macarons, nycwff, esca, saving children by stuffing my face and imbibing

the boss brought back pierre herme macarons from paris. OH GOD. they are heavenly. transcendent even. salted caramel was my favorite. or maybe the vanilla and olive oil.

 

the anthony bourdain interview with frank bruni was good. bourdain talks in soundbites and is genuinely very funny. and bruni is eloquent and smart so the questions were thoughtful and interesting which is just what you ask for from interviewers, i suppose. i had a haircut in the meatpacking dist on saturday so managed to catch the cute wine and food festival activities down there: farmers market, illy cafe, some diet coke tent, lots of restaurants passing out cheap samples of whatever.

 

katie had me up to the showroom where a lot of clothes that get sent out to magazines end up back in their closets afterwards and then straight to salvation army. she said i could take whatever i wanted. i possibly went crazy. maybe took home three pairs of shoes and like 10 dresses. maybe.

 

sam texted, which is rare because he's usually on the other side of the planet doing whatever rich people who don't have jobs do. most recently: seeing the F1 race in singapore. who knows. he and mike hit a snag when, after flying into kuala lampur mike got stopped by customs because he didn't have any empty pages in his passport for them to stamp. enough begging and probably greasing of palms, they were allowed out to go to the embassy so mike could add pages to his passport. dummy. sam bought a hella expensive leica (M8) and a custom made case by a guy named luigi in italy. i mean, i can't even comprehend that life. so we met at esca because i was craving linguine with clams. ruth reichl was in the house. showed up without a reservation on a night they were fully booked. they found her a corner table (of course) and she thanked them a thousand times telling them she'd never do it again (yeah, i'm sure). you could tell the hostess was sweating it out a bit but then had a last minute cancellation which meant the crisis was averted. then we went to rudys to watch the second half of the yankees game. rock. on.

 

went to a save the children benefit party last night. a very random mix of people. julianne moore, deepak chopra, the queer eye guys, peter sarsgaard looking very hairy, vanessa williams...no tabber! hooray! this party was the bomb. they had a manhattan bar, a rum bar where some mixologist was setting your drink on fire, a tequila bar (100% agave, $300 a bottle, which the rep swears won't give you a hangover. all i know is that i did a shot and didn't black out or even cringe as it slid down my throat which is an accomplishment for tequila), a filet mignon bar with several sauces for dipping (my favorite: chimichurri), paninis, lots of yummy passed stuff. it was busy without being crowded and everyone there was very rich and sophisticated looking. just a good time all around which is rare for this kind of thing.

 

it was funny to see actual people in the penthouse apartment. last time i was there it was just me and my friends goofing around for a while. last night there were security guards EVERYWHERE telling people not to touch things. and we were all, "i was IN that bathtub a couple weeks ago" and "i was WEARING that fur coat" and "we DANCED in that recording studio"

 

my director friend is in from LA this week and of course i'm booked straight through until she leaves. she came in last minute and i'm having trouble shuffling things around. a wedding in baltimore on sunday and new yorker festival events friday and saturday. suppose it gives me a reason to head out west to see her soon instead. the wedding couple both went to st. johns (that college where you learn ancient greek and then read plato and euclid in greek, then you learn french and read decartes and pascal) so the group is guaranteed to be eclectic and kind of brilliant if not maybe the most socially graceful. i'm excited to see gina's dad, a huge chicago wine rep, who always has the best stories from his trips to italy and always brings the most amazing vino anywhere he goes. gina's an accupuncturist now so maybe i can get her to throw some needles in me while i'm there.