Greetings friends, old and new, and Happy MY BIRTHDAY Week!!
Have you not been celebrating? Might I suggest a No Pants Wednesday (or Monday) in my honor? Perhaps crush a cup of tasty beer with a friend. You just gotta ask yourself, WWJ(ordan)D? (No sacrilege meant here. I’d really be curious to know what folks did when they thought, What would that Jordan do?) If you’re new here, check out my 7 Links post for a little more about me!!
I’m currently celebrating my birthday week in style with a private, GIANT booth at Rockfish Seafood Grill (my home away from home).
How many people will be joining you? None? But you need a table? We got this.
Yet again, I can’t thank the folks at Rockfish enough for being so accommodating (always) AND emailing me a gift certificate for my birthday (!!!! FISH IS THE GREATEST GIFT EVER !!!)
Anyway, chances are, you didn’t come to hear about my fish fiesta. You came here to find out what this whole HLS drama is that I’ve been posting about, tweeting about, and generally abuzz about since…. well since I bought the ticket.
I’ll start at the beginning….
The beautiful Krissie from PhillyNerdGirl picked me up moments after I walked out of the PHL airport, a grin on her face and a bag of tiny pumpkin donuts in her hand. What a giver!
And a chatter! Love talking blog-talk.
Krissie and I sped crawled through some serious 3:30 traffic in Philly before eventually reaching Chez Ali (aka the Infamous Allison who planned the entirety of the Cocktail Party and saved us all from sobriety). Without wasting a moment (ok, we wasted several, ogling Krissie’s sexy shoes and eating s’mores crack like it was…. crack), I politely requested hungrily demanded a trip to Wawa. This Southern girl needed her fix.
Come to Mama. That's the good stuff.
Then, it was time for some Boost Boozy (DAMN YOU, AUTOCORRECT!) Arnold Palmers (I’m sure there’s a real name for them. But I like to imagine Arnold Palmer himself, all liquored up, hanging out with us.)
Thumbs up for booze, buddy! (Click image for Source)
Krissie, Ali, and Jordy: Sipping
We could only drink and gossip for so long before the itch to primp kicked into high gear.
A Glam Slam! (like a grand slam. I wish this was a real phrase.)
My best friend Ring, who was quite a hit at the party
We took an incredibly easy cab ride over to Reading Terminal Market, a place where I once enjoyed the best roast pork sandwich known to mankind (at DiNics) and the home of the HLS Cocktail Party. After jimmying the door open with my superior lock picking skills asking a security guard to let us in, we rounded up the rest of the ladies and, like a herd of extremely willing cats, headed to the party spot.
Hell hath no fury like HLBloggers tryna get some snacks.
Guess where I headed, with my two complimentary drink tickets?
Am I really that predictable?
The selection was actually top notch:
- Dogfish Head Chicory Stout
- Voodoo Brewery’s Pilzilla
- Philadelphia Brewing Company’s Fleur de Lehigh
- Philadelphia Brewing Company’s Kenzinger
- Some wine (yeah, I had no eyes for that)
- A YUMMY cocktail made with DrinkChia that was like a creamy daquiri with jelly chia bits
I went straight for the Chicory Stout first. And then I realized that I could still enjoy a few nibblets.
Quite the spread.
Single asparagus spear? Ok.
Also, I wore a tiara.
See, the thing is, with Ryan moving this week (Wahhhhhhhhh! – Snookie) and me having a work training then heading to OCNJ (again) for my cousin’s bridal shower, I wanted to celebrate. But really, I just wanted to wear a tiara. That’s What Jordan Would Do.
I met bloggers, large and small.
A lesson in extremes
I tried to meet them, one and all.
That's a lotta ladies.
I even took a picture near a stall!
Class-Act.
There were spider senses,
With the Okie in Pink, Lisa
And some blog-lebrity blends(es? I’m just trying to rhyme here)
Courtney and Julie, two of the women I read before knowing what HL was!
Birthday buddies!
Carly and Michelle finalllllly found some tiaras! (and a really weird fellow who photobombed from within a photobooth. that's skill.)
And my very favorite sponsors of the entire conference, Chandra and Mark from Drink Chia!!
Ch(i)andra!
I also think I found a kindred spirit in Jess, a fancy lady from the heart of dairy land.
Sassy as hell.
There was dancing.
There was not dancing. This might be my greatest disappointment of the weekend. There was something wrong with the iPod hookup, or something, and I felt very weird mingling and running around with no (and then, later, very quiet) music. Sort of like if the cocktail party was hosted in a GIANT elevator (full of food and drinks).
However, they more than made up for it by allowing me to drink as many cocktails as I wanted. Either there were so many pregnant ladies that their drink tickets somehow all were given to me, or they overestimated how much folks would drink…. or the beer gods were shining down on me (I choose this one.) Whatever happened, it worked out completely in my favor.
I want them all.
I tried to mingle, I truly did. I figured the tiara and octopus ring were both great ice breakers. And some folks were totally happy to chat. Other ones were either uninterested, or in the zone with their own little groups. I’ll admit, I’m not very well “established” in this particular community, and I had never met most of the men and women before, so I understand. But I’ll say that my heart was swollen with joy when Katy Widrick chatted my head off about beers. Finally, I felt like my two passions were merged and I didn’t feel like the odd girl out.
Then again, maybe I’m just a little too rambunctious to be brought out in public to new people. Like that time, at the end, that my overzealous flinging of an umbrella resulted in the demise of said umbrella.
JORDAN SMASH!!
Blonde hair, don't care. (Balaguer, 2011)
But, as I’d learn later in the conference from the wisest of all owls….
Thanks, Pauly.
But to see the source of this hilarious picture…. well, you’ll just have to stay tuned.
