an entire batch of over 3000 hot dogs was discovered with pubic hair inside the frankfurters! The recall nearly bankrupted the company, and it took years to recover its fine reputation. They failed again with their short-lived mustard cologne, “Je m’appelle Dijon”…

7)   Doug Von Trapp – pretender to the SOUND OF MUSIC Von Trapp legacy: Doug (later renaming himself Gahnef Von Trapp) made a marginal living claiming to be “the Unknown Von Trapp Child” at Vaudeville houses and on the burlesque comedy and carny circuits. Prancing about in baggy lederhosen and giant floppy clown-shoes he would yodel popular Patty Page songs in a screechy tenor while comically pickpocketing audience members he would invite onstage for pranks. After several years of struggle and inspired by the drag-example of Milton Berle on early television, Ganef-Doug changed his name and his costume to a female Von Trapp; Streudel Von Trapp, “the one with the eating disorder”. Struedel would still yodel, pickpocket and prank, but now she would conclude each performance by eating massive quantities of Austrian foods often brought by the audience; sacher tortes, cream puffs, sausages, chocolates, bratwursts, pots of cabbage soup, and on and on! Though now famous and fairly well-off,  “Struedel” eventually weighed over 612 pounds and was a full diabetic. His career ended a week before he was to appear on the Ed Sullivan Show in NYC along with the McGuire Sisters and Señor Wences, when he exploded while eating his tenth plate of Wienerschnitzel… the police were convinced it was the lingonberry jam that caused the fireball.

8)   Fabrizio Chesterfield – (no known relation to anyone famous): Young Fabrizio was raised mostly on the streets of Detroit’s Brightmoor ghetto. He started smoking at four, and drinking at 8, and distilling and distributing his own chocolate milk vodka at 14. His brilliance with chemicals and the process of making various household products inspired him to invent his own air-freshener. He took an assortment of alcohols he’d brewed, and then substituted the cigarettes for Binaca breath-sprays and… well… you get the idea. Sadly, the name “Fabreze” was too close to “Febreze”… but they DID buy his idea for a wall-mounted plug-in… for about $200.00… and change. He spent it all on Aqua-Velva.

9)   Margaret Nayvocks – claiming to be the rightful (but wronged!) heiress to the famous Magnavox television and appliance empire, Maggie became a runaway at 17 to NYC’s East Village and styled herself as an electrical “event artist”. She’d plug herself into a nightclub’s wall sockets with a series of taped together extension cords she’d shoplifted from going-out-of-business hardware stores along the Bowery, and then pole dance barefoot while haranguing the audience to spray her with seltzer bottles. It was during a particularly stormy night on Avenue C at the Caffé Pathetique Lounge, when she was simultaneously hosed, plugged in, and struck by lightning that her hair-braids suddenly became a fabulous TV antenna and people could watch the finals of the Poka-Ma-Hola Bowling Finals on the old Magnavox over the bar. The bowling match completely distracted everyone’s attention from her gyrations on the pole. The crowd only returned to her when Maggie’s head turned into a burning haystack.

 

Bottom row – left to right…

10) Debbie Galileo - great, great, great, great… oh lots of greats… grand daughter of Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642) one of the earliest developers of the first telescope: As a tribute to her ultra-famous ancestor, Debbie has spent most of her life exploring alternatives to the traditional telescope.

11) Fred McMahon – claiming to be the brother of famous infomercial and TV-Sidekick yuck-meister Ed McMahon, Fred tried to glom onto Hollywood’s b-list at vegan barbecues, topless Weight-Watchers meetings, and backyard puppet-show fund-raisers for paraplegic pet charities. It was only when Johnny Carson, the great star himself, mistook Fred for Ed during a Tournament of Roses Parade that all Hell broke loose. Johnny called up his pals in the Rat Pack, specifically Frank Sinatra and took out a contract on him.

12) Jackie Koostow – next door neighbor to a woman who claimed to be the college roommate of the cleaning lady that Jacque Cousteau hired to keep his ship, the Calypso… um… shipshape: Jackie had been a child champion at the swimming and diving club at Kootchie-Koomie Summer camp and had dozens of medals and ribbons for her wins, but as she grew older, her competition began to out-race her. She didn’t seem to mind. She spent more time on her collection of aquariums and raising her exotic fish. Around the time she entered high school, she watched a special on TV called “The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau”. She became obsessed with his weekly adventures and the developing science of Oceanography, and she wrote to his production company to apply for a job. Amazingly, Jacques Cousteau actually responded himself… he suggested that she come to their central offices and have lunch with him and the board of directors. He had some ideas for the expanding options that were coming his way; magazine interviews, important press conferences with political leaders, and appearances on network  television! That specifically was where she might fit in! Can you imagine? Little Jackie Koostow! On television!! Well, she made the trip (all expenses paid!) to Cousteau’s home! And she sat with all the people who worked with him on his expeditions and projects… and they asked her about her life and background… and then… they suggested that she take all her experience and talent with swimming, aquariums, exotic fish and turn it all into a dream come true! And so, on prime time television, in scientific symposiums, and in Senate hearings and at state dinners with the President and foreign dignitaries, Little Jackie Cousteau (the spelling of her name was easily changed!) became “The Fabulous Fish Lady”!... her talent was to do impressions of the world’s most rare and endangered fish! And in classrooms across the country, children everywhere cheered her as their beloved “Guppy Girl”!!

13) Nick Roomenefski – long-lost (according to him!) heir to the Russian throne: Mr. Roomenefki, after a slight blow to the head during a Summer camp dodge-ball tournament, began claiming that he was not only Russian but also had survived the basement executions of Czar Nicholas II and his family in 1918. Okay… so firstly, the Roomenefskis had immigrated to NYC from Bulgaria as a nice Jewish tailoring family… in 1883! Secondly, young Nick was born in 1968 in Cedar Sinai Hospital!... with witnesses!!... and without a Russian accent!... which he only managed to come up with 15 minutes after the bump on his head at age ten… and NOT a very convincing accent at that!... and lastly; this whole notion of royalty only occurred to Nick after a tv showing of the film THE WIZARD OF OZ on an NBC affiliate station in Queens, NY. Poor impressionable Nick raided his mom’s bathroom for her hot rollers and her kitchen for a pair of oven mitts, and… well, the photo from the local children’s welfare agency says it all… On the other hand, Nick did rule over the children in his neighborhood with an even and compassionate hand, and, during his lengthy and peaceful reign, a new jungle-gym and swing set were allocated to their local playground.

14) Hiram Hires – self-styled inventor of the bottle-opener.

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Sybil Bruncheon's "Just My Opinion... BUT!"... Bad Table Manners! A deal breaker???

Darlings, Aunt Alicia in GIGI (1958) may have been right when she said, "Bad table manners, my dear Gigi, have broken up more households than infidelity."

Have you ever gone on a first date and been shocked over dinner? Or embarrassed to introduce your luncheon pal to your Mother? Or stunned at your boss' behavior over a morning coffee? Well, here are just twelve of the many, many table-manner DON'Ts that are deal-breakers for many people... sort of our Dirty Dozen of Dining!

1) Chewing with your mouth open! The truth of the matter is that no one needs to see time-lapse photography of each mouthful as you chomp away. We're quite sure it's all being broken down quite adequately behind your CLOSED lips. This also keeps any of it from falling out on the paisley necktie your grandma gave you commemorating the Beatles 10th anniversary of "We're So Sorry, Uncle Albert!"... And of course, it precludes you talking elaborately with your mouth full too...

2) Speaking of talking, the invention of the cell phone has resulted in vast portions of the population no longer speaking to dinner companions... or even looking at them. Indeed, with the entire workforce sitting in cubicles, there's much to be said for building all future restaurants with single-seat dining boxes. A "four-top"?!?... Why bother? Cell phone use is particularly annoying for the unfortunate diners who actually go out to dinner to visit and chat with a companion... and how poignant, actually tragic is it to see a child at a table with parents blabbing or texting away without so much as a smile to their young?... unless of course the toddler has already been swallowed into the same blank cult with his own cell phone!... a gift for his first birthday!

3) Smoking at the dinner table was finally outlawed in restaurants, but only indoors. There are still open-air places where people can get away with it... or try to. Simply put, it's disgusting, especially if other non-smokers are trying to enjoy their food without the flavorful additions of Marlborough or Virginia Slims. Excuse yourself, and go someplace DOWN-wind of everyone who's decided to preserve their poor hardworking lungs! And even if you're out with a bunch of smoking diners, never, ever stub a cigarette out in a dinner plate when you're finished. It's an appalling insult to your host and the cook.

4) Along those same lines, I can't tell you the number of people, rich and "cultured" ones as well, who casually drop their napkins over the food on their plate when they're done. Literally blanketing that Bœuf Bourguignon with a fine linen napkin and walking away as it soaks into the red wine sauce... I especially like it when they take the time to fold the napkin before they do it... as opposed to just crumpling it up in a wad... and then, KER-PLOP. Unless you really mean to thoroughly insult your host, the cook, or the entire restaurant because you absolutely hated the meal, never, EVER do anything to any napkin! No crumpling. No sauce. Nope! When you're finished, simply fold your napkin neatly and place it beside the plate. BESIDE THE PLATE! Done, and done!

5) Silverware; Ok, presumably, you're not a 4 year-old at the beach with a sand pail and shovel!... nor are you Jack the Ripper about to disembowel your dinner date... or are YOU? Your fork and knife are placed where they are to stay; Fork on the left, knife on the right! Pick your fork up in your left hand, and there it stays! You can use it to scoop or if you roll it over, to pierce. And your knife is in your right hand to cut, or to scoop food onto your fork (still in your left hand!) No need to switch hands and utensils, and PLEASE! Check Youtube videos or enroll in an etiquette school to see how to HOLD forks and knives! Again, they're not gardening tools! You don't hold them in a closed fist as if you're in the mess-hall of a penitentiary. Children's little hands may be clumsy with silverware, but grownups (and I mean 10 year-olds and older!) should be able to manage this simple manual task!

6) Hands; Yes, there are some cultures that use their hands to eat without the benefit of any utensils at all. But in the West, we still rely on silverware, (and in the East, there's the chopstick). From Seattle to St. Tropez, the only foods you need to pick up in your hands are breads (dinner rolls, donuts, peanut butter sandwiches), vegetables (carrot and celery sticks, French fries, edamame beans), and treats (chips, pretzels, expensive chocolates)... most everything else is too wet, juicy, and messy to eat with your fingers... unless you're home alone in the bath tub gorging by candle light! Don't eat with your hands in public, and don't lick your fingers!

7) Never "noodle"! Slurping up spaghetti or even noodles in chicken soup is wrong! JUST PLAIN WRONG! You're not an Electrolux vacuum cleaner, and no one wants to see it or HEAR that sound!... and speaking of that sound! What's with slurping? Is it a cultural thing? Why does Streisand do it in THE WAY WE WERE (1974)? It's grotesque. Imagine if every table in a restaurant was doing it... or all the guests at a royal banquet in Buckingham Palace!... or all the mourners at a funeral luncheon for Aunt Harriet!! Slurp! Slurp!! SLUUUUURP!!! Really!... and that goes for ANY noisy eating what-so-ever! Except for the unavoidable crunch of crisp foods, ideally, eating should be silent! Conversation should be unpunctuated by anything else!

8) Double-Dipping! Back to communal food… Case-in-point; Chips and dip! What are you thinking when you scoop a chip into a bowl of guacamole, bite half of it, and then scoop again with the same chip… or carrot stick, or whatever! Either swallow the entire item you’ve scooped… or break a bite-sized piece off before you scoop it into the dip. Your saliva, your sticky fingers, indeed, any part of your body and its bodily fluids do NOT need to be in circulation at dinner. I know, it doesn’t seem fair in this me-first political climate, but that’s just the way it is, Karen!

9) Never eat out of a serving dish. Famous narcissists like Roy Cohn use to do this at dinner parties. Right out of serving dishes at high-class dinner parties on Fifth Avenue! And people would look down in their laps, cough nervously, and try to ignore it because… well, because he was Roy Cohn and a profoundly dangerous thug in New York’s social life. When he wasn’t in someone’s home, and was out in NYC’s fabulous restaurants, he would actually eat off other people’s plates. I’ve had family members who did this, and, when confronted, being narcissists, they either chuckled merrily or acted hurt and imposed upon… Unless you’re home with family (and enablers at that!) never presume to put your hands into other people’s food… unless invited! Period!

10) Never be rude to restaurant employees. Even if they’ve been rude first… Yes, you’re paying money, and yes, you DO deserve to have a lovely evening!... BUT. If you’ve never had a food service job, you have no idea how appalling and contemptible the dining public can be on their 2 hour Saturday night outing with a little liquor and all the sad bourgeoisie pretensions of having a “staff” at their disposal! The average Joe isn’t a Vanderbilt, a Morgan, or even a Kennedy. Having never had servants, Joe doesn’t realize that eating in a restaurant in Buttpoke, Arkansas doesn’t mean he should order everyone around in a Thurston Howell III lock-jaw! Just as most waiters learn to “kill the customer with kindness” to get the best possible tips, customers should learn to “kill the staff with kindness” to get the best possible service (and a possible extra glass of wine or a dessert!). Always look the waiter in the eye when you’re ordering. Don’t look all over the room while you’re talking to them! Would you do that to your boss, your spouse, your MOM? And try using the waiter’s name when you ask them for more water, coffee, a slice of lemon! Using a person’s name in conversation is one of the basic and most effective life-lessons in the general adventure of living! Please and Thank-you are great dining tools too! And don’t get me started on tipping. If you can’t afford to tip, you can’t afford to go to a restaurant, or indeed get a coffee at Starbuck’s!... and you know who you are.

11) Bodily functions!... need I say more? No, really! Need I say more? No one is interested in you blowing your nose or picking it, drilling into your ear, or trying to dislodge food from your teeth at the table! It’s a short, slippery step to belching, farting… and if we’re going to allow that, why don’t we just take a dump at the table? Excuse yourself to a restroom for ALL and ANY of it… and by the way, cover your wide-open yawns, and certainly do them silently, behind your napkin!

12) Even when you’re home alone… and on the phone! Do you really need to eat into the ear of your caller? Maybe you don’t mind folks chewing and chomping into your ear during a phone chat, but some folks consider it really déclassé. Above and beyond the sound being like fingernails-on-a-blackboard for some people, it also might symbolize something else for them too… You might think it’s a sign of familiarity and intimacy, but some people consider it dismissive and insulting, as if you’re just fitting them into your busy schedule. Similar to using the toilet while you were talking to them on the phone.

These twelve are just a few of the many egregious Table-Manner Related Dining DON’Ts that have become de rigueur in this culturally bankrupt world we live in today! Feel free to contribute your OWN pet peeves. I may have to do another Dirty Dozen list!

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Sybil Bruncheon's HIT-OR-MISS Histories... Fascinating Inventions:

... Ah, yes... the famous Seatless Hysterium... invented by Hyrus Schnectum. A student of Sigmund Freud, he became obsessed with the idea of the "unsatisfied" female psychiatric patient and that "hysteria" was a completely curable condition if a woman was properly... "attended to". Indeed, the word hysteria originates from the Greek word for uterus, "hystera". The oldest record of hysteria dates back to 1900 B.C. when Egyptians recorded behavioral abnormalities in adult women on medical papyrus. The Egyptians attributed the behavioral disturbances to a "wandering uterus"—thus later dubbing the condition "hysteria". In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, a variety of electrical devices were patented as both medical and home remedies for female disorders which a woman could use "in the privacy of her toilette"... but it was Schnectum who came up with this dual purpose excercise/sexercize "Seatless Hysterium". Suffice it to say, there was no seat, ok?... I guess we can let the smile on Mrs. Gladys Hobkins tell us everything we need to know. Schnectum's slogan for the Seatless Hysterium?... "Pedal! Pedal! Pedal your way to PLACID!!"...

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Sybil Bruncheon's Hysterical Histories... "The Good Old Days"...

"No, Suzy, Mommy and Daddy are no longer accused of being Communists so we're painting the living room red... and learning Russian... just in time for nice Mr. Khrushchev's visit! Now run outside and play with all your little comrades!"...

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Sybil Bruncheon's "Biographies in Brief!... Uncle Fuzzy…

Mr. Herbert Limpkin had the distinction at eight years of age of being the only person ever bitten by one of the cute little bunnies at the Oakleyville Presbyterian Petting Zoo… and during their Springtime “Let’s Meet Our Animal Friends Festival”. Imagine how little Herbie must have felt with his pudgy little hand throbbing and bleeding as he looked down at the hissing white bunny with the red eyes!... and there on the office wall of the zoo’s nurse, a poster of the Blesséd Savior in his heavenly white robe, surrounded by little animals and children, extending his crucified palms… and all of them smiling; Jesus, animals, children smiling right at Herbie as he begged Nurse Charmondely NOT to put in the three stitches! Of course she did, and gave him a tetanus shot as well, which hurt like Hell!...

…which also gave him his infernal idea… the idea he employed as an adult when he decided to be the Easter Bunny at the Halloween Holidays-in-Hell Barn in Akron, Ohio. High School and college kids from miles around came to the fabulously scary installation which ran from October 1st through Halloween night itself, ending in a massive costume party and dance and a contest with prizes! Interestingly, no one seemed to notice as the October days went by that Mr. Limpkin was getting weirder and more withdrawn from his fellow “ghouls” and “goblins” during their lunch and dinner breaks in the cafeteria. Authorities found out later that he spent hours every night after work “enhancing” his Easter Bunny costume with finger nails made from actual nails… and teeth made from sharpened bathroom tiles. Scarier and scarier… and finally quite horrifying according to the two managers and the director of the facility, shortly before Herbie brought the ax… and used it. Later, during his seven consecutive life-sentences, he created the Uncle Fuzzy Junior Jammies Company employing his sewing skills, making cozy pajamas for children… and Uncle Fuzzy’s company slogan??... “Sweet Dreams Are Our Business!”…

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Sybil Bruncheon's "Biographies in Brief!... Madame Zeezette"...

...Mrs. Agnes Gladstein, widowed at 50-some years or so, was forced to find work since her ne'er-do-well husband, Carl, had gambled his assistant plumber's salary away at the races. Agnes tried everything from substitute teaching 3rd graders (she hated children) to grocery store cashier (she couldn't count change) to ballroom dance instructor (no sense of rhythm… and corns). Finally, after seeing a Red Skelton/Lucille Ball screwball mystery/comedy (8 times!), she decided to adopt the name Madame Zeezette and tell fortunes in various luncheonettes up and down Third Avenue.

Amazingly, she caught on, especially among the window-shopping housewife crowd (usually in twos and threes) and the two-martini businessman crowd (also in twos and threes). Her shockingly accurate predictions while reading palms and dealing tarot cards became all the rage. She even threw in a free Phrenology consultation… FREE! She was famous for pinning down stock splits to the week and unexpected pregnancies to the day! Car accidents, house fires, food poisonings, burglaries, even projectile vomiting during golf tournaments... and comet-strikes. She could predict it all and was paid handsomely for it. Ironically, The Mysterious Madame Zeezette didn't foresee the end of Bakelite jewelry and little luncheon hats even as the 1950s were drawing to a close... but then, when you're a luncheonette fortune teller, no one expects you to be a fashion-plate.

(photo by Norman Lerner 1957)

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Sybil Bruncheon’s “Aren’t Families Funny?”… Elspeth, Egbert, Irina...et al.

We all have relatives that we love but still just drive us crazy, don’t we?... Take this old photo of my Grandmother Elspeth at a young age with her mother, my great grandmother Irina there on the right. Truth be told, it looks as if Irina is lecturing Elspeth (as usual!) on deportment, posture, penmanship, lady-like conduct, the proper wardrobe and accessories, clean gloves, table manners, letter-writing etiquette, thank-you notes, flower-arranging, embroidery vs. needlepoint, and properly filled out dance cards at cotillions. This was how they spent their days together, and indeed how most mothers and daughters spent their days in 1893.

 Interestingly, the two gentlemen to the left of them are Elspeth’s twin brother, Cedric, and his… um… “friend”, Horace Makeworthy, of the vast Makeworthy Mustard and Cough Syrup fortune… They are apparently remaining polite and silent as many “sensitive and single men” of that time did when in the presence of a self-possessed older woman… or a battleship, both of which my great-grandmother was mistaken for… frequently… at Bridge parties, and in harbors. This photo shows a typical day in London when Great-Grandma would commandeer members of her family to accompany her on errands, social calls, and shopping while her husband Victor would be at “the club” with his pals smoking cigars, wheeling and dealing, and regaling each other with adventures that probably never happened.

 Oh… and there are two other members of my family in the photo there too… Yep, there on the extreme left, peeking out from behind that street post, is cousin Egbert, who adored startling his relatives at the most inopportune moments by playing endless and often tragic practical jokes. He often would disguise himself as infamous murderers that had made the headlines of the newspapers and climb up trellises or hide in hedges to frighten everyone in the family… well, except for Great-Grandma Irina who was as deadly with a pair of hedge-clippers as she was with a frilly parasol. His favorite modus operandi was to skulk about at night dressed in a huge cape with a rubber knife and to jump out on unsuspecting victims and “stab them to death”. London, and indeed most polite society around the world, was still reeling from the unsolved horror of the Jack the Ripper catastrophe just five years earlier, so Egbert rocked with glee when his serial-killing pantomimes would send chamber maids, nannies, and ladies of questionable character shrieking in terror, if only for a few minutes, until they realized they’d been attacked by a giggling simpleton in a Vaudeville costume with a toy store knife.

Of course, Elspeth, after having been killed on numerous occasions, only scolded him, and Egbert was too wary of Irina’s deadly parasol. By the way, when Egbert was on his night-time forays into the world of mayhem, he called himself Knifey! He would scrawl “Knifey was here!” in chalk, or sometimes chocolate syrup near his latest murder, and he explained that his name as a serial killer should leave no room for confusion, especially if Scotland Yard were to become involved. He often reversed letters in “Knifey” or wrote one backwards or in lower case and upper case mixed to increase the sinister air about it all. You can imagine how vexed he was that Scotland Yard never attempted to solve any of Knifey’s murders… nor indeed, ever came to the house to express a passing interest. It only drove him to greater and more wanton stabbing incidents; in just one infamous week, he stabbed several of his younger sister’s dolls, a plate of cookies which he proceeded to eat, and various neighborhood cats (who scratched him rather badly, and who can blame them? Cats have very little sense of humor when it comes to rubber knives and play-stabbing!)  Great-Grandma finally ended his semi-appalling crime-spree when she pulled out a pair of sewing scissors and snipped his rubber knife in half just as he was about to stab her Charlotte Russe during tea.

You remember I mentioned there were two other relatives of mine in the photo; Egbert on the left, and on the extreme right… there’s Cousin Danny; perfectly lovely in so many ways, with quite an impressive stamp collection too, but unfortunately given to urinating out-of-doors… often in broad daylight. Oh well.

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Sybil Bruncheon's "My Merry Memoirs"... Chapter 31, page 372... Cousin Patrice...

Did I ever tell you about my lovely cousin Patrice de Laminoir? She was as beautiful as she was clever, and her radiant wit, grace, and ebullience assured her of admirers, both men and women, throughout her life, despite her unfortunate accident. You see, she lost her left leg in an unlucky kitchen catastrophe involving a runaway cake mixer and a nutmeg grater, and... oh, it's too horrible to recount here, but suffice it to say that even though she was as one-leggéd as any pirate in a boy scout adventure comic, she lived her life to the fullest. And she was determined not to let her missing leg nor the elaborately carved mahogany wooden one hold her back... as a matter of fact, she tossed her prosthesis, and had all of her right shoes fitted with a small caster that swiveled 360° around. On any escort's arm, her mother claimed "she was as mobile as a marble"... but with even more sparkle! And later, speaking of marbles, she actually invented the first "Shepherd Caster"... but was so distracted by her fabulous life that she never got around to getting the patent!

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Sybil Bruncheon's My Merry Memoirs!... Dagmar's "doll"...

Darlings, I've told you about my twin sister many times and in stories that you either have asked me to dig up or stories which you like me to tell and retell again... (much like terrifying ghost stories around a roaring campfire during a girl scout jamboree... with S'mores... and calamine lotion!)

Anyway, I don't think I've ever told you the story of Dagmar and her special doll... and "The Nearly Lost Weekend". You see, Dagmar and I are (and always were!) identical, and I mean IDENTICAL twins! No one, not even our parents could ever tell us apart... well, unless Dagmar had pulled a gun out of her purse or started a fire in someone's dining room, starting a five years of age. I would find a stray kitten and be devoted to it... Dagmar might start researching recipes to serve it "en brochette". Thankfully, our family's staff of gardeners, butlers, maids, etc. managed to keep her from any serious mischief, (although old Mrs. O'Reilly next door DID disappear during our Halloween party when we were 8... and she was never found again. A piñata bearing a striking resemblance to her was reported at the Masonic Lodge's costume ball a couple of miles away... oh well. Another story for another time...)

At one Christmas when we were still quite young, Dagmar had managed to drug my eggnog claiming she was just sprinkling some nutmeg in it. I really should have known better, especially because her "nutmeg" was in tablet-form and out of a clearly marked prescription bottle! But I was still very open-minded, open-hearted, and credulous, even for a child! It turned out that Dagmar dragged me, unconscious, gagged, and handcuffed into a remote corner gable of our cavernous and maze-like attic! There, buried in stacks of crates, Vaudeville trunks, dress-forms, and clippings and posters of questionable hootchy-kootch acts, I languished while she rampaged through our family's Christmas celebrations, completely undetected! She had secretly commissioned a life-size doll from a Bulgarian puppet-maker... or was it Hungarian??... Akron?... whatever. It arrived by post, and she spirited it away to her room, dressed it in one of our matching pinafores, and then proceeded to walk it around the entire estate, conversing elaborately with it, and keeping it just out of eye-shot enough for no one to notice that it, in fact, was NOT me! 

Imagine! Decorating the house, Christmas Eve dinner with family and friends, off to bed before Santa's arrival, and then... CHRISTMAS MORNING! There was Dagmar dragging that damn doll dressed in a matching nightgown downstairs with our entire family... handing out gayly and gloriously wrapped presents! Opening them! OOOHING AND AHHHING at each lovely gift... and Dagmar using her infernal talent for ventriloquism to make the doll sound like me in complete conversations about the whole Holiday weekend! Apparently, my "gifts" to the family (courtesy of Dagmar's diabolical sense of humor!) included crayon-drawn "gift-certificates" to my Mother (building a gazebo out of field stones for her herb garden), to my Father (fetching, cleaning, and dressing any game birds that he and his pals had shot in the next 3 months!), to my Aunt Deirdre (canasta and rapt listening to her endless stories of nursing during the earlier Influenza epidemic of 1889 during which she fell in love with about 87 doughboys!), etc., etc., etc. for everyone else in the family! Given Dagmar’s natural instinct for practical jokes… and malice, you can imagine the “gifts” that I was responsible for by that evening. Thank goodness for completely disoriented and dotty Aunt Deirdre (yes! THAT same Aunt Deirdre!) who wandered away from the family festivities, blundering about unsupervised until she finally got to my remote part of the labyrinthine attic dressed in her old Florence Nightingale nurse’s uniform. Carrying her old railroad kerosene lamp, she literally stumbled over me, sure that I was a prisoner of war of the Kaiser’s German army that she needed to rescue! Despite her impaired perceptions and abilities, she still nimbly picked the locks on my handcuffs with a bobby pin plucked from her nurse’s wimple. But before she would release me, she insisted on checking me thoroughly for signs of abuse, torture, malnutrition, and lice. When I finally got back downstairs and confronted everyone, I wasn’t sure what I was more infuriated by; Dagmar’s villainy, or my family’s not noticing the difference between me and some doll… or possibly Aunt Deirdre’s highly invasive checking for lice! Whatever. This photo is of Dagmar and her doll… By the way, that’s Dagmar on the left!!!!!

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