"All my team in harmony like The Bee-Gees." - Mick Boogie & Little Brother, Life of the Party (Remix)
December 9 – Party
Prompt: Party. What social gathering rocked your socks off in 2010? Describe the people, music, food, drink, clothes, shenanigans.
(Author: Shauna Reid)
*Most names have been removed to protect the guilty.
We were well lubricated. Fresh dressed like a million bucks, we started the party at Loa, my favorite hotel bar in New Orleans. With each round, we got louder, more hilarious, more emotive. This is the kind of thing one does after a day of putting in hard work and was made all the more special by having most of my favorite people on the planet there.
But this was just the pre-show.
The real star of the night was to be our dinner at Restaurant August. I'd had the best meal of my entire life there with Tiffany just 5 months prior at Christmas and it became important to share that experience with these people when we returned to do some good in my favorite city in the country.
They weren't ready.
As our table was getting prepared we spent some time in the front bar and had the bartender's signature drink, a rum punch. For some of us, this was a knockout blow to all sense of sobriety and propriety. There were lots of soft eyes, loose smiles, and droopy eyelids. We started talking to those around us—a lawyer in town from Tennessee, folks there for the New Orleans Food & Wine Experience, well dressed southerners in seersucker suits.
After a few drinks, I'm all about chatting up the strangers around me so I was engrossed in conversation when Tiffany and one of our friends returned from the bathroom excitedly talking about their moment with Chef John Besh. The rest of our foodie crew all of a sudden had a desire to go tinkle as well and went to have their own swoony moments with the James Beard award winner. Even those of us with no f'n clue who John Besh was.
But you know me, JT plays it cool. We finally got seated at our table and these drunk fools I call my friends couldn't contain themselves. We were loud and obnoxious in the classiest joint around and so I had to make a declaration:
"People, hearts at 11, face at 7."
AKA -- keep it classy. Fortunately, while my wit was appreciated, the advice was not heeded. Faces went to 20 with the first bite of our meal. Voices got loud with a brief glimpse of Paula Deen. Guests at tables near us may have asked to be moved. And, while this is the kind of situation that usually mortifies me, I had to give in.
This was our party.
Everybody else were just extras in our movie About That Night.
*note: Tiffany wrote about the same night but I didn't read her post until writing mine.
