BlogHer09 Report #4 The Laundry List, now with stolen pictures!

I'm doing laundry.

Big surprise when you've been out of the house for four days, right?

And it's not that Mr. Buxom wasn't fabulous, because he was.

Not only did he help with Poppy Buxom's Awesum Cocktail Party on Saturday night, hauling booze and ice and food trays all over creation and staying up til the ass-crack of dawn surrounded by lovely young women,* he also spent four days watching the kids, installing a closet organizer in his study, cleaning up the storage room in the basement, and buying and putting together one of those tall storage etagères for seasonal decorations and miscellaneous crappe.

He also introduced Young Master Buxom to the Kill Bill movies.**

Meanwhile, I was downtown hanging out with blackbird, Susie Sunshine, Martha MacGyver, and LemonySarah.

After the forces had gathered in my apartment, the BlogHer Contributing Editors headed to the Sheraton for the BeautyHacks/BlogHer cocktail party. This gave me the chance to meet some of my BlogHer colleagues (and let me tell you, it gives me a thrill to call them that): HeatherB, Metalia, Mocha Momma, Liz Henry, and Liz Gumbinner.

I also discovered that Sarah of Sarah and the Goon Squad is a fellow mezzo-soprano. If you heard a couple of bloggers pretending to be Carmen and Cherubino, that was us. I'm kidding! I wasn't that drunk. Yet.

Susie Sunshine, Goon Squad Sarah, and me before I finished my first drink.
Photo stolen from BlogHer's photo gallery

I was introduced to Neilochka by blackbird because he asked. What a gentleman! He didn't even remark on how buxom I appeared. Not more than once or twice, anyway.

Was stopped by Mir, who is adorable whether she's wearing her hair curly or straight, so there.

I squeee'd at Y of Joy Unexpected and Cheeky Lotus and drunkenly invited them to my cocktail party. In fact, for me, the first night of BlogHer was really a squee/business card/drunken inviting marathon of sorts, so if you found me a little bit off-putting, I apologize. I really only get this stupid at BlogHer. I mean, yes, I do like my cocktails, but I'm not usually riding up and down hotel escalators yelling "I AM SO DRUNK!!!11eleven!1!"

And that wasn't me who streaked the lobby. Hand to God.

Met MudslideMama and she is completely adorable and makes me want to move to California. (This is advance notice for her to move to Oregon to avoid meeting me again.)

Later that night--and the conference hadn't even officially started yet--we went to the People's Party. There I accosted Jennette Fulda of Half of Me, who is just as cute and funny as she appears in her blog. Then I bopped around and sang along with Chris Mann ... and did I let a little thing like not knowing the song stop me? Of course not. Because my fifth drink had informed me of one crucially important fact: singing in key is for pussies.

Someone told me that The Bloggess was holding court in the bathroom, so I went in to meet her. She was wearing her long red wig, for those of you who are keeping score. But neither The Bloggess or I remember much about it because we were both drunk. At least I was.

After a healthy breakfast consisting of a handful of Excedrin, coffee, and a Egg McSheraton, I reunited with the extremely hilarious Jasmine Davila. Jasmine is a friend from usenet days, and I was glad to see her again, because after only a decade or so of living in the same city and never seeing each other, I thought it was time. Not that we're misanthropic geeks or anything like that.

Throughout the day I took every chance to renew my acquaintance with some of the incredible women I was lucky enough to meet at Blissdom: Alli Worthington, Mary Anne of Stiletto Mom, Amy of OutdoorDogs, Rachel of Southern Fairy Tale, Annisa Mayhew, Kelby Carr, Catherine of Her Bad Mother, Sugar Jones, Casey (moosh in Indy) and Tanis a/k/a Redneck Mommy. (See, the advantage of going to a small conference like BlissDom is that you meet so many amazing bloggers and they all become your new best friends so you can totally assault them when you see them at big conference like BlogHer. Just so you know.)

Met TW and then didn't recognize her when she strolled past working a very retro red and white dress. Because I am just that much of a dork.

Around lunch time blackbird and I went to the Swap Meet and met Kristen of Mommy Needs a Cocktail, her four-month old son, and her inventory of amazingly clever t-shirts. Did I tell you I got her to make special Mamarazzi t-shirts for my Awesum Cocktail Party? Well, I did.

I'm not just a pal of Kristen's; I'm a client.

And of course, Kristen was hosting the Mommy Needs a Cocktail Party on Friday night. We started the evening there and made free with the chocolate fountains, tiaras, and booze. It didn't take us long to hook up with Jen Lancaster as well as some of Jen's posse: Kristabella, MaNiC Mommy, and tutugirl. I also met and hung out with middle-aged-woman and the Hotfessional. And Velma!

Me, Susie Sunshine, and Wendy. You're no one until blackbird has chopped the top of your head off.

Next door at the Mamapop party I hurled myself in a pathetic fangirl fashion at Schmutzie, The Palinode, and of course, Sweetney, who had to deal with drunk Poppy not once but twice. Lucky her. (I also disco-danced with blackbird. Apparently we're on video, so somebody somewhere has a big future in blackmailing.)

Another picture stolen from blackbird. Notice how I limit myself to a black and red color scheme? Like a POPPY. Also, see my clutch? bird gave it to me. And she bought it on Etsy--which is coolness cubed.

Saturday morning called for another Excedrin breakfast, and then I sat and thought hard about the panels. The ones I really, really wanted to go to were on Saturday. The Vaginally-Challenged panel. The Humor Panel. The Blogging as Storytelling Panel. The MamaPop panel. But I was hosting a cocktail party on Saturday night, and I know myself. If I had gone to the panels I'd try to listen, but my brain would be yammering HAVE YOU ORDERED ENOUGH ICE and MAYBE THERE WON'T BE ENOUGH FOOD and WHEN WILL THE T-SHIRTS SHOW UP so I figured I'd better skip them all.

Let the following row of dots represent my attempts to chill out and take a disco nap on Saturday:

...

So we head straight to my Saturday night party, where many of the above-linked people were in attendance. And the really cool thing is that people brought friends, so I had the chance to meet people in an atmosphere where I could actually hear what they had to say. Like Vodkamom, and Cinnamon, and Alli's adorable assistant Cassie. And Alli's super-talented, adorable, charming pal Chris Mann. And a bunch of people from one of the panels called something like "Hey, I'm More Than My Disease, For Christ's Sake," like ChronicBabe and Rachel and MajorBedhead. Many of them were dia-babe-alicious, so when I gave them their bags of custom Mamarazzi M&Ms, I made sure they were the bags that were really hard to open. I like to think of it as my contribution to their future well-being.

Picture totally stolen from Kerri Sparling of sixuntilme. I think of it as a digital swag bag.

We had what I think I can describe without hyperbole (but with plenty of cliché) as a magical evening up on the rooftop deck of my building. Some of us even got to watch the Venetian Night fireworks. And all of us got to drink and lounge around on chaise longues and eat turkey roll-ups and hang with each other.

And then the party guests went home and I put my blood alcohol level and my vocal chords to bed.

I love BlogHer. I wish you could have all been there.

It's so not about the swag.

* Maybe this part of things wasn't all that hard on him.
** OK, maybe I could have done without that part.