Monday, November 30, 2009

Great Grandpa's 99th Birthday Thanksgiving Party

The Party: Great Grandpa Jack's 99th Birthday / Thanksgiving Party
Location: Cousin Kelly's House (in Brooklyn)
Total Party Count: 72

In 1621 the pilgrams of Plymouth, MA made a big potluck dinner party (no indians allowed!),  and a few years later in 1910 my great grandfather Jack was born in Syria. Last Thursday, these 2 monumental events were combined to create one glorious party at my cousin Kelly's house.


I feel like anything that my dad does is automatically cute/funny, e.g. scooping up marshmallowed sweet potatoes / kicking me up a staircase

 
Is my grandma hotter than me??

 
Just a small Thanksgiving with the fam

 
99 and still partying!! (my cousin got that hat at a magic party yesterday)

 
I made a card!!!! HAPPY GRANPA WE <3 U BIRTHDAY

 
I like to connect with today's youth


 Auntie Elaine shows off the amazing cookies everyone else made

 
 I think all this partying is catching up with me
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Saturday, November 28, 2009

Rebecca Turbow's B-day Party

The Party: Rebecca Turbow's B-day Party
Location: Andrew's Apartment (Lower East Side)
Total Party Count: 71

My old friend Rebecca Turbow, fashion designer extraordinaire, had a last minute birthday party at Andrew's apartment, or perhaps it had been planned for months and no one bothered to invite me until the party was already happening. I should have skipped the party to teach everyone a lesson, y'know, really stick it to 'em by sitting in my apartment alone and writing in a blog, but instead I took a taxi downtown after Party #70 to hang with Turbow & Co. It was one of those parties where you have no choice but to take your shoes off  and leave them in the hallway, which was a daunting scenario because I knew I had holes in the toes of my tights-- talk about a TOTAL FASHION FAUX-PAS! Maybe I should take less party taxis and buy more hosiery.



rebecca and thomas

 
"cum 2 d party~~  is fun"

 
please stop judging my holey tights

 
oh yeah, someone was murdered!!!!!



YAY FUN PARTY!!!!!
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Ruthie & Forrest's Engagement Party

The Party: Ruthie  & Forrest's Engagement Party
Location: Museum of the City of New York (Upper East Side)
Total party Count: 70

The other night I had a unexpected reunion with an old bunkmate due to having gone to  Party #50 Marathon Afterparty where I met Danny Chen who invited me to  Party #56 Office Warming Party where I made friends with Avi Flombaum who invited me to Party #70 - this very engagement party which he was DJing, when there she was, Ariel Goldwyn, my long-lost favorite camper from Camp Seneca 1996, with whom I shared a summer filled with blue nail polish, Aussie hairspray, Tradition noodle soups, and perverted puberty topics like tampon coaching and who bled all over their bed.  I hadn't seen her in 12 years since our respective yeshivahs held a joint "oh-my-god-i-love-god-so-much-he's-so-amazing-let's-sing-and-dance-and-pray" retreat in 9th grade, which included a lecture about "why the girl in this photo looks slutty and what you can do to avoid it." Fortunately Ariel avoided being brainwashed and she is still the same awesome girl, and a giant slut (her dress was above her knees).

 
Me & Ariel, 2gether again!

 
She married the super-dreamy Jared Harary from my HS. He didn't know I existed (I thought he did but he told me he didn't at the party)


Amazing rat tail with Jared decoy.

 
Avi says its easy to make Jews dance, but he could have made non-Jews dance too.

 
Can I make a request? Do you have something else?
 


Avi's Posse


Forrest is marrying one of these two fine young ladies. What a lovely couple!
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Thursday, November 26, 2009

Kevin Kearney's Bday Party

The Party: Kevin Kearney's Birthday Party
Location: Upstairs at Aces and Eights (in the East Village)
Total Party Count: 69

Hey guess what- Kevin Kearney had a birthday party!  I don't really know him so I might not know what I'm talking about, but he seemed a little bummed out about turning another year older (or maybe he can always be found sulking by the bar). If I were him I would cheer up because he had some pretty cool people at his party. All the VIPs of the internet were there, like the founder of Four Sqaure and a lot of Gawker folks. Chin up Kevs, you're doing alright!


Me & Birthday Boy Kev. At first he didn't want to be on my internet but then decided that I seemed normal enough, though he'll probably change his mind after this.

 
Lockhart Steele of Gawker Media / Curbed. He is much nicer than you'd expect for a guy with a name like that.

 
Practicing douchey party poses. Thanks for indulging me Lawrence!

 
Me & Nick Gray. We've partied together 3 times now so we've obviously grown very close.
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Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Dean Bein's 27th B-day Party

The Party: Dean Bein's 27th Birthday Party
Location:  Apartment in Fort Greene, Brooklyn
Total Party Count: 68

Dean Bein is 27! But I remember when he was a mere 26, trying to make it in the big city with his record label, Mighty Duck Records True Panther Sounds, with a roster of bands that almost nobody ever heard of. And then one night he came home from a business dinner wearing finely pressed pants and a nice belt he borrowed from  his roommate who had parties in the apartment every night (that's why I was there), and the normally incredibly cool  Dean just stood there in shock-- I looked at his hands and he was trembling. He had just been told that Beggars / Matador Records wanted to pick up his label. Brooklyn Vegan broke the news 7 months later so I guess he wasn't lying. Not a bad year.

Anyway, about the party. It ruled. Alex from Lemonade is officially a gifted, dutiful party chef-- I recommend him for your next simcha.  He made amazing burritos and/but he will passionately relay to you just how organic the burrito goat is and how he wishes he could have seen that goat being raised on the special organic farm. Also I am going to advise party hosts Jesse & Dean to check the batteries in their smoke detector because we probably all should have stopped-dropped-and-rolled out of there, but I'm glad we kept partying!!!


 
Alex & Dean. Keep Cookin!

 
I got confused and actually meant thumbs down. Sierra Nevada's "Celebration Ale" is nothing to be celebrated.

 
Hanging by the fridge, checkin out magnets 'n' stuff


still nervous around the opposite sex

 
Dean enjoying his birthday bananas foster. Mike Sniper enjoying his tequila.



 Eric, remember when we talked and you had a tortilla chip? THAT WAS SO AWESOME.


I was supposed to delete this and I really was going to. New Tanlines press photo, email me for hi-res.
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Monday, November 23, 2009

"The 18th" Monthly Dinner Party

The Party: Anne Apparu's "The 18th" Monthly Dinner Party
Location: Makeshift restaurant in an artist's studio (551 West 21st)
Total Party Count: 67

Party #2/2 of the night was innocuously pitched as a "dinner party downtown" but I think my evening's party guide Andrew was being modest. The artist & chef  Anne Apparu hosts a large monthly dinner party called "The 18th Restaurant" on the 18th of every month, always in a different location. At first I thought "The 18th Restaurant" was an actual restaurant, kind of like when I thought the New York Public Library was a hot spot for intellectual socializing, especially with certain band members of Brian Jonestown Massacre, when really everyone was just getting wasted at The Library bar every night.

The delicious dinner was held in an artists studio, a really big beautiful one, probably Norman Rockwell's. We made new friends that we can motorcycle cross country with and I saw Nick Gray again of Nick Gray's Culturally Significant Parties! There were probably some other people there who are more culturally significant than Nick, but if they don't invite me to their parties, they're not getting blogged about.


 Preparing the Dinner (actually I missed that photo op- now they are just washing dishes, sowwy!)

 
Andrew & Nick picking the location of next month's dinner


Right after the Spinach Quiche, just before Nicole Kidman walked in naked.

 
Aliya decided to have her wedding shower in the corner (I am expecting a thank you card for the 2 pieces of potato)

 
Me, Nick Gray & Emmy with Norman Rockwell's latest works in progress.

Andrew & the boss lady, Anne Apparu!
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Private Social Club Squash Party

The Party: Post-Squash Championship Party
Location: A Private Members Only Uptown Social Club
Total Party Count : 66

My party guide for the night was Andrew, who I met at the Pump Up The Jamz Party and again the night prior at The MOMA Tim Burton Party (though he insists we met a year ago). He is the kind of guy who knows which celebs live near you (apparently Sofia Coppola and a few old models), how many square feet their apartments are, and what material their cabinetry is made of (total crap!). Straight out of a scene from  American Psycho Metropolitan, Andrew took me to a Squash Championship Game After-Party at "a Private Members Only Uptown Social Club." (I'm not allowed to say the name!) He signed for some drinks and we chatted with  an old man with a really cool tie  from 1988 that his wife didn't like. Amazing.



The Squash Table

 
Put it on my tab

 
With a little bit of bloomin' luck!
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Friday, November 20, 2009

Cousin Sherri's Engagement Party

The Party: My Cousin Sherri's Engagement Party
Location: Gravesend, Brooklyn
Total Party Count: 65

Sherri is getting married! Yes, my wonderful 6-years-younger-than-me cousin has found the love of her life, so I headed out to my hometown of Aleppo, Syria Gravesend, Brooklyn to celebrate at their engagement party! The event was a test of how many hundreds of relatives and kibbeh could fit into a  house (answer: a lot), and how long I could keep a conversation going (answer: two rounds of pleasantries, or about 13 seconds).


My lovely cousin Sherri and her future husband. 


3 Braha Girls

 
WORLD'S #1 DAD!!


Sherri's Awesome Bat-Mitzvah 4evs!!!


Men


The Shirley Brahas
(if you see videos of me doing hip hop routines on youtube, its probably Shirley #2)
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Thursday, November 19, 2009

Poker Party

The Party: Monday Night Poker Party
Location:  An office in Soho
Total Party Count: 64

There are some things in this world you might want to avoid doing in public until you've practiced them extensively in private. I've learned this the hard way through activities like playing doubles tennis ("sorry!" "oops!" "sorry!"), driving an ATV (fell into a ditch) , and being a magician (almost definitely the worst act of the 6th grade talent show). After accepting Avi's invitation to a Monday Night Poker Party, I realized this could be bad. How was I going to prevent myself from being a giant poker fail?? I was determined to avert disaster so I spent an hour before the party brushing up on my poker lingo and memorizing card rankings.


 Who wants to play a fun game?


Mike Unbluffing


Everyone saw my stupid 7 of clubs when I took this pic.... and I won anyway.

 
I MAKE BIG MONIEZ!!!

(PS I SPENT THE ENTIRE SUMMER OF 2006 PLAYING TEXAS HOLD EM)


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