Though yesterday evening started out on a rather somber note, through the twin powers of heavy drinking and attractive women, I eventually forged my way back to near full-blown holiday spirit.

Specifically, I headed up to Columbia for a friend’s Champagne & Sinatra party, an event that works pretty much as the name would lead you to believe: champagne flows, Sinatra croons from the stereo, and everyone does their best to look and act Rat Pack chic.

As the hostess is a director, the crowd was overwhelmingly dominated by movie people, leading me to stray from my (rarely successfully adhered to anyhow) “no film girls” policy. I spent most of the evening flirting with a Danish writer so Nordically beautiful that (despite my advertised egotism) I kept wondering why she was possibly talking with me.

Still, by the time I left (in the wee small hours of the morning, as it were [my apologies to Old Blue Eyes for that pun]), I’d not only secured her number and a good-night kiss, but set up a date for later this week.

Spent last night drinking vodka with a few compatriots in the mischief-making cause, coming up with a truly brilliant prank to pull on our fair city. Not since my Porn n’ Chicken days have I had chance to plot benign chaos at such a large level, and I’m absolutely thrilled to get the project underway. Naturally, I could write about it here, but then I’d have to track you all down and kill you.

About two weeks back, I bought a Treo 600, a giant dorky combination phone/PDA. And, despite the hard time I’ve been getting about it from friends (Sarah Brown: “Ooooooh! A refrigerator phone!”), I’m a huge fan. On-the-go access to email, my address book and calendar, and Vindigo’s location services, all make my life immeasurably easier.

But the real bonus is, I now have a way for the drunk version of me to leave notes to my more sober self. This morning, for example, I awoke to find a task titled ‘Allison’ added to my to do list, with an attached note reading:

Hot, blonde Mt. Sinai med school student you met at John’s party. Call her: [phone number]. Also, sister’s name is Callie, sister’s roommate’s name is Dianna; you signed Dianna’s breast.

This is the sort of thing that leads me to completely swear off drinking, at least twice a week.

Last night at Lucky 13 with Hilary (on whom I totally have a crush) and Helen Jane:

“And I was like, there’s no way I’m eating a half a pound of pot – without a drink.”

Recipe for a very good night:
– One of the founders of Napster.
– Two Israeli girls he picked up the night before in Vegas.
– Wine.
– More wine.
– Very late dinner.
– Hard liquor.
– Even more Wine.
– The back seat of the Israeli girls’ rental car.

Headed up to Oakland last night to cook dinner with Helen Jane. Without a recipe, we winged it on chicken parmigiana, which came out surprisingly well – particularly the homemade sauce. Apparently, the secret to cooking Italian food is consuming several bottles of vino in the process.

Helen Jane’s husband, James, is recovering from a serious fall that left him wheelchair-ridden for several months, though by now he’s up to crutching around with great aplomb. I was lucky enough to spend a lot of time with HJ on the set of I Love Your Work, enough to determine she’s one of my very favorite people, but I hadn’t spent nearly as much time with James. So I was particularly glad to spend an evening with just the two of them – sort of a chance to further feel him out. By the end of the night, I’m pleased to say he’d earned the official self-aggrandizement stamp of approval.

As the two had been unable to hit the bars (or, really, leave the house) for the past few months, they’d instead honed their card games skills to an impressive peak. Intermixed with cooking, drinking and eating, we blew our way through several games of Coolio, Egyptian Rat Screw, and an excellent variation of bullshit (possibly called ‘fourshit’?) that I taught. The latter game requires both strategy and the ability to seamlessly lie through your teeth, which left James and I to battle it out while Helen Jane – whose tendency to dissolve into fitful giggles when bluffing put her at a bit of a disadvantage – mainly egged things on.

Eventually, we ended up on their porch, where Helen Jane and I shared blogger gossip (accompanied by much eye-rolling by James), and we all generally shot the proverbial shit. It was one of the most delightful evenings I’ve had in weeks, and as HJ’s best friend Hilary (another recent addition to my very favorite people list) just managed to break her leg in three places and may consequently be coming to stay with Helen Jane for a few nights (thereby expanding Oakland’s apparent mini-Bellevue), I suspect I’ll be making it back at least once more through the course of this quick jaunt out West.

Ah, jet-setting, jet-setting.

Prior to this morning, it had been altogether too long since I came home so late that the sun was already beginning to rise.

This morning, as occurs troublingly frequently, I woke up promising myself I’d never, ever get as drunk again as I did the prior night.

Just in case you were wondering why I don’t normally return home Thursday nights, three sheets to the wind, and comment on friends’ blogs:
– Her entry;
– My (inexplicably pseudonymized) comment.