Parties You Will Never Get Into

With the opening of a W Hotel nearby, The White House has effectively extended its corridors of power—suites. Its new neighbor, reckoning with the world’s most powerful environs, in turn mounted a party of presidential proportions.

W Hotel officially opened its Washington DC branch Oct. 8 with an extravagant fete unseen since the Barack Obama inaugural balls. Over 500 invitees, including a few White House staffers, partied in the American capital’s hottest new hotel.

Locals surely could not miss where party central was that night. Awash in purple lights, the hotel glaringly stood out at its address in 515 15th Street.

Outside the building, a carpet of the same color rolled out for the stellar guests. Presidential speechwriter Cody Keenen walked the purple carpet, along with Obama Presidential Aide Reggie Love; Associate Social Secretary Samantha Tubman; POTUS Secretary Katie Johnson; and Assistant White House Chef Sam Kass.

Also in the District of Columbia that night were Hollywood actors Emmy Rossum, Tatyana Ali and Anthony Mackie. They breathed the same air as ambassadors (Stuart Holliday, Gilles Noghès), lobbyists (Jack Quinn, Lyndon Boozer) and many other politicos.

One serious time warp ushered guests inside. Men and women, dressed in 18th century costumes, were paid to traipse around the party.

For his part, W Hotel’s resident restaurateur Jean-Georges Vongerichten cloyed attendees with bite-sized burgers, spring rolls, mini chicken samosas, oysters on half shells, and crab fritters. From the open bar, guests could guzzle mojitos, Circoc vodka cocktails, and other tippler’s delights.

So many sports deities came to savor these treats. Wizards DeShawn Stevenson, Caron Butler and Brendan Haywood were spotted at the party, and so were Capitol’s Jose Theodore, Brooks Laich, and Nicklas Backstrom. Blue Mercury founders Barry Jon Beck and Marla Malcolm Beck also came to party.

Grammy-winning artist John Legend served as the musical guest. In a rare feat for a party entertainer, the “Ordinary People” singer managed to play for nearly an hour.

It was that one day of the year again, when the commander-in-chief of a superpower traipses on a garden with basketfuls of goodie for children. On March 24, 2008, U.S. President George Bush and wife Laura played peachy hosts-with-the-most for the annual White House Easter Egg roll.

That frosty Easter Monday morning, 22,000 people who had snapped up free tickets trooped to the hallowed South Lawn of the White House. President Bush decided his demographic that day would be tots seven and younger. For once, children, not heads of state, strolled around the manicured lawn.

Kids were treated to great food, and entertainment running the gamut from egg coloring to face painting to magic shows. They were also given a head start in politics, rubbing elbows with larger-than-life characters like Tweety Bird, The Cat in the Hat, Clifford the Big Red Dog, Charlie Brown, and of course, cute Easter Bunnies.

Teen sensation Jonas Brothers brought the house down with rocking musical performances onstage. On a more subdued note, the artist named Wyland organized painting activities commemorating the chosen theme of the year, Ocean Conservation.

No less than the First Lady told the children stories. Likewise, other renowned personalities grabbed the respite of reading to other people’s children. Readers even included secretaries and other high-ranking White House officials. There was also ex-Dallas Cowboy Troy Aikman and TV star Kyle Massey. But then again, Nancy Tafuri and Rosemary Wells, children’s book authors, were on hand for good measure.

But the children were most giddy about the Egg Roll itself. Precocious competitors toted giant spoons to push 7,500 eggs across the patch of greens in the Egg Roll. Others never said die to the egg hunts, which involved 3,200 colored eggs. Still there were those kids content with coloring plain hard-boiled eggs, some 4,500 of them. When the revelry ended at 2pm, children took home with them a commemorative Easter egg of wood.

President Bush was hardly the first one to hold Egg Rolls though. He was part of a long line of U.S. presidents, starting with Rutherford B. Hayes in 1878.