Boston Tea Party 2013 Update #1
First day of Spring! And it’s SNOWING in Boston?
That was us yesterday, on our way from DC to Boston Tea Party for the 10th year in a row. We have a ritual. Every year we say “Why do we want to go north where it’s gray and bitter and the ground is covered with snow when yesterday out the kitchen window we spied yellow petals on the forsythia and green daffodil shoots poking up under the maple tree? Where in four days the cherry blossoms will explode into billows of pink fluff along the Potomac and the streets of our nation’s capitol will look like they’re lined with cotton candy?
So remind me again – why are we going up there to a Lindy event? The biggest Lindy event in the country? What was the thinking here?
This is us every year as the plane lifts off and we scowl out the window watching Spring tilt away beneath us.
And every year on Sunday after Awards we say Holy Shizmanoly TeaPartyOly what a CRAZY great weekend I haven’t laughed so hard in years great social dancing great energy OMG the invitational the crossover funniest thing I’ve ever seen in my life what a show what fun -
What a great event!
Let’s never miss this EVER. Put this on the calendar for next year.
Don’t forget okay?
So here we are again and what do you know! It’s already fun. The event hasn’t even started and it’s fun. Registration is fun. The registrar people are fun. They’re bouncy. They only hire cool bouncy people to be registrars here. I bet they have registrar parties. I want to be a registrar. Registration is fast, too – since noon it’s been a steady stream of dancers signing up for comps, getting banded, picking up packets, and no line all day. Cause it’s all so well organized – pick up your packet and go (packets stuffed this year by 8-year-old Gracie – the competitive cheerleader-turned–gymnast, scrumptious adorable daughter of event directors Steve and Rebecca … here’s Gracie last year dusting the ballroom ceiling with her hair:
and here:
and here are Melissa Rutz and friends trying to outdo Gracie.)
Now we remember that we actually love how this is a combined West Coast/Lindy event. Lindy-Hoppers have cool hair and wear cool hats and flowers behind their ears and frilly bloomers. Lindy is our Brotha-From-Anotha-Motha. Same dance different dialects like Parisians and Québecois.
Which is what makes the late-nite crossover social-dance room the craziest, most wide-open, interesting and creative room of the three all-nite floors.
Speaking of social dancing – last night’s Thursday Kickoff dance was pretty good. Mostly local dancers I would guess – we didn’t recognize anyone from outside the US or outside Boston, really. Joe Mahoney DJ’d and the floor stayed full all night. When we left at 1am I’d guess about 30 couples on the floor, another 50 people milling around the periphery.
Breakfast buffet in the restaurant here but no dinner buffet. Two restaurants and a snack/cafe kind of place in lobby, all open til midnight, supermarket and liquor store an 8-minute walk away. The event provides a midnight breakfast Friday and Saturday nights. This is the hotel I’ve written about which overlooks the Charles River – one entire wall of the restaurant is glass from floor to ceiling, quite beautiful if you, like I, are mesmerized by light and shadow and the play of sun on windy water. Geese bobbing about, honking, making their opinions known all day long.
[six hours later]
- A 15-piece band is playing live as I write this, in the Lindy room! The White Heat Swing Orchestra! How cool is that?
- Gracie did back flips and cartwheels across the floor! And then back again! And then back the other way again! And then back again! She’s way too cute. She might teach a gymnastics/cheer-leading workshop! I am SO taking that workshop if Gracie teaches.
Tonight we watched the Open west coast and Lindy strictlys followed by the Invitational west coast and Lindy strictlys.
Open: Two heats, twenty couples in each. Our emcee is Rob Glover, John Lindo is DJ, Judges are Tatiana, Melissa Rutz, Benji, Torri, and Chief Judge Angel.
Songs:
- “Lost Control/Let Me Down” (Keri Hilson)
- “Tell Me Why” (Joe Louis Walker)
- “Boom Boom” (Justice Crew)
- “Slow It Down” (Tyga)
- “Little By Little” (Kirk Fletcher)
- “Beauty and The Beat” (Bieb)
Seven couples in the Invitational
Rob, in is wonderful Cockney accent: “Your music choices are either a mish-mash of slow, kind of a potpourri if you will, a mixed-up mish-mash potpourri of slow – I don’t know what that means I was just told that’s what I need to say. Or fast. Mish-mosh or fast, those are your choices. Victor told me to say that.”
Seven GREAT dances:
- John Lindo and Melissa Rutz danced to “Boom Boom,”
- Arjay and Torri to “I Can Only Imagine,”
- Ben and Jessica to “Reign,”
- Jordan and Tatiana to “Suit and Tie,”
- Kyle and Sarah to “Novacane,”
- Benji** and Patty Vo to “Things Are Changing,”
- Angel and Jennifer Lyons to “Valerie,”
- and the All-Skate to “Imma Go.”
Midnight breakfast buffet (eggs, bacon, sausage, potatoes, muffins, bagels) and late-nite social dancing. Such good dancing in the ballrooms right now! Tomorrow – Jack and Jills!
**Heard tonight that I’ve been misspelling Benji’s name in addition to randomly calling him Brennar. What a numbskull Liza geesh. It’s like finding out I smiled for a picture with a large leaf of spinach stuck on my tooth.