We had a grand time at Twist on Friday night; important members of Court like Mrs. Stuyvesant-Fish and The Baroness Seitzinger showed up in glory. Everyone effectively emptied Tommy's bar of all the good booze and somehow lived to tell about it the next day. For Mr. Astor and myself, Saturday began The Weekend of Retreat; it seemed as if we had not had any rest for months. I spent most of the weekend in bed and the rest baking; Leopoldo shopped. We spent the nights having dinner by the pool and getting tipsy.
Tonight we were dining on my pork cutlets (damn swine flu fear) and killing any internal bugs with copious amounts of red wine when Terry raised his hand to his mouth with the loudest gasp I've ever heard, looking to his right. Leopoldo shrieked, jumped up, and ran...ran half way to Hialeah. I screamed too, convinced that Terry had seen Bigfoot emerging from the ficus bushes, looked to my left and saw IT: a baby possum which had casually walked up on the deck and was lumbering its way toward the table. By the time I had jumped to my feet to defend our table from Nature with a butter knife, the poor little creature was scurrying away, undoubtedly scared by the screams of terror. (Later I wondered if the neighbors would have called the police as--in my mind--it must have sounded like we were the victims of a South Beach Manson family.)

I have never been a big fan of Nature unless it was within the covers of National Geographic, but there are far more frightening things than possums. Sure, they can be rabid, but most of my friends are. So--to make amends--I left the leftover Brussels sprouts in a bowl outside our door. The poor thing probably needs counseling after tonight episode, but the next best thing would be some nice veggies in butter sauce. It's the least I can do.