Boogie Woogie

Last night we got dressed up and went into town to help out as volunteers at The Mendocino Art Center for their 50th Anniversary Rhododendron Ball. We were recruited for this last minute mostly due to the fact that Billy was sporting his state parks volunteer name badge the other day when we stopped in to see what was new at the art center's galleries. The guy who runs the gallery took one look at Billy and exclaimed... "Volunteers?! We NEED you! Can you help us HERE on Saturday night?" All he had to say after that was free champagne and fancy chocolate desserts all night long and we we sold. This was a "Black Tie Affair" which in Mendocino means "take a shower and definitely wear shoes." So we did. I have a 70's maxi dress that I scored along time ago at an estate sale in Santa Fe that I have never had occasion to wear so I busted it out last night. It is a perfect Mendocino dress being that it is a photo fabric with an endless image of beach stones on it. It's very hippie, very ME and I was stoked to get to finally wear it. To further develop my look I even went so far as to wear my vintage Minnetonka moccasin boots in lieu of more proper heels. It was big fun.


The woman whose family founded the art center set us up with the easy job of maintaining the coffee, dessert plates and napkins for the night. No biggie. I went ahead and did the dishes as they came in as well. That was not my favorite thing to do but I could not stand the visual of them stacking up on the small countertop of the wee little kitchen. Other than that we were free to hang out eat cream puffs and if we had the guts to hit the dance floor we totally could have. They had a great little swing band playing. The crowd was all definitely well above and beyond our age range.... but holy crap they were cuttin' it UP out on the dance flo'. There was one couple in particular that I was basically in awe of. This photo lacks the movement and excitement to convey what they were pulling off out there but it does succeed in showing you how darned cute they were.




I mean it when I say that guy was fully living up to his outfit. He was kickin' it. They danced like fiends the whole night. I was tuckered out just watching them.

The only action shot I was able to land all night was Billy puttin' the hurt on yet another chocolate cream puff. Pardon the blurry nature of the photo but he was moving pretty fast.



My funniest moment of the night was while shooting the pictures of the dancing pros. I was leaning in a door frame and Billy had been standing right behind me also watching them dance. I was paging through the images I had just shot on my Nikon view screen to find the best one to show to Billy and I turned back facing right into his chest and announced rather loudly "Dude! I F*cking LOVE those two!" (For those of you who don't know me I have a mouth like a drunken sailor.) Then I realized that Billy was not wearing a caramel colored leather jacket and that I was nestled into the chest of a total stranger. I looked up into his startled face (which at that moment was like 4 inches away from mine) and I pulled of a rock solid "I meant to do that moment" by continuing to rave to him about the dancing couple as I slowly backed out of his personal space. Geeezus. I really can create some memorable moments. Anyway... the guy ended up to be an artist named Peter Masters and his work (glass medium) is really cool. Billy and I stood around talking to him for awhile so I think we were both healed of the awkward social moment I had flung upon us. You can see some his work HERE.

Around 9:30 we had had our full share of the scene which was starting to look a bit like this...



which translates fully to "ZZzzzzzzzzzz...time to go." No offense to the peeps at the event! I was just ready for pajamas and to sleep off the sugar rush I was in the full grip of.

We are coming in to the final days of prep for our trip south to Carmel for Billy's painting competition. We leave this next Saturday! We can't wait to go and hit the beach in Carmel. Everyone start sending Billy your good vibes for the paint out! Dudes... he is in it to win it.