Thursday, November 10, 2005
Champions of Breakfast
This morning Gawker ran an item about Judith Miller eating breakfast at Balthazar. I guess this marks a new high (by which I mean 'low') in Gawker-stalking but that wasn't really what caught my attention. Instead, I was very shook up by the opening sentence from Gawker's breakfast correspondent:
I have breakfast with a friend every Thursday morning at 8am at Balthazar."
Now who in there right mind gets up, dresses and goes out for breakfast at 8 am on a set day, every week with anyone, anywhere? I'm usually still trying hold down last nights cocktails at 8 am.
I decided to IM my friend T-Muffle to ask what the hell was going on.
ManhattanBlog: Does this makes sense to you? Who gets up, dresses and goes out for breakfast at 8 am every week with anyone, anywhere?
TMUFFLE: Adults, MT. Adults do that.
Now I remember my parents used to get up and read the paper and drink coffee every morning. My father would check how his stocks were doing, because it was before cable television. My mother would read whatever they were calling the women's sections in those days. I don't think the folks ever actually ate very much for breakfast, probably because they too were trying to keep last nights cocktails where they belonged. I guess it's a family tradition.
[An aside: now that I've written the phrase twice, I think lastnightscocktails.com would be an excellent name for a blog. Memo to Krucoff: another one to add to your growing blog empire!]
The thought of actually going out for breakfast in the morning is so foreign to my life that I'm actually strangely attracted to the idea. In the same way I'm attracted to the idea of having super powers that would let me fly or be invisible. Hardly anyone I know eats breakfast, unless you count some rising traders who take their morning nutrients nasally, much less goes out for breakfast.
I decided to check out some likely breakfast spots and discovered an interesting class system operating. Namely, Balthazar opens for breakfast at 7:30 am while Pastis doesn't open until 9:00 am. This means that people who work can eat at Balthazar, while people who don't (or whose work is done while eating out) can eat at Pastis. Balthazar is Pastis for the working class.
