I’ve come to lightly dread a server asking “Have you dined with us before?” Not because I feel uncomfortable being new, or insulted if they don’t recognize me from a previous dinner, but because I know my answer does not matter. It’s not a real question, but an overture to a canned speech about every single dish on the menu.
Once I had to go to Disney World with my small children. On the way to the airport our taxi driver exhibited signs of Obsessive Disney Disorder—when he found out where we were going he started obsessively describing and listing and explaining everything that had to do with Disney World, even though he was a grown man.
We stayed at the Portofino Bay Hotel, a Disney-owned property that is a replica of the storied village on the Italian Riviera. There were imitation Renaissance churches and Mediterranean piazzas clustered around a fake harbor with old Fiats parked on the cobblestones and fishing boats moored in the fake bay. Outside cafés ranged on the harbor, serving espresso under green-and-white striped awnings. Italian cypresses were planted along the pools. If you didn’t know it was a Disney replica of a real place, it would have to be characterized as being extremely tasteful and lovely. So you did tend to get confused between: Is this a theme park of Italy or is it just lovely and pleasant.
Relationships between humans and animals that emerged from these meetings of different peoples planted the seeds of many of today’s ethical and environmental challenges — from colonial wealth and the dispossession of Indigenous peoples to the modern meat industry. They even explain people’s bonds with their pets.
When was the last time you had pure, light-hearted, smart-aleck, gee-whiz, smack-your-forehead, geeky goodness from a book? If it’s been awhile, you’ll want to find “How to Win Friends and Influence Fungi” now.
You won’t be sorry you did, once you dip into the facts you didn’t know you needed to know, offered to you informally here, and with a slice of sarcasm. Authors Balakrishnan and Wasowski break their book down into 11 basic categories, but the knowledge inside it runs from arthropods to World War Z and lots of other subjects in between.