Let Us Eat Boeuf Cake

You can keep your Nobel Prizes, your Emmys, Grammys, Tonys, Sneezys and Grumpys; I am about to receive one of the highest honors known to dames. The Dames du Boeuf have invited me to one of their rarefied outingss tonight. Les Dames are a select group of groovy ladies who appreciate the finer, older things in life. These vintage vixens get together every few months or so to have some smart cocktails and dine at one of New York City's old-school boites. 

As their feature in the New York Times put it: "They favor places with a sense of history and glamour, even if the former is sketchy and the latter has faded. And they dress the part, donning vintage clothing culled from years of diligent thrift shopping. With their combination of appetite, style and moxie, they manage to resurrect and inhabit a bygone New York most of us know only from the movies." 

And, as if that weren't enough -- and let's face it, it IS -- the Dames even have their own insignia. I'm down with anyone or anything with an insignia. (I'm thinking mine would include a picture of a lipstick, a puppy, and maybe a stack of pancakes on it.) The insignia is "shaped like a heraldic crest...[and] features a fork and a knife, a cocktail shaker, a diamond and a "No squares" symbol. Many of the Dames proudly wear the emblem on a notebook, a wallet or some other accessory. The other marker is a medallion with a steer's head depicted on the front. (It was a part of the uniform Miriam Linna, a Dame member, wore when she waited tables at a Brew Burger in Manhattan in the 1970's.) At the conclusion of each outing, the medallion is awarded to the Dame who best exemplified the group's ethos that night." 

Anyway, my friend the preternaturally adorable Coco Doane is one of the beefy "dame-sels" and through her sweet efforts tonight they have seen fit to let me in on the action. As if eating weren't enough -- and let's face it, it is -- I get to meet some fabulous women who love les vielles choses as much as I. For once I won't be the only woman in the joint flossin' a wasp-waist and rhinestones. 

True to form, tonight's restaurant is charmingly antiquated; there's apparently no door, one has to be buzzed in. When I arrive I won't be a bit surprised if I see Anita Loos and Robert Benchley at the bar, telling me yes, I am in fact dead and I've arrived in heaven just in time for cocktails. Whee!