Butlers are Cool

Oh yes they are. I wish that I had one. Jeeves is of course the premier Butler of fiction, and thanks to Bully, I can hear about him during Wodehouse Week, which is always fun. I am also fond of Bunter from the Dorothy Sayers books.

In comics however, there is Alfred and Jarvis. Try as I may...and I admit that I haven't tried very hard...they seem to be the only ones around. Alfred of course, is Bruce Waynes general factotum, Butler, friend and Father Figure. He apparently makes honey tea to die for, and spends a lot of time bringing dinner trays down to the batcave to be ignored. He also has brains and a gift for being sarcastically witty. Frankly, I love Alfred to death.

Jarvis has a much bigger audience, he is the Butler for the Avengers, and looking after THAT bunch would drive anyone to drink. He was also carrying on a rather interesting flirtation with none other than Spider-Man's Aunt May for a while there. What happened to that development anyway? I gave up after Civil War.

As annoying as Batman's little tics may be, I think that Alfred may actually have the (slightly) easier job here. He only has one or two spoiled brats to look after, while Jarvis has to coddle the whole bunch of them. Shining Iron Man's suits of armor alone would take an entire day. I do hope they hire additional help for the mundane chores, because as I've said before, expecting a couple of middle-aged to slightly elderly men run around and do all the cooking and cleaning and laundry is a bit much to ask.

THIS however caught my eye, and I've decided that Jarvis is just swell!


He knows where to put the oyster forks! I'm in love.

The oyster forks of course to to the right, next to or even nestled in the bowl of the soup spoon. Then you just work from the outside in, with each course. The oysters and soup courses will be followed by the fish course, with the corresponding fish fork and knife, the fish fork is the farthest to the LEFT, with the fish knife to the left of the soup spoon. Then the meat course, with the meath fork and knife the next ones in, and then salad.

I know that they bring the salad first in restaurants, but this is actually incorrect. It's just so that they have time to make your dinner. Then you can either place the dessert fork and spoon above the plate, or simply bring it in with the dessert itself, along with a finger bowl and doily.

Finally, just line the glasses up along with the silverware for the appropriate course, and you're in! Sherry with soup, white wine with fish, red wine with meat, and champagne in the flute, and a large water goblet, so you don't pass out from all the booze.

I love that Jarvis's first instinct is to save the china! Seriously, the amount of breakage must be HORRENDOUS! I also love that he actually has a couple of footmen to help out. That looks like it would be a worthwhile dinner party.

You don't see the X-Men going to this amount of effort. No wonder the world hates and fears them.