The Inevitable Guest by Marcia J. Monbleau

A Survival Guide To Being Company & Having Company on Cape Cod

By Walter Brooks

I worked along side the redoubtable Marcia Monbleau for almost a decade at The Cape Codder during the 1970's. She was then, and still remains, what the better crosswords define as a "oner".

Marcia's book is only $11.95, but it's advice is worth a small fortune. It's at all local booksellers. It's published by Bog House Press, ISBN 0-9676220-1-8

I first heard about Marcia from her brother-in-law, Dr. Carl "Painless" Clapp, my family dentist. At that time Carl was also chairman of the town Conservation Commission, and his family had deep, local roots, despite their "Moody-Maine" origins.

At the most frightening moment of an office visit, Carl leaned over his forceps and said, "Walter, my sister-in-law is looking for a job. She's trained to be a journalist and wants to work at a newspaper. Will you talk to your boss Publisher Mal Hobbs, and tell him what a great girl she is?"

Marcia started at The Cape Codder about a month later. She was a reporter. Among other things she covered her hometown of Harwich where we both live.

Harwich was never the same again.

When there was a lull in the news, and back then lulls in the news actually happened, Marcia and her senior sidekick in the newsroom Paul Kemprecos, would condescend to pen silly stories for our hugely successful real estate sections.

In retrospect it is quite amazing that the real estate community continued to advertise with us afterward. But boy, those tall tales were funny.

After nearly two decades at The Cape Codder, a new and very stupid management decided they would be better off without experienced reporters like Marcia and Paul, pros who knew the territory and also lots of "institutional history". In Marcia case she quit when she couldn't stand the jerks any longer.

Paul went on to write his Aristotle "Soc" Socarides mystery series and co:author the latest Clive Custler novels, and Marcia went on to become Publicity Director of The Cape Playhouse, executive producer of tv's "Offstage and write her series of wonderful and witty books like this one.

"Passing by" and "on our way" aren't possible around here

Her book is a delight. The chapters are short but there are dozens to make up for their brevity. They cover every aspect of that chancy relationship between host and guest in a vacation area like ours.

In the first chapter she savages "the inevitable guests" who have inflicted themselves on cape friends as they were "passing by". Marcia points out that geographically you can't get to Cape Cod "on your way" to anywhere else. Chapter one begins,

Few words are more frightening to a Cape Codder than "stop" and "by," particularly when used together as in the following example:

"We've been in Maine for two weeks, and we thought we'd like to stop by on the way home."

Readers will laugh until their quahogs crumble, and those "inevitable guests" deserve her rapier wit.

Here is Marcia's chapter on....

Lobsters

When Miles Standish first visited the Cape from Plymouth in 16-something-or-other, he approached the first person he saw and said, "Is there a good place around here to get lobster?"

Marcia's book is full of lovely drawings by Lucretia Romey who also did the cover. This one "tells all" about lobsters, stuff like stomach whoosies.

Since then every guest has asked the same question, sometimes substituting the word "cheap" for "good."

Once and for all, lobster is not "cheap." Here. There. Anywhere.

That settled, there are two good places for lobster on Cape Cod--out and in. "In" is best.

Guests might offer to buy lobster for dinner some night. Your hosts probably haven't had any since last year's company was here. So go to the fish market, pick out what you want and ask the folks there to cook it for you.

This way your hosts will not have to hear--for the thousandth time--"Ooooh, you're not going to kill it are you? Oooh, I can't bear to watch!"

Lobsters--around here, anyway--almost never commit suicide. If you are reluctant to kill something, cabbage would be a good meal.

The dirty deed being done by someone else, it's time to set the table. Cover the whole thing with newspaper. If you, like many other guests, insist on getting The New York Times while you're here, this is the best use for it--all of it--except the glossy magazine section, which is non-absorbent and, therefore, completely useless.

Put great big bowls in the middle of the table. Alongside, put some Cape Cod napkins (paper towels). Get out picks and nut-crackers and forks. Add a platter of corn on the cob and two bags of potato chips.

There you have it.

Salad and wine are optional, but no other vegetables, for heaven's sake. And never milk.

Ready? There are four basic parts to a lobster: the claws and arms that connect them, the tail, the stomach (up toward the eyes) and those little whoosies that flap off to the sides. Claws, arms and the tail make excellent eating. Some people like to suck on the whoosies. While doing this, they roll their eyes and squirm, maybe to make you think they're getting something really good, which they're not.

Finally, very few people are hungry enough to root around in the stomach. You can spend an extra half-hour scraping and poking there, but what you end up with looks like a pile of wet, gray sawdust. If someone else at the table likes that sort of thing, give him your stomach.

The lobster may contain a lump of red stuff or green slimey stuff. The red is roe, or eggs, the slime is lobster liver, called tomalley (not to be confused with tamale), and the discovery of either will make most visitors draw back, shudder and say "Ick" twice. Pass it over to someone who likes liver 'n' eggs, or throw it away. (That's what the big bowls are for--that and the empty shells.)

For additional copies of
The Inevitable Guest
(you'll surely want to send one to all your off-cape friends and relatives) send $11.95 per copy (Mass. residents add 5% tax) plus $2.50 for shipping to:
Marcia J. Monbleau
14 Old Tavern Lane,
Harwich Port, MA 02646

Don't ask your hosts to crack open your lobster. Figuring out how to do it is part of the fun.

You are eating at home, as we have suggested, because this is one messy meal. Despite everyone's efforts, lobster water and bits of shell will be flying around the room, and puddles of goo will collect on the Times. It also is the loudest meal. When was the last time you heard people giggling, grunting and shrieking "Ooooh, I don't know how to dooo this" while eating pork chops?

When finished, remove plates, tools and shell bowls from the table. Roll up the newspaper and take it to the dump--immediately, if possible.

You can go "out," of course, order "lazy man's (or woman's) lobster" and let someone else do all of the above.

But "in" is better.