Here's a phrase we don't say often enough but, dammit, we should - God bless Jay McInerney! Jay - he totally captures the zeitgeist, you know - kindly, so kindly, settles a debate that has undoubtedly been depriving millions, nay, billions around the globe of sleep: how did he break his ankle?
In his restaurant review in House & Garden (like we said, that McInerney can SURF that zeitgeist) he announces - tar an tara! - that he will finally put us out of our collective agony by explaining "How I broke my foot on a full stomach." "It's not even a very interesting story," he says before then spending 500 words telling it in depth. On first reading, LiS thought he might have done in his ankle by tripping over a name he dropped, seeing there is a perilous litany of 16 in the review. Seriously, it would take a stronger woman than this half of LiS to be able to tap dance past Bernard-Henri Levy AND Taki, not to mention "some very distinguished looking gent who I'd never laid eyes on before" (i.e., therefore clearly no one of any import but he was eating with Taki so he merits a token mention.) Anyway, there they all were, eating at the latest pointlessly trendy NY restaurant, Waverly Inn, owned by Graydon Carter, a man who manages to be almost as impressed by celebrity as Jay, and it turns out that Jay broke his ankle ... trying to hail a cab afterwards. As the lovely Jess Cartner-Morley wisely asked, is there any sentence in the English language less likely to garner sympathy? Funnily enough, possibly yes. One must read the article in full (http://www.houseandgarden.com/winefood/blogs/jay/2007/06/how_i_broke_my_.html) to appreciate the beauty of Jay's reviewing techniques but here's a little taster: "the macaroni was sublime, the creamiest, cheesiest--is there some comté in there? --mac and cheese around and the summer truffles, shaved by chef John himself, were pretty aromatic and tasty. Not black but the summer dish is $10 cheaper at $45." Not black? Poor diddums! Admittedly, a bargain at $45 but no wonder Jay throw himself down in 9th street in despair. I nearly ran outside and tried to break my neck.
