The Jon Blog

The Best Dinner Party Ever

So Seattle was wonderful. All 59 hours of it. Except for the few I spent stressing about the fact that Continental fucked up my seat assignment during online check-in so I ended up without the window seat I wanted.

The highlight of the trip was dinner with six fabulous friends on Wednesday evening. The peope who I went out with mostly know each other but there were a few who met each other that evening, and some who should see more of each other more often... which totally applies to me. But the best thing was that the conversation just flowed naturally. Granted, we used some wonderful grapes to lubricate it, but it was just a great time. Seven people, five of whom imbibed in the Dionysian fruits, four bottles of wine, lots of silliness, some good food, and four hours. Isn't that what it's all about? I felt just so wonderful about life after that dinner... except for the part about not seeing those wonderful people often enough. But you know, if we all lived in the same city, we probably wouldn't have managed to get together for that type of evening. So it was totally worth it, and that made the trip 100% worthwhile.

There were a few other wonderful moments in the trip, too, such as touring Seattle's new downtown library, an astonishing building by Rem Koolhaus. They have wonderful collections, too. I really enjoyed meandering there. I wonder if NYC's libraries are comparable. The only experience I have with the NYPL is at the 53rd Street or 58th Street locations, neither of which are stellar examples of library science. Of course, someone is probably better qualified than anyone else I know to answer any question about the NYPL system, or at least about a branch of theirs.

Another wonderful moment? The Seattle Art Museum is exhibiting masterpieces from the Kroller-Mueller Museum in Holland. Oddly enough, I have actually visited this museum in person (on that whirlwind post-college-graduation European tour), but it was great to see the art again. The highlight of the show was Van Gogh's "The Night Cafe." The show had great art but in my opinion was fairly crappily organized in the museum: too many "important" paintings too close together, around funky corners, etc, so that there were too many people in a bunch to be able to view the paintings well. They definitely needed a better sense of spatial organization. But the art was great and that's a big part of what counts.

There are lots of cute guys in Seattle, too, so the boy-watching was fun.

All in all, it was just a lot of fun. Pacific Northwest rain, sun, clouds, friends, and fun. But still, it's great to be home.

Posted by Jon at July 9, 2004 09:44 PM | TrackBack