When you head out to Minneapolis' premier German restaurant, Gasthof zur Gemütlichkeit, you expect brats and bier and kraut. You might not expect the Third Reich. But then, Christmas is a time for special celebrations.

Earlier this week you may have read in the New York Daily News about the international adventures of Jon Levy, a 33 year-old New Yorker who spent “a year of weekends at the world’s most exhilarating and entertaining spectacles.” The article neglected to mention Levy’s extremely important side gig as the host of the “The Influencers Dinner,” a monthly gathering of self-described “influentials” (including, at one dinner, a Winklevoss brother) at his massive Manhattan apartment, which he likes to call “The Manor.”

The New York Times brings us an unusual update on America's growing acceptance of home-cooked roadkill. Earlier this year, Montana's state legislation passed HB 247, the "Roadkill Bill," a measure that allows people to scrape up a car-killed carcass—specifically antelope, deer, elk and moose—and eat the meat for dinner, provided they present the corpse to a peace officer within 24 hours of the animal's death.

The 84-year-old line cutter who was recently rewarded for jumping the queue at Publix with the largest single jackpot in American lottery history ($370.8 million), may have bought dinner for a restaurant full of strangers over the weekend. She also may have continued hoarding the millions all to herself, not givin' anyone shit. An employee of the Buddy Freddy's restaurant in Plant City, FL told the Tampa Bay Times that a woman who "sure looked like" Gloria MacKenzie paid for dinner for 180 people on Sunday. That woman told the employee that she sure wasn't Gloria MacKenzie; just some other mysterious 84-year-old millionaire from central Florida buying everyone dinner for no reason.

No dis-R-E-S-P-E-C-T intended, but Aretha Franklin needs to learn how to be cool at a party. TMZ is reporting that she was both the first guest to arrive at and the first to leave Sarah Jessica Parker's $40,000-a-head Barack Obama fundraising dinner Thursday night.

I'm feeling pretty special this morning, because I received a personal invitation from Malcolm Sykes, CEO of SocialMeter.org (which "allows members to meet and build professional relationships while contributing to charitable causes"), to have dinner with the one and only Mr. Barack Obama, president of the USA.

Last night President Barack Obama delivered the keynote address at the Human Rights Campaign (HRC)'s National Dinner in Washington, DC, and spent much of his time at the podium raving about his meal. "The dinner rolls were absolutely divine," he said. "The little potatoes—well, I need to get that seasoning recipe before I leave here tonight. And the peas and carrots had the perfect amount of butter on them. I remember when I was really little, like maybe five or six, my mother used to drop a whole inch-thick cube of butter on my peas and carrots, which turned them into a fattening, greasy soup. I always told her, 'Ma,' I said, 'if you want me to eat my vegetables, you gotta lighten up on the Land o'Lakes. My arteries, man.' But she never acknowledged my simple requests, and now I bear the emotional scars of feeling invisible during my formative years."

[Designer Thom Browne showed off his Fall/Winter 2011 collection in Paris by staging a dinner. Image via AP]

Yikes, someone has leaked footage of the penultimate Harry Potter film online and people are mad. Also today: Steven Soderbergh tackles an old TV show, Rocco DiSpirito gets his own show, and another actor loses his.

So: journalist, writer, and Sarah Palin critic Joe McGinniss was outfoxed in his attempt to bid on a dinner with Sarah Palin by $3,200, bringing the final bid to $63,500. The winner, please?

More accounts from Obama's dinner at Blue Hill in the Village via the Daily News. Choice quote, from one of their co-diners: when they got up to leave, "this blasé New York crowd stood up and exploded in spontaneous applause." [NYDN]

Barack Obama and Michelle visited James Beard award-winning restaurant Blue Hill on tonight's NYC date.