Mummy P's Birthday Party

The Plots are home, on Monday at 3:45pm, which ends a weekend of furious activity mixed with questions about whether the birthday girl would stay out of the hospital long enough to have her party.

It all turned out to be worrying about nothing. After saying she didn't think she could stand her headache any more and that they'd probably have to cancel the party, at the last moment she relented.

What happened was a blast of fun and family. Plot and his brother Schmeckl kept the guest list down, against all odds, and the food level up, despite entreaties of "Why are you serving meat? Why are you making so much food? Why haven't you invited X, Y, Z, Z Prime and Z Squared?"

The menu was all recipes that were Mummy P's specialties through the years: Butterflied, bbq leg of lamb, cheeze blintzes, zucchini and pine nut casserole, carrot cake and poppy seed cake, plus lots of salads and other recipes too. She blew out the one candle, after making a wish. Shmeckl and Plottie sang a new version of "16 Candles" called "95 Candles," Plottie read his Mom's Brisket story and Cousins Cindy, Jerry and Judy recalled some funny stories, one of which no one had ever heard before.



It seems that one night in 1966, Grampy P. took a gift out of his jacket pocket for Cousin Cindy and Cousin Karen, then teenagers. They were flabbergasted because in his hand were two tickets to see the Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl.

The problem was Cindy's father refused to allow his daughter to go see an evil rock and roll concert. Uncle Morrie had a head of stone -- once his mind was made up, there was no changing it. Which is when GrandMummy P. stepped up to the plate and used the only logic he would listen to: the girls should be allowed to go the concert (the tickets for which Grammy P. had herself stood in line for hours with a neighbor to buy), because: "It'll be good for the Jews."

Why exactly would that be? No one could figure it out, but the girls got to see The Beatles. The Great Plotnik was working at the Bowl that night, ushering for the concert. He was astonished to see Cindy and Karen come running by, laughing their heads off in happiness to have actually gotten out of the house. Cindy says Plotnik yelled out "What are YOU TWO doing here?" but they were having 'way too much fun to answer.

Cindy and Karen sat at the very top of the Hollywood Bowl. If you have never been there you cannot imagine how far away that is from the stage. They could barely see the bandshell itself and couldn't see the Beatles at all, but they could hear 'em. It turned out the same for Plotnik, who could hear everything quite well but spent his entire evening with the other ushers hauling unconscious teenage girls to the infirmary, all of whom had passed out cold the second John had led the Beatles onto the stage.

Mummy P's party was filled with stories like that. Not so Aunt Margie's memorial the day before. Plot'll tell you about that tomorrow.