A Perfect Saturday

The best cupcake in New York City is from Magnolia Bakery.

In fact, the best Saturday imaginable involves a trip to Magnolia. The one on Bleecker. The one that Carrie Bradshaw made famous. You go and you get your cupcake. (Bleecker St. has become less crazed since the days of SATC, and if you pick an odd hour, say, 11 AM, you're not going to face insufferable lines at Magnolia. Who says you can't have a cupcake at 11 AM? I say you *can* ....)

You get your morning cupcake, and you sit in the little park across the street with the chess tables. The cupcake should have a chocolate base, and then the frosting should be buttercream. What's special about Magnolia is that there really is no effort to pretend that the cake itself is important. The cake is, like, the width and depth of a dime. A Magnolia cupcake is merely a vehicle for the delivery of frosting--and I like that Magnolia doesn't "pretend." I tend to hate duplicitousness.

Not only is Magnolia frosting piled high, but it's also absurdly thick with butter. It is like butter with a small dab of food coloring in the middle. It's so rich, you might briefly worry that your bowels will revolt, or that your heart will stop. That's how to make frosting.

After you have finished your cupcake, you are to proceed to Film Forum, conveniently located two or three blocks away, and you're to see the early screening--and, preferably, it's "Dial M for Murder," by Alfred Hitchcock. (No 3-D necessary, but if they're offering the 3-D, then, fine, go for that.) Since it's before 1 PM, you'll be in a nearly empty theater, except there will be some old people. The lucky old people will be paired off in couples, and they will talk too loudly. ("NO, FRAN! IT'S NOT HER ONLY HITCHCOCK! SHE DID To Catch a Thief, AS WELL! AND Rear Window!!! WHAT ARE YOU THINKING????")

The less-lucky old people will be embittered and single, and they will make their displeasure known. "STOP TALKING! WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE???" The hissing and scolding will be totally ineffective--the talking will continue, and perhaps the volume will even increase--but at least a complaint has been registered. That complaint is like a finger in the hole in the dyke. Ineffective, yes? But at least an effort was made. Let the record show that someone made a gesture. Let that gesture be at least one point--one fraction of a point--scored in favor of the maintenance of civilization.

Take a nap somewhere before the actual murder--before the scarf comes out. Or is it the pair of scissors? Who can remember?

Go home and think back fondly on your experience. Have dinner around 5 PM. Watch YouTube clips--perhaps your favorite Glenn Close interview, or a lecture in which Val McDermid tries to explain where her murder plots come from.

In bed at 9 PM.

That's an ideal Saturday, if you're single. I won't have many more--I will soon be a dad--but this is an effort to preserve, for the record, my memory of my once-wild bachelor life. I'll miss those old ladies at Film Forum. Sunrise, sunset...Swiftly...through the years....

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Outside, Mary held Jack's arm and walked with her head down. They moved slowly on the sidewalk. He listened to the scuffing sounds her shoes made. He heard the sharp and separate sound of a dog barking and above that a murmuring of very distant traffic. She raised her head. "When we get home, Jack, I want to be fucked, talked to, diverted. Divert me, Jack. I need to be diverted tonight." She tightened her hold on his arm. He could feel the dampness in that shoe. He unlocked the door and flipped the light. "Come to bed," she said. "I'm coming," he said. He went to the kitchen and drank two glasses of water. He turned off the living-room light and felt his way along the wall into the bedroom. "Jack!" she yelled. "Jack!" "Jesus Christ, it's me!" he said. "I'm trying to get the light on." He found the lamp, and she sat up in bed. Her eyes were bright. He pulled the stem on the alarm and b...

Liars and Saints

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