What Cynthia Nixon Doesn't Know

What's with the nose?

Here in Maine there are many wonderful things which account for the state's motto, "The Way Life Should Be." But there are no bagels, which makes me think the motto should be amended to, "The Way Life Should Be for the Goyim." Yes, sure -- there are bagel shops and supermarkets that sell bagels, or what they think are bagels, or what look like bagels to Mainers. There is even a ubiquitous chain here called Mister Bagel which I have never patronized because their logo is so ugly, it offends me both as a graphic designer and a Jew. (Not only is the typeface hideously outdated, but the depiction of the baker with his big nose is almost a cultural slur. And look at those bagels! They're all puffy, like Krispy Kreme donuts, and a true bagel should not be at all fluffy but instead dense, chewy and almost flat.)

This is on my mind because I was in New York earlier this week and had the delightful experience of dining at a place called Goldberg's Bagel Company & Deli. It was heaven. Entering the store I was immediately in a trance, my whole body aquiver over the sights and smells of the place. I asked the manager why bagels can't ever be found outside of New York and he explained, "It's the water." I understood immediately, since I learned early on that bagels are boiled in water before they are baked, and if the water is wrong then the bagel can't be right.

Now that's a logo!

Another thing that got me going was an article in today's Wall Street Journal about Cynthia Nixon, she of Sex and the City fame who is now running for Governor of New York, caught on camera ordering a cinnamon-raisin bagel, loaded (meaning with lox, cream cheese, capers, onion and tomato), at Zabar's, Manhattan's Upper West Side temple of specialty foods. Putting it plainly, this is simply not done -- certainly not by anyone sane.

Apparently her culinary and religious faux pas ignited a storm of controversy online, causing many New Yorkers to vow right then and there not to vote for her even though she is a lesbian TV actress and who's more qualified to run our nation's fourth-largest state with the third-largest economy and a population of almost 20 million citizens than that? Of course she is a shiksa, so what does she know about bagels? (Probably as much as she knows about governing.)