Bar Exam

I went to a cosmo melee/Sex and the City screening party at
El Gaucho’s fancy bar and the Big Picture last week, and all I got was
this truly fantastic “BOTOX® (Botulinum Toxin Type
A)” T-shirt. No, no: I got a BOTOX T-shirt and much, much more,
including all-I-could-eat mini crab cakes, multiple pink drinks, and a
temporary lobotomy in the form of the movie (not all that temporary,
actually: It is approximately 17 hours long).

The T-shirt came from the event’s goody bag, a bottomless pit of
multifarious charms issued to each of the 87 women and 1 man in
attendance. (The event sold out two nights, $85 a ticket; the man on
the first night was someone’s paragon of a husband, standing stoically
at the bar as the whole room purred its approval.) Accompanying the
T-shirt (with the “toxin” right there on it!) was a BOTOX pen (or
possibly a self-injector?) and a coupon for $50 off my first treatment
(wisdom from the movie: “Unlike relationships, BOTOX always works!”). Also: a mini-vibrator from Babeland with accompanying
Babeland-brand AA batteries dated “MAR 2008,” a book called Getting Into Your Pants (because if you can’t get into
your own pants, whose pants can you get into?), a travel mug
sponsored by Certified Angus Beef® that I like to call my Meat Mug
(soon to be ® by me), Sweet Decadence chocolates, sparkly tissue
paper, and much, much more. If one were to redeem all the additional
gift certificates, one would be airbrushed, tightened, serviced,
contoured, removed, rejuvenated, redefined (via Restylane® or
Perlane®, neither of which sounds adequately toxic), and find
oneself at Chopstix, the dueling piano bar, with a plus one and a
Certified Angus Beef product in hand. The bounty!

Prior to the movie, a debonair silver fox of a bartender mixed
countless cosmopolitans as high heels and enormous handbags moved
about silently, the conversations of their conveyors reaching a
deafening volume. Estrogen/ERT filled the remaining airspace in the
dim, subterranean Pampas Room. Soon enough, the sisterhood of the
Sex series—an essentially sweet-hearted if often appalling
celebration of feminine bonds, sexual freedom, emotional vagaries,
materialism, and much, much more—asserted itself via toasts,
gales of screaming laughter, and strangers complimenting each
other’s attire.

The party stampeded to the Big Picture, where everyone was
administered an additional cosmopolitan (at the Pampas, made with fresh
lime; here, tasting like melted strawberry Jell-O). Inside the theater,
popcorn was distributed to unaccountable excitement. An attendee
briefly adopted emcee duties, standing in front and shrieking “SEX AND
THE CITY!” to universal delight. The movie began. It still has not
ended.

The Pampas Room, 2505 First Ave, 728-1337.