At a common friend of ours’ house a few weeks ago, Mr. T somehow cajoled me into throwing another party at his house.

Cajoled?

Who am I kidding? I love the party spotlight, but New York house party planning is a big responsibility – a task I felt up to in the dog days of July over my birthday, but the current winter rain, sleet, snow, workload and overall depression doesn’t really make for the best party ambiance. Everyone’s fighting off a cold and already drunk on Nyquil. Why leave the house in below freezing weather to get buzzed?

Initially, I thought Mr. T was throwing this party idea around just to be nice. As the weeks pushed on, it became apparent that he was entirely serious. Having sprung from the womb of Olympic level worrier (my mother) I had the following concerns:

1. On the scheduled party date (Tuesday the 18th) many people would already be out of town

2. We’d be throwing a party on a weekday and it wasn’t joyous summer anymore

3. Our last party, was so incredibly fun and successful we were setting ourselves up for failure in comparison

A last minute crisis occurred when my trusty right hand girl Bartok, who had helped out tremendously during my birthday, was rushed to hospital and diagnosed with bronchitis. I spoke to her on the phone briefly and she could only deliriously drone on about some reoccurring nightmare involving a Michael Kors tote bag she’d seen at a discount store that had been unjustly swiped from her by a female shopping competitor. I was glad her painkillers were working, but saddened she wouldn’t be coming to New York. This meant I was essentially flying solo with the aid of my roommate Tatas and Mr. T’s girlfriend. My state of panic heightened.

Why panic you say? “It’s a party. It’s about having fun.”

Wrong.

That’s like saying New York relationships are about love and happiness when clearly they’re about winning. Same with parties. Fun? It’s about demonstrating your PR skills and making sure everyone else has a fabulous time. If you manage to stick a crab cake in your mouth or enjoy a glass of rose’ while doing it that’s great, but not the point. It’s a hostess’ responsibility to make sure that the music’s right, that everyone meets everyone, that everyone has someone to talk to, that no one’s destroying private property in the corner, and most importantly, to make sure the party doesn’t suck.

Envision all your guests at work the next day when someone asks them, “What did you do last night?” A hostess’ job is to make it impossible for them to say: “Just went to some lame-ass house party.” That statement is the jagged-edged, rusty dagger in every hostess’ central artery. This cannot be their response. You must create such an aura of bliss that the next day people won’t mind that they’re hung over. They’ll respond, “I went to this awesome party. You won’t believe what happened _____.”

That’s a lot of pressure for one person to deal with. Maybe this is why when over the course of the night people asked me if I was having fun I’d tilt my head incredulously and look at them as if they’d just landed from Mars (before plastering on a smile and vigorously nodding.)

Upping the party-planning stakes once again after the absence of Bartok was the discovery of the iPhone’s fatal flaw:

You can’t send group text messages.

I’ll write it again: You can’t send group text messages.

I’d heard this rumor before purchasing the iPhone, but quickly laughed it off as absurd. I’d attributed the rumors to jealous iPhone haters and people who were too stupid to know how to work the thing. Apple wouldn’t make a tri-band device with the most intelligent keyboard known to man, an iPod, a web browser, a camera, a computer that fits into the palm of your hand and not include the ability to forward an SMS or send group texts. That thought’s just as silly as snow in Miami in July.

But it’s true.

For two days I refused to believe it. I researched online; I even went to the SoHo Apple store. There a worker with a nametag that said Jason confirmed my biggest fear.

“They’re working on a solution. The feature will be added and available for download sometime in February.”

Me: “But my iPhone’s smarter than me. It’s a work of genius! How is it possible they overlooked this essential feature the clunkiest, old school Nokia has?”

Jason explained that the developers probably tried, but the program that enabled this feature had too many bugs in it to be released. My next question was why they’d release the phone at all when it had such a fatal flaw. Then things started to get heated and I could tell Jason wanted to kill me. He feigned sympathy as I explained I had some very important party invites I had to spam out to everyone in my address book. He just shrugged his shoulders and said “email it to them.”

Ha.

Anyone who’s ever attended an event knows that emailing is not enough. People need to have the party info on their phones in order to show. For me to voluntarily make it somewhere to have fun with no personal motive attached I need to be spammed at least three times. And I think I’m more attentive and organized than your average Manhattener.

Despite the multiple, escalating layers of panic (living up to the last party, no Bartok, no group SMS) I managed to relax enough to properly prepare on party day. Mr. T’s girlfriend was incredibly sweet and helpful and we did all the shopping together. Tatas and I managed to assemble outfits we were both happy with, and word of the fiesta naturally spread. Overall, the party was an enormous success and from the feedback I received up to this point, a good time was had by all.

There were however, certain humorous crisis situations during the party that my average guest was hopefully not aware of. These to be divulged at a later date.

To Be Continued…