"What the hell is this, and where did I get it?"

I'm currently reading a delightful book called What She Ate: Six Remarkable Women and the Food That Tells Their Stories,  by Laura Shapiro (who turns out to be the author of an earlier book I loved, called Perfection Salad, about the origins of the Home Economics movement). And I think I'm in love with Barbara Pym. Not only did Ms Pym put food and drink into all her novels, she noted these subjects in wonderful detail in her journals and notebooks. And she seems to have had the same problem sourcing the items in her notebooks that I have: the title of this post comes from something Shapiro says Pym wrote into a notebook next to a bit of conversation she'd taken down someplace at some earlier date.

Equally important to any writers reading this: Pym spent nearly a decade and a half in the publishing wilderness, unable to sell her novels to anyone. She kept at it, though, and lived long enough not only to see her reputation revived, but to see it enhanced and to find herself on the short list for the Booker Prize.

The critic in me feels obligated to mention that the chapter on Eva Braun doesn't really belong in this book (or, to be honest, much of anyplace else) but I'm enjoying this book and that's what matters.

And I think I'm going to see what the library has in the way of Barbara Pym.