photo by Jack GouldWe were worried. Yes, we wanted the complimentary haircut and color by Jon Caputi, who had once assisted on Princess Di's microweave (the People's Princess spent $1,450 every six weeks just for her highlights, Caputi claims). We also wanted the complimentary facial. And the complimentary massage. And the complimentary manicure and pedicure. We wanted it bad. But we were worried. What if it changed us? What if we turned instantly from your favorite socialist socialite into . . . just a socialite? What would Commie Mom say?
We're proud to say we took that risk, arriving at the new Premier Atelier spa and salon in South Coast Plaza's former Crystal Court at 2 p.m. Saturday for our superduper bribe-athon and exfoliation. And while we may have sloughed off a few of the dead skin cells glued to our arms, hands, face and feet, we're happy to report: still a socialist! Whew!
When we arrived, we were whisked into a darkened room by the Paris-trained facialist Silva(our new best friend), who for more than an hour pummeled, massaged and spritzed us with good-smellin' aromatherapeutic masks before he “extracted.” This means that Silva spent quite a bit of time popping our pimples for us. O, the sorrow of adult acne!
Silva made our life a better place, all to the honeyed sounds of Enya, whom we were shocked to discover we kind of like, whereas before, we'd always wanted to punch her in her dolphin-lovin' throat. Did we mention that Silva is our new best friend?
From there, we were delivered into Caputi's hands for our comped cut, color and blow-dry. We thought he was joking when he said he was going to make our hair look like that shampoo commercial in which the model's hair cascades in slo-mo down her back like Willy Wonka's chocolate river, but it turned out he wasn't joking at all.
By 6 p.m., we were ready for our manicure and pedicure by Christine, a sweet and chatty blonde in her 40s, and by 8:45 p.m. our last coat of polish was being applied. It was extremely discomfiting, though, to have a woman in her 40s sitting on the hard tile floor to cater to us, our small and perfect feet in her lap. Perhaps if she'd had a pillow on which to rest, or some kind of low, milkmaid-like stool, we would have felt different. But she didn't.
We were looking forward with ill-concealed delight to kvetching in dulcet, cultured tones about how exhausted we felt after our day at the spa; we were heading to a debutante do, and we figured this kind of chatter would soon make us bosom friends with all the evening-gowned misses. But the sad fact is, we were exhausted. It was lovely, yes, lovelier than we can even say (and free!), but seven hours is a long damn time. And some ladies do it for entire weekends! O, the demands of beauty! We would end up punching someone in the throat.
And so it was that with a mane of gleaming hair, some rather boiled skin (one never gets a facial the day of an event; still, it felt damned good), and shiny lavender nails, we attended the Young Professionals Against Cancer (YPAC) fete at Newport Beach's Balboa Bay Club. And after seven hours of being fussed over and primped as if we were about to cut the ribbon on Her Majesty's Royal Orphanage and Leper Colony, we still weren't as easily glamorous as the celebutantes (though it was no fault of the Premier Atelier, we assure you). What the hell is wrong with this county?
One of the entertaining things about YPAC is how very elastic their definition of “young” is. Oh, and a large sign invited us to please patronize the event's main sponsors, one of which was Boeing—as if you'd open up your checkbook and buy a 747. The other sponsor, Koll Development Group, is trying so very hard to develop the Bolsa Chica wetlands that it changed its name to Hearthside Homes. It's so much homier that way, you know?
The people at the casino night and dance party were very friendly and fun (probably because we were so well-disguised!), and we enjoyed them all very much, especially our new best friend Diane, a gorgeous, muscular-in-a-feminine-way OC blonde who's probably in her mid- to late 30s. Diane is a PR volunteer for an OC multiple sclerosis charity, having quit her job five years ago due to her own MS. And since she quit, she's just been getting healthier and healthier. Diane brooks no bullshit, and we liked her very much.
But most fun of all, the DJ was the very same one who was at Oktoberfest at Old World Village, where he yelled between each song, “Is this a great party or what???” Should we ever marry, we hope we can book him to tell people, “Okay, all the sexy ladies, make some noise!”
Blind item! Which award-winning OC Metro writer named Kedric Francisreportedly had himself a giant orgy at his downtown LA digs Saturday night? We're not telling!
The orgy—the natural 4 a.m. evolution of what had been merely a giant rocking party complete with our new best friend, a darling young Marxist named Brooke who gave us this United Nations statistic, which we shall pound for the rest of our natural life and possibly beyond: “If the five richest individuals in the world gave up 40 percent of their income for one year, it would pay for the underdeveloped world's education, health care, and [uh, something else] for 20 years”—was held right there in the unnamed Francis' room in the penthouse loft of the historic Alexandria Hotel. You could have knocked us over with a cat-o'-nine-tails when we (that's “we,” singular) awoke Sunday morning, sunlight streaming through the glorious floor-to-20-foot-ceiling windows onto the Art Deco moldings, to hear some girls next to us discussing the putative orgy, which had reportedly been held on a futon a few feet away from the cloud-like bed on which we'd soundly slept. “Orgy?” asked we. “Who had an orgy?”
“[Kedric Francis] did!” the girls enlightened us. “We tried to wake you up to see if you wanted to watch with us, but you were out.” We were heartbroken that we'd missed it; we could have made popcorn and snide but extremely hilarious comments, like singing over and over Morrissey's refrain, “He was the last of the famous international playboys,” which we proceeded to do for the rest of the day anyway, as a large group of us dim-summed in Chinatown, but it would have been much funnier if we'd gotten to do it while the anonymous “Beach Buzz” writer was actually having sex with people.
O, life's bitter dregs.
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