Part 2: Vino's Bachelorette Party

Just a warning, this is a really long post with lots of pics. :)

After straightening up at the house, the 5 of us (Vino, Blondie, Sporty, Dressing Queen and moi) threw our massive amounts of crap in the back of Sporty's SUV, jumped in the car and headed out to start the second part of the weekend. But first, a quick stop at Starbucks for iced caffeinated beverages and then we were on our way to downtown San Diego.

Thanks to no traffic, we made it to the Manchester Grand Hyatt in good time. After checking into the room, we started getting ready for the evening festivities. Someone noticed a wedding that was happening that evening by the pool and we all took a break to watch the processional when it started. It had such potential from the set up (chic black and white with red accents), but the actual execution left a lot to be desired. Highlights were bridesmaid bouquets that rivaled what Miss America carries after winning the crown and what looked to be a black sheet attached haphazardly to the back of the bride's dress, that was supposed to be a train? So. Ugly. And thank god we were on the 24th floor because we howled with laughter when all this went down. Yes, we're evil.

Anywho, back to the partay. At 7pm, we popped open the bubbly and a few other girls met us in the room to have a toast and let Vino open another round of presents for the bachelorette portion of the evening. She gots lots of pretty things.
It's not a party without party-favors. Look, an army of pecker party bags!
And they double as hand-puppets!
While Vino was opening gifts, some of us were having fun with the contents of the bags.
8pm finally rolled around and it was time to head to dinner. Although, not before I took a partial group shot. Wheee!

We met Crafty in the lobby of the hotel restaurant, Lael's, and then headed in for dinner. We specifically chose this place because they generously accomodated food allergies and with 3 of our diners having gluten allergies, this was a good choice. Almost immediately after taking our seats, our server greeted us and left us with menus. A short time later, the manager came out to say hello, quickly followed by the head chef. He spoke with each of the guests with the gluten allergy, answering their questions and deciding on a yummy entree for each of them.

Before the main courses were delivered, however, we started with an amuse bouche. Sea scallop on truffled mashed potatoes with some other stuff mixed in. Absolutely amazing!
Several of us ordered the sea bass crusted in crab with garlic mashed potatoes. The picture is ugly, but it was so good! Perfectly seasoned, perfectly cooked. I paired it with a glass of Kim Crawford chardonnay, which was also wonderful. There was a multitude of other things ordered and everyone seemed very pleased by their meals. About midway through dinner, the server re-appeared with champagne for the table, compliments of the house. Um, guys, this wasn't the drug store special. A bottle of Veuve Cliquot for the bride and 2 bottles of Moet White Star for the rest of us. !!! I know, I almost keeled over, too. At this point, most of us have had at least a glass or two of champagne in the room, a glass of wine with dinner and then some more champagne. Suddenly, the penis straws became very popular.
The restaurant was fantastic and I'd highly recommend it if you're ever in the area. Once we were done with dinner, Crafty decided it was time to high-tail it out of there, but not before posing for another picture with her daughter. We're really glad you were at dinner m'dear! Thanks for putting up with all of our shenannigans. ;)
A quick bathroom stop and then we jumped into cabs and headed to Envy at the Ivy Hotel. One of Vino's friends, we'll call her Spitfire, thought she'd be able to get us on a guestlist, but it didn't quite work out. We did manage to get into the club fairly easily, but instead of striding up to the rooftop area, it was closed for a private function. This was information that was somehow not told to us until after we'd pay the cover. Um, boo. Sporty tried to work her magic and get us upstairs, but sadly that failed, too. We heard there was a dance floor downstairs, but the line to get down there rivaled ones I've seen in Vegas. We were a sad little group there for a bit, until Sporty found a manager and laid it out there for her. I'm paraphrasing but it went something like this:

"Look, put yourself in my shoes. We're all old and we don't go out very often. Our friend here is getting married and we were told this is the place to go to have a good time. So, we come here, we pay our $20 and then we can't get upstairs. And this area sucks. So, either give us our money back or take us downstairs right now."

The manager looked at her, shrugged and said "Okay, let's go." Ah-maz-ing.

And then the party really got started. The alcohol was a flowin' and while we were only there for a few hours, I think I took enough pictures to create a flipbook of the evening. I'll just let them speak for themselves.

Shortly before the bar closed, Spitfire bought the 6 of us a shot. Um, I might have downed it like a marathoner downs gatorade and I might not have remembered taking it until the girls reminded me of it the next morning. Yeah, about that... But, I was coherent enough for pictures! Before we knew it (no really, time goes by really fast when you're the opposite of sober), they started clearing out the club. I thought it was a good idea to wave bye to everyone and tell them to have a good night. Vino waved with me and thanked them for "coming to my party!" Look at how nice everyone was to us.
Eventually, we were ushered out, but for some reason stopped to chat and take pictures with the bouncers. I suddenly really needed to go to the bathroom before we left and they let me back in. And then I got lost and couldn't find the rest of the girls :/ Thankfully, Dressing Queen came back to get me and then we piled into pedi-cabs and headed back to the hotel.

If you couldn't tell, I was on a bit of a roll with the camera at this point. And the first few pictures I took were good.
And then, they looked like this. As Blondie said the next day "Well, the last 12 pictures about sums up the evening, I'd say."

Not that you can tell from the pics or anything, we were actually racing in the pedi-cabs. And the 2nd one crashed right before we got back to the hotel. And they still ripped us off. Lovely, right? Grrrr.

We finally managed to make it back upstairs at which point, the rest of the evening becomes fuzzy. There are a few points that I remember quite clearly that I'd rather forget (I was a bit of a hot mess) and other moments that I'm sure would have been even funnier if I didn't just hear about them the next day (i.e. Spitfire passed out on one of the beds, me face first on the aerobed on the floor and the other 4 squished together like sardines on the other bed.)

I won't even discuss the next day because really, it was painful. Very, very painful. :/ Some of us faired a bit worse than others *cough*me*cough*, but it's not like anyone was ready to go run a marathon or anything.

All in all, it was a ridiculously fun party! Somehow, we all seem to be partying harder the older we get, which none of us can figure out. Maybe because we don't get that many chances to really *party* anymore? Who knows, but it does lead to to really fun times!

Vino, I hope you had a great bachelorette party and I can't wait for the wedding next month. You can be sure I'm bringin' my A game! ;)