The Night of the Grand Marnier

Before I get into how Kari and I ended up moving two more times that season, I have to share about the Night of the Grand Marnier. This one goes down in history for Kari and me even though no one else may find it funny. (Kari: Ha! Remember this!!!????)

Kari had been living in San Francisco before she came to Miami and about 2 months into season, her friend, Dante, came out to visit her. Dante was a hairstylist from SF full of mischief and party fever and we just felt it was our responsibility to show him a good time South Beach style. Eileen had gone back to Portland for the month to see her boyfriend so Dante was able to stay with us and we also somehow had acquired a new, temporary roommate from Spain. I don't actually remember how she ended up staying with us or why.....I think her work visa had run out and her agency was giving her the boot which meant she had nowhere to live until she could book a plane back home. Something like that. And I can't for the life of me remember her name, so from this point on I'l call her Ana.

So, there we were, an odd foursome in a little SoBe studio with altogether too much time and privilege on our hands. On South Beach there are always a handful of the "It" clubs (these change from season to season) and each of these offer a different party on a specific night each week. If you aren't booked for the next day, then you go out. That is pretty much it in a nutshell. The VIP sections of these clubs are always full of models and celebs on the designated nights, and when you are a model, you never, ever have to wait in line. We would show up in jeans, tank tops and flip flops and be let in behind the velvet ropes while hordes of regular people would be left dressed to the nines waiting outside.

We had to show Dante what it was like to be a pseudo celeb....so every free night we had that week we took him and Ana out with us....Bar Room, Club Amnesia, Crobar....we were there. We even accepted an invite to go to the Hawaiian Tropics competition and party at Level which was cheesetastic and one step up from going to a strip club. Note: Fashion models can't stand "skin models" calling themselves "models". It lumps us all into the same category, and well, that is just not cool. Sorry to sound like a pretentious bitch, but that is just how it is.

We had fun, but there was nothing close to debauchery going on. No blackout drunkeness or holding back of anyone's hair as they hurled their stomach lining into the commode. So far, Dante was having a great time, but he wasn't yet feeling like a rockstar. So on his last night in Miami we decided we really needed to give him a good send off. A rather large bottle of tequila was purchased along with some 40's and we prefunked at the apartment O.G. style. We'd be heading out to Senor Frog's for their Monday night party and then over to Nikki Beach for Beehive to close the evening out. Between the four of us, that bottle of Cuervo or whatever the hell it was emptied out at the speed of light and after some totally justified mayhem and creative make-up application we made it out the door.

Something wicked this way comes.....in a bottle:



I'm sure you can imagine that at this point we were totally obliterated & I cringe at the thought of what we looked like walking down Collins Ave. Then again, if you are in South Beach and it is past 10 pm and you are not falling down drunk, then you are an anomaly. I do remember at one point (and she swears this didn't happen...lolol!) Kari fell sideways and headfirst into a privet hedge outside a restaurant mid-song....we'd been singing something, and don't ask what cuz I can't remember, at the top of our lungs at that point. Oh, models behaving badly indeed....

Myself, Ana and Dante in full rockstar pose....getting ready....:



At Frog's we hung out with the usual crowd. Monday nights were popular with the model set since it offered $1 beers and live rock bands....and really good nachos. That I know of, nothing much happened there other than we met up with friends and then walked over to Nikki Beach. At the time, Nikki Beach hosted Beehive on Monday nights which was a weekly hip hop party held by my friend, Linley. Anyone from Ice Cube to Eminem, supermodels to Pauly Shore could be seen preening or on the prowl accompanied by their entourages on any given Monday night.

So, we get to Nikki Beach & since it's an outdoor club on the beach itself, we head straight for a table on the sand. At this point my buzz was wearing off and I was feeling that heavy & unpleasant ugh-ness that would always follow one too many drinks for me. It felt good to sit under the stars & feel the ocean breeze...respite from the thick as stew cigarette smoke at Frog's. At this point, Dante parks himself on top of the table and grabs the menu & before we know it he has ordered the cheapest item on it.....A $200 bottle of Grand Marnier. After it arrived, a couple of model boys also mysteriously appeared at our table, no doubt to partake in what would be free booze for them. I was liqoured out and Kari had passed out in full recline position against a palm tree, so Dante and the boys drank the entire bottle of GM. It was about 1 am at this point and being that I was the most sober of the group, I gathered our band of revelers (yes, Ana was still with us, and I am sure she hd wonderful stories to tell her cronies once she got back to Barcelona.....about los Americanos....lolol!) and we headed back to the homestead. Dante had to be at the airport by 6 am.

I'm sure genereal pukeage ensued after we got home, followed by room spin episodes and desperate clutching of pillows and mattresses before consciousness was lost. At 5am, Dante's alarm went off....and it is by the grace of God that it ever got set in the first place. I remember opening my eyes and seeing him pee in the bathroom sink, splash his face with water, tell his reflection he was a rockstar and then leave. That was the last time I ever saw him. A week later he called Kari to say he had never had a better time in his life & to ask if she knew what the $200 charge on his Visa card was from.

The morning after is not good, ever. Here is the ugly I promised to deliver along with the good & the bad...