Get the Party Started

You have to love a party that begins with dessert.

This was originally a "Farewell to Summer" party which had morphed into a "Hurricane Recovery Party" two days ago.

I was one of the first to arrive, no doubt because I never lost power and there was nothing I could do about my collapsed ceiling today except sweep up the debris.

The hosts were still without power, so the cookout had been changed to a taco party and the guests began to gather on the deck.

Our soundtrack was the next door neighbor's generator, buzzing away noisily in the late afternoon sun.

No power meant no ice, so one host was out trying to find some while the other greeted party-goers.

He insisted that we begin with ice cream since it was rapidly becoming soup cream.

Hard at work until 3:30 a.m. last night, he'd added a Guinness Stout reduction to vanilla ice cream and was serving it with chocolate ganache.

I may not be a beer drinker, but this was about the chocolate and the cream, not the beer.

Once we'd gotten dessert out of the way, we moved on to his basil peach sangria, which packed quite a punch.

Sangria is usually so mild-mannered, but my host had chosen to cut the sweetness of the wine with vodka, resulting in what one guest called a peach mojito.

You know, the old "cut alcohol with alcohol" trick.

Plain and simple, it was a big old cocktail, albeit a beautifully flavored one, and although I'm allergic to peaches and not a cocktail drinker, I drank up.

By some miracle, just as we started eating dinner, the neighbors turned off the generator. It was like a gift to our eardrums.

The crowd was eclectic - an author, comedians, a DJ, several IT types, bloggers, symphony musicians and several Henrico County school employees who got the word that they were off tomorrow mid-party- so the conversations were all over the place.

Where do you send a NYC transplant who asks, "Where can I go to meet people?" someone asked about a new coworker.

Well that depends on what kind of people you want to meet, I said.

Without knowing their preference, someone suggested that you send them to a place that has available men and women so they can pick their favorite flavor.

During a discussion of cell phones (nerdy vs. trendy, sleek vs. washing machine-like), I volunteered to the group that I didn't have one.

Stunned silence.

"Wow! That makes you the biggest hipster here," a girl finally said.

"Do you have a land line?" someone else asked. I nodded.

"Even more so," she pronounced.

Win friends and influence people by being a Luddite.

At dusk, the hosts brought out scads of candles and began making Guinness floats for those with an alcoholic sweet tooth.

Soon the tiki torches were lit and a fire was roaring in a small grill in the back yard.

After the third person asked me what my next stop was, I figured it was time to go.

I stopped home to make sure that no more ceiling had fallen before going to meet friends at the one bar that never seems to close, Bamboo.

And because it's Bamboo, there were as many people outside smoking as there were inside drinking.

Amongst those doing the latter were my friends who had spent a good part of the day shooting a video for their band.

During the shoot, they'd created a house party, with everyone drinking, talking and having a good time.

In essence, the exact same thing they were now doing at Bamboo, but without the cameras rolling. Even some of the extras showed up in their party girl dresses.

But the band members were tired of all that and wanted to talk about more substantive things like "Koyaanisqatsi," Lewis Ginter's mausoleum and surviving a broken heart when your ex walks into Bamboo.

You have to love a party where nerds win out over party girls.

Late Night Adrenaline Shots

The hurricane tourists are out in full force.

I walk Broad and Grace Streets every Sunday morning and they're both usually like ghost towns. I'm lucky to see three people in three miles of walking. Not so today where it was like a street festival and everyone had a phone or a camera.

Couples strolled hand in hand, only pausing to snap pictures of crushed cars and downed trees. People in cars drove slower than I walk to point and exclaim over what they saw.

Yes, it's a beautiful day and well worth being up for, but I question how many of these people would still be in bed if there was no destruction to ogle.

Broad Street was where useless umbrellas had gone to die. They were littered on the sidewalk and stuffed in trash cans, their broken spokes testament to their worthlessness.

A window had blown out and the shards of glass scattered across the sidewalk. Over on Grace, some of the sidewalks became impassable due to broken branches and fallen trees and I had to take to the street. On Allen between Broad and Monument, the devastation was widespread. Both sides of Allen on either side of the median were covered in enormous dead trees.

The fire department had several trucks there, no doubt intending to take care of the situation or maybe just shoo away the paparazzi. And still, people gathered at the yellow tape lines to get better pictures. Coming soon to a FB page near you!

The extent of the devastation for me came from four little leaks in my bedroom ceiling. When Irene's wrath began yesterday, a drip started and I put a pan under it. By the time I went to bed, I had four drips and four pans but not a lot of accumulated drippage in them.

Apparently it was enough because at 3:06, a large chunk of ceiling crashed to the floor, waking me up like a shot (and probably my downstairs neighbors, too).

It's hard to come down from an adrenaline rush like that.

I wasn't about to get up and do anything about it, so I rolled over and began thinking about puppies and rainbows nothing I'm going to admit to here and finally fell asleep after about an hour.

A second slightly smaller piece crashed down around 6 a.m., but I was a pro at being terrorized awake by then and fell right back to sleep.

When I got up, I saw that the floor around two sides of my bed was covered in ceiling chunks and drywall dust. The pans of brown water had bits floating in them. It looked even worse than it had sounded, and that's saying a lot.

Let the record show that I did not take out my camera and document any of it.

Sporting a Drip Dry Dress for Irene

So today I broke almost all the rules of hurricane behavior.

Stay away from windows.

I can't recall a day when I spent so much time looking out the open windows.

The rain and the wind and the trees they were abusing made for such a show that it was irresistible not to just stand there transfixed by what was happening.

Every time I heard the distinctive crack of a branch breaking, I rushed to the window to see where it had landed on Clay Street.

Stay tuned to local TV.


Oops, don't have a box, so I couldn't obsess over the Weather Channel like so many of my friends were.


Stay tuned to a local radio station.


No can do. I can't abide any station in this town, so I listen to a public radio station in Charlottesville, where they made a point of saying all afternoon that it wasn't even raining.

Plan to be self-sustaining for three days.


While I have oatmeal, bread, cashews and plenty of fruit (clementines, cantaloupe and bananas), my main protein sources are Boars Head hot dogs and eggs. Lame, I know.

Have extra batteries.


By the time I heeded the hurricane warnings, there wasn't a "D" battery for sale within the entire Mid-Atlantic, but at last night's dinner party, my good friend had slipped me two "Ds" so that at least I have a working flashlight.

Stay inside.


That's easier said than done. When you live alone, it's inevitable that you go a bit stir crazy after a day like today.

I read for hours. I took a nearly two-hour nap. But after a while, I needed conversation in the worst way.

Throwing caution to the (60 mph) winds, I felt compelled to head out of here before 7:00, hoping like hell there'd be other people at the bar closest to me.

It was a dark walk. With the city having turned off the street lights for the evening (frayed wires and all), I put on my rain jacket, took the biggest umbrella I own and soldiered the two blocks to the Belvidere.

My umbrella threatened to turn itself inside out every third step. The lower third of my dress was soaked.

Must. Find. Other. Humans.

Besides the staff of four, there was only one person at the Belvidere when I arrived., but I was hopeful.

Before long, the owner delivered another (who knew they had pick-up service?).

I ordered a glass of Gatao Vinho Verde and settled in to meet some new neighbors.

One was a sous chef whose restaurant in my former neighborhood was closed tonight and the other a long-time firefighter who now works as a corporate drone for Capital 1.

Before long, a couple came in. And then two more. A three-top called before showing up. It was enough.

I was not shy about joining the other escapees, insinuating myself into their conversations and finding plenty to talk about.

Favorite quote: "The difference between boys and men is that men figure out a solution." Uttered by a man, of course.

The owner decided to document the occasion, shooting video of the storm on Broad Street and doing some slow pans through the bar while we drank and talked about today's endless sirens.

For my hurricane supper, I chose the Belvidere's stellar burger, knowing it was better than anything I had at home.

Smothered in caramelized onions and cheddar, the half pound burger was way more than I needed after a day of doing virtually nothing, but I was trying to store up for Irene's aftermath.

Who knows what tomorrow will bring?

For that matter, it's not like I know any of the post-hurricane rules.

Or that I'd likely follow them either.