0:00 Who [music] are you? And where are you going? [music] What do you want? Hello and welcome to Jiggers's Place. I'm your host, Kevin Deml, and I'm here every other Thursday. I have to remember what today is. every other Thursday to have a cocktail and a smooz as we say. And today our topic is beauty. And uh
0:38 you know I have a feeling some of you may not agree with my perspective on this but that's okay uh because we're going to have a cocktail first. So in anticipation of uh today's subject uh my cocktail designer chat GPT and I came up with a came up with one called the quiet alignment. So you'll see why that's relevant when I talk about beauty. But it's it's very different than any cocktail I've ever made before. It has no primary spirit in
1:16 it. has no no vodka, no gin, no whiskey, no tequila, uh none of those things. Okay. It's actually its primary ingredient is uh pear ov. I'm using um one it's called HM Leman. It's pu pu which is French for pair Williams grand reserve. And it's been made uh by father and son since 1850. I got this when I was in um
1:51 shoot I was in France. I forget which town it was. Um and then we're going to add to that a little bit of fenino cherry. This is what I typically use. Teepe. And then there's some ingredients that I mixed or squeezed myself. So you if you if you get the my emails, you know that um the recipes are in them. So it calls for some uh chamomile tea. I was positive I had chamomile tea and then when I went to make the honey and chamomile tea syrup, I realized I didn't have any. So this happens to be rose hip
2:27 and hibiscus tea and honey syrup. Um the flavor profile will be a little bit different. Uh but we're only going to use a half ounce of it. So, I think we'll be okay. We have some fresh lemon juice and some uh salt water. And then we're going to garnish it with little slips of lemon peel. So, we're going to start out with the with the pear odvie. For those of you who know your French, you know that ode to literally means uh water of life.
3:03 Take an ounce and a half of this. So, uh, it'll it has a OD to are typically made in fruit flavors, although technically they can be made with really anything. So, this has nice pear flavors. Put that in the mixing glass. And then we're going to have a half ounce of cherry. This is again this is a feno cherry which is a a dry sherry
3:39 thing there. Okay, there we go. You may wonder why I use this glass instead of a a [ __ ] I actually have several jiggers like these. Uh the I find the the glass uh measuring uh cup easier to to read because it it's graduated in ounces, tablespoons, teaspoons, and cc's. Okay. Next, we're going to put in a half ounce of the
4:15 chamomile tea. There we go. Well, this is actually chamomile tea and honey syrup is really what it is. And it's and again, it's rose hip tea and syrup, not chamomile, but that's okay. Okay. And then we're going to use a/4 ounce of lemon juice. And then it calls for just a couple of drops of of um salt water. kind of me
4:51 remix the salt water there. And I'm just going to do real carefully that that should be that's probably more than enough. Okay. And then you know now normally when I'm mixing the cocktails I mix it for about you know at least 30 seconds. And the idea is not just to chill the uh the mixture, but it's also to let some of the ice melt because water opens up the flavors. But in this particular cocktail, it says to stir it
5:27 gently because it really doesn't want the ice to melt very much. Um, we just want to mix the flavors together. And so I I'm going to I'm going to do it rather gently. You can see it's got a bit of a pink color. That's because I use the rose hip tea instead of the instead of the chamomile. Okay. We're just going to do it gently here about 20 seconds. 20 to 25 seconds.
6:02 Gentle. Gentle. Okay. And again, the recipe says into a chilled poop glass. My poop has unchilled by now because I don't have a freezer behind me. I actually do have a freezer behind me right over there, but I have to defrost it. So, you know, perfection is never the aim. It's always just having a wonderful time. Okay. So then we're going to take our strainer and we're going to strain it into our
6:38 coupe glass. Oops. Do it. And we're going to express the lemon peel over the surface. Um, and it says to discard it, but I'm going to drop it in. Why not? It's because I don't have the chamomile flour, which wouldn't be the right flour anyway. And cheers.
7:21 Very interesting. Okay, see you over on the couch.
8:03 >> [clears throat]
8:04 >> I have my spherical pillow. So, let's adjust that. There we go. Little more. Okay. So, I don't know about you, but we're we're here at the end of January. The year is almost a 12th over already, and it has just started out at a furious pace. So, I was thinking, oh, you know, we'll kind of ease into the year things will be nice and calm. But no, it hasn't
8:39 turned out that way. It's and I've been talking to a lot of other people, work colleagues and such, and everybody seems to be experiencing the same thing. We thought, oh, you know, usually the year gets off to a kind of a, you know, somewhat of a slow start and then by around now it starts picking up speed, but we all feel like we've been sprinting since January 2nd. And I guess that's okay. [snorts] U but the year is zooming by. So, and in fact, because New Year's Day was an episode of Jiggers's
9:14 Place, we're a month into the year and we've already done three Jiggers's Places. So, that's good. Why not? Okay, so onto our subject, beauty. So, I'm sure you've heard the old expression, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And that seems to have been replaced by uh a an idea that was uh a lyric to a song back in the I think late60s. And if you remember the song, everything
9:49 is beautiful in its own way. Like a starry summer night or a something or other winter's day. Oh, a snowcovered winter's day. Now, it's a beautiful sentiment, but if indeed everything is beautiful, then the word beauty has no meaning. Because beauty is a term of distinction, even discrimination. Now, discrimination
10:25 has come to be a terrible word uh in our in our society. But to discriminate really just means to choose between. Okay. So there's one can discriminate appropriately and one can discriminate inappropriately. I I would say so when if we really want the word beauty to have meaning then it must be that some things are beautiful and other
11:00 things are not. Now that brings us down to another distinction and that is is beauty indeed in the eye of the beholder or is there a more objective standard of beauty that is apart from the beholder? [cough] Excuse me. Got have a little more my cocktail. I have to say
11:35 this is just a really interesting taste. Real interesting flavor. And I think it's good. I think it is, [laughter] but I'm not sure. Uh I think I think I I have another cherry that's made by my friend Jeff Morgan at Covenant uh Winery. Maybe I should have used his sherry. I have to think about that for next time. Anyway, so I would argue that there's we're really talking about two concepts here.
12:12 One is beauty, which is an objective idea, and one is preference, which is a subjective idea. So, uh, what I what I prefer in terms of how a woman looks, how I make my house an environment that I find enjoyable.
12:47 Okay. [snorts] It may not meet the objective standard of beauty, but it certainly reflects my preferences like my spherical ball pillar pillow and having books all over the place. If you came to my house, you would see there are books I think quite literally in every room. Okay? even los vanos as as u as we say in Spanish. So I I I hope that
13:23 my home is at least res reminiscent of objective beauty. But in the end what I really want is a place in which I feel comfortable, relaxed, and that serves how I live my life. And so, um, the fact of the matter is I suspect my home is too cluttered to be beautiful. And um, it it doesn't quite meet some of the
13:59 other standards of beauty that I'm gonna that I'm going to talk about in a few minutes. But that's okay because it's it's really designed for my personal comfort since I live alone. Beauty is something different. So, if you've ever seen the statue of David or Lutell, this the the Eiffel Tower or
14:34 I was going to say the Mona Lisa, but actually I've seen the Mona Lisa and it's not nearly as impressive as I thought it would be. uh perhaps um the uh the Acropolis in Greece or one of the pyramids in Egypt. These aspire to an objective an objective beauty. Okay. And I I I came up with four
15:10 aspects that something needs to have in order for it to be objectively beautiful. And and I'm I've used that word several times. Let me let me explain what I mean by objectively beautiful. it something that's objectively beautiful is beautiful even though I don't necessarily like it. Okay. So, uh for example, as as the French say, I'm I don't know why I'm in a French mood. I'm wearing
15:45 Italian clothes. I guess it's the, you know, it it's the uh it's the French uh pua odiv. So I sort of like some opera but not a lot to be honest. And one of the reasons I don't like it or I don't particularly like it is the voices and it's it's it's very
16:21 it's heavy and yet I recognize that opera is beautiful. The the people who can sing in an opera have exquisite voices, far better, more highly trained voices than most people who sing popular music. Now, by the way, there are people who sing popular music who have highly trained voices. They're they really are extraordinary.
16:56 But that's the exception rather than the rule. In opera, there's nobody singing an opera who does not have an extraordinary voice. And the composition, the singing, the presentation, it's all objectively beautiful. And here's why. So first of all it has proper proportion and harmony.
17:32 Not harmony in terms of musical harmony, but harmony in this in the sense that the parts go together. When when when one looks at something that's beautiful, whether it's the statue of David, whether it's the Eiffel Tower, whether it's uh the marriage of Figuro, whether it's Beethoven's fifth symphony, one has a sense that each part
18:08 is crucial to the hole and that all the parts fit together like a hand sliding into a custommade glove. Right? So that's number one. That beauty has it has a a a sense of proportion and harmony. It's one of the reasons why Greek architecture is so beautiful because the the men who designed and built these
18:45 buildings had a very profound sense of proportion and harmony. Number two, beauty has integrity. So it's it has authenticity. It's not pretending to be something else. [snorts] Okay. There is no beauty, no true beauty in the hotels in Las Vegas because they're all
19:21 faux uh in the French word. They're all fake. uh whether it's the Bellagio which is trying to be reminiscent of an Italian a grand Italian villa or castle or the Luxor which has the pyramid. Okay, they're not those things. The pyramids in Egypt have beauty because they are the tombs of the pharaohs
19:56 who are buried inside them. So authenticity too is a a a factor in beauty because if someone is faking it, they're not beautiful. So you may say, "Well, wait a wait a minute. Wait a minute. Women wear makeup. That's not authentic." Well, one could potentially argue or perhaps
20:32 argue that it's not natural because we're not born wearing makeup. But the pyramids had a cladding on them to give them a finished appearance. And an opera is rehearsed in order to give it a finished appearance. So beauty can have enhancements
21:10 to give it a finished appearance, but it can't be fake. That's why when a woman is overly made up, a beautiful woman, an otherwise beautiful woman overly made up is no longer beautiful because she's not finishing her beauty, she's masking it. I'm going to talk more about that in a minute. Beauty has clarity of purpose.
21:49 Now in many cases the purpose of beauty is to convey a sense of beauty. It's to inspire. The Eiffel Tower is certainly an amazing feat of engineering. A as are the pyramids. An opera is It's it's it's there to evoke from us a sense that there is something to life
22:24 beyond the ev be beyond the everyday world. There is there is spirit, there is greatness. The same is true of concert music, symphonies, concerity. When we listen to them, especially live, we we can feel them inside ourselves. And they're aspiring to raise us above our everyday lives.
23:01 And if you've ever met a person who who's truly beautiful, if you've ever seen Trying to think of someone who perhaps Grace Kelly. Okay. Perhaps the most beautiful actress woman who ever lived. To watch her in To Catch a Thief, for example, my favorite Grace Kelly movie. How she moves, the grace with which she
23:36 moves. It's it's really not of this world almost. I I have a friend who she she's like that when we're walking together and I'm and I take a glance at her and I see the way she's just moving through space. It's it's it's not of this world. That's all I can tell you. She dancer all her
24:12 life, gymnast, but it's even beyond that. There's something coming from inside of her that's expressed in the way that she walks. There's true beauty there, objective beauty. And finally, there's depth. So this is why as much as I enjoy popular culture, there really isn't beauty in popular culture. Now sometimes something will start in
24:47 popular culture and will move beyond it into the realm of beauty. For example, Rapsidity in Blue by George Gershwin. It originally it was it was it was just this jazz composition but to hear it one realizes it's just it's beautiful. It's beyond popular culture. It is symphonic. Much of Aaron Copelan's music is the same way. Even though it's very much for
25:25 the common man and yet when one sits and listens to it were taken out of ourselves were elevated I think is the best word. Okay. So, I want to go back to this idea of integration because it it really gets to the heart
26:01 of what is beautiful, especially when we're talking about people. So, there there are many I I live in Los Angeles, as you know, used to be the entertainment capital of the world. I guess in some ways we still are. There are countless physically beautiful people here and I think that's at least in part if not largely a result of Los Angeles
26:36 being the capital of the film business initially and then became a huge center of television production as well. And so people who wanted to get into those businesses came here. And in general, those people tended to be very physically attractive. Here's the thing. Beauty goes beyond physical attractiveness. And the fact of the matter is a lot of people who are physically
27:11 physically beautiful, it's it's it only goes skin deep. And that's not true beauty, right? And that's why when I when I spoke about or when I mentioned Grace Kelly, I hesitated a little bit. Um she was physically beautiful. She was very gracious in her behavior, but um you know, she had an affair with uh Being Crosby, who was a married man at the
27:46 time. And at least some sources say that she seduced him, not the other way around, when they were making um shoot, I can't I don't remember the name of the movie now. Now, you know, one could argue she was captivated by being Crosby. He was evidently a very charismatic man. Okay. So, you know, is does does something have to attain perfection to be beautiful? No, I don't think so.
28:21 Uh the statue of Venus demo, you the arms have broken off or whatever. It's not perfect, but it's certainly beautiful. So, we're not talking about something that is perfect, but it's it's something that is the is is about as close to perfection as as we can get. And so, that's why I would say that um that Grace Kelly is beautiful. Okay,
28:56 we as human beings, beauty comes from not only our physical appearance but our behavior, how we treat other people, how we speak, how we behave, especially in public. It's it's it's an expression of our souls and our souls are I don't know inside of us I guess right but someone who you know can rip one like a sailor as we
29:33 used to say you know uses a lot of profanity that that is not a beautiful person. someone who abuses other people. Not I'm not talking about someone who they're very tired or sick and they snap at somebody. We all do that. But someone who routinely thinks it's okay to yell at other people, to make demands of other people, maybe because they work for them or even worse
30:09 when they don't. who belittles other people, calls them names, that person can't be beautiful. Their behavior excludes them from that designation. And that I think is is the most important aspect of this Hopefully, we're all aspiring to be
30:45 beautiful or to be more beautiful, to approach more closely to this objective idea of beauty. And in order to do that, we not only need to groom our appearance, we need to refine our characters. And that that's a challenge in in a society that I think on the one hand says everything is beautiful and on the other hand doesn't really have any
31:21 respect for beauty. It's very hard to refine ourselves because we're surrounded by unrefined behavior. And so in the end that's really why I wanted to do this show and talk about this concept of beauty. One of my um part of my ray on detra, my reason for being is to live a life of of in
32:00 pursuit of beauty and grace, to continually work on becoming an ever better expression of myself. And we're we're still in the first month of the year. And we have another 112th 11 12ths of the year spreading out before us. And so there's lots of time for us to
32:35 work on becoming more beautiful. I'll never I'll never be beautiful. That's for sure. Look, uh, but I can work on it. I'll tell you, one of the most beautiful women I've ever met was I was working in the parking lot at Disneyland. This is going back now close to a half a century. Not ex not quite there, but close to it.
33:12 And this woman, she was driving a big Cadillac and she was driving and she saw me and she drove up to where I was and she stopped and she rolled down and went over and she said, "Can you help me?" And I walked over and I said, "Yes, ma'am. What What do you need?" And I I I took a look at her and she was a woman in late middle age even under, you know, the somewhat shifting standards of physical beauty. I
33:49 wouldn't say she was physically beautiful. I She was I'm not saying she was ugly, but you know, she wasn't she was not Grace Kelly. And yet when I walked up to the car and and and started speaking with her, I felt like I was surrounded by her aura. I can still to this day
34:24 remember the feeling of being in her presence. and and she she just said to me, "I'm I'm I'm I'm sorry to bother you. I'm not sure where I'm supposed to park. I think I'm lost." I said, "Oh, I I mean, are you meeting friends here or something?" She said, "Yes, I'm I I'm supposed to be meeting them at the main gate." And and [clears throat] I I'm not even sure how I got up here.
35:02 And I and I at the time, this was Disneyland is different now. At the time, we had kind of VIP parking in the very front. You had to have a red or a white tag on your windshield. And we carried them. Some of us did. And I said, "Ma'am, I'm going to put this tag on your car. This allows you to park in the VIP parking. And if you look just up ahead, you'll see some cones there. I'm going to pull the cones aside. And and please just pull right in there. Take any available space and you'll be you we're
35:38 right next to the main gate here. And she said to me, "Oh, that that's so nice of you. Thank you so much." I said, "You're welcome, ma'am. I I hope you have a wonderful time here at the Magic Kingdom." I was just a kid, 17, 18 years old, whatever I was. This was a beautiful person. You could feel the beauty coming out of her soul. Now, you may say, "Oh, no, no. She was just playing you to get VIP parking." No, I don't think so.
36:14 I don't think so. It was too genuine. So I I I hope this year and ever after we'll all aspire to making ourselves a little more beautiful, a little bit closer to this objective idea of beauty. We'll seek proportion and harmony. We'll seek integrity.
36:49 will seek clarity of purpose and we'll seek depth. Jiggers's place is a spot, a moment in time to do those things. So, I hope you'll join me here often and I hope you'll join me in my pursuit of beauty.
37:24 So, thank you very much for watching today and I wish you a wonderful evening and I'm going to sign off to another beautiful, beautiful remembering a beautiful, beautiful soul. Marie darling, you are my bell. Courage at all times, my friends.