How can a conservative fuck like me spend an evening talking to a bunch of liberals and have a good time? Well, when they’re reasonable people like Matt Welch, Brian Linse, Steve Smith, Kevin Drum, Mickey Kaus and Armed Liberal — one can have a very good time, especially when the host is as accommodating as Linse, who not only opened up his liquor cabinet and ordered pizza, he also offered fine selections from his humidor. So what is there to complain about? And Cathy, sorry the picture of you and Kaus didn’t really turn out.

UPDATE: Cecile found us unsafe!

Then I went to another small circle of four male bloggers including Matt Welch. Some mention of Reason and politics here and there interested me as I noticed that they all wore glasses.

I popped a carrot into my mouth and went back to comfortable territory, Amy Alkon.

Amy is indeed safe territory. I’ve been reading her column in the VCReporter for at least six years now. She’s the best advice columnist in the universe, and if your newspaper isn’t running her column, your newspaper is downright primative. Amy, btw, is as lovely and charming as her writing. It was a thrill to meet one of my contemporary prose heroes.

P.P.S: Cecile’s Mom also has a round upof the Linse Affair. And I still say she needs her own domain and the more customizable MT for her blog. It’s brand, and if you’re a freelancer giving away your pearly prose on the net, you should at least (IMHO) get paid back in better branding. But that’s just me.

OK, and it’s confession time … at 3 a.m. last night I only looked at my pictures in preview mode … and I thought Cathy’s eyes were closed, so I skipped over the pic I’m including in this update. Just now I opened it in PhotoShop and I think it really capture’s Cathy’s charm and Mickey’s … um … Mickeyness. Does the picture say they’re married or divorced? I don’t know. I vote for married.

P.P.P.S: More from Drum.

BTW: Key piece of information left out so far … the whole reason for the party, really, was so we could all meet Perry de Havilland and Adriana Cronin of Samizdata.net. I spent a good deal of time talking with Perry, who is quite the urbane Londoner, and London being just about my favorite city that I can’t afford to live in on earth, it was fun talking with him. Here’s more photos. Also, check out Perry’s post on regulatory insanity, which was a topic we discussed briefly.