I confess I don't know a lot about Perez Hilton, aside from his reputation as a (formerly?) snarky, popular celeb blogger. The first time I read his blog was last week, so I can't compare the content to his pre-attitude-adjustment work, but I will say that judging from his presentation last night he seems pretty sincere about being a nicer, better person. I have begun to really enjoy my own journey of self-improvement so it was encouraging to hear someone famous express the hope that more of humanity and society was perhaps heading in the direction of kindness and compassion. Fingers crossed!
[On that note, I'm excited to announce plans for a new blog/website of my own that will promote kindness and compassion along with hopefully-productive navel-gazing. The vision for ThisIsWheretheHealingBegins.com is strong but the website is weak, so don't bother checking out the link until I update otherwise, but consider this advance warning.]
Back to the amazingness that is a Manhattan PR party: Perez Hilton uses BlogAds for his advertising needs and so does my company, for which my sister is an ad rep who also uses BlogAds, sometimes to advertise on Perez Hilton's blog. Hence her ability to get wristbands for the BlogAds/Perez Hilton party, the purpose of which, as far as I could tell, was to celebrate general awesomeness.
So my sister and I and two of our friends show up at the appointed time and after a short wait are released into Stone Rose, which is on the fourth floor of the Time Warner Building at Columbus Circle. Because the room had yet to be filled, the four of us easily snagged comfortable leather chairs by the floor-to-ceiling window that overlooked Central Park as well as the iconic Columbus Circle statues and traffic.
Within minutes polite waitstaff came by with sake-inspired beverages: I would never have thought to pair sake with berry iced tea, but it was delicious. And then came the hors d'oeuvres. OH the hors d'oeuvres. I recently attended an event that promised "heavy hors d'oeuvres" but meant "lots of mini pizza slices," so the food at last night's party was the real deal and a welcome contrast. Pastry puffs filled with goat cheese and feta, chicken and pesto finger sandwiches, smoky spiced hummus on crackers, and more were continually offered to us over the course of the night. It's been a long time since I turned away free food, but the pickings were so good that we were eventually sated and started focusing more on the sake.
Around that time, my sister and her friend decided to make the rounds of the room while I stayed put in my comfy leather chair and chatted with my coworker. My sister and her friend returned with two photos: one a digital camera shot of them with Perez, with whom they chatted briefly, and another of them that was a professional photo booth shot.
I am familiar with the concept of photo booths at weddings or promotional events, but have never partaken until last night. But after Perez gave a welcoming speech and his pal Sandra Bernhard gave a comedic performance (I think that's what it was; I was laughing anyway), I was ready to take on the photo booth.
I'll let the following picture tell the rest of the story, but let's just say I am decidedly in favor of dress-up props. We had such a fun time and, given the incredible view that accompanied us, I must declare it an Only In New York experience. So, for the time being anyway, I ♥ NYC!
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