Cocktail farewell party

As far as my 10 Things to Do in L.A. list goes...I'm going to call this "partial completion."

One of my coworkers is moving to England this summer. Her fiancee's visa expires soon, and due to complications and legalities, they can't extend it right now. So rather than fight the system, they're both going to pack up and move back to England.  As the fiancee is leaving is two weeks (to set up a home base over there; my coworker will follow about a month later), they held a going-away party this weekend.

So Friday night, we took over the upstairs private room at Monsoon. (That's on Third Street Promenade, so partial completion!) I've been there before for staff holiday parties, and it's always a good time. The food at our holiday parties was always excellent...but this was more of a cocktail/dance party, so I missed the noodles and salmon goodness this time.

I finally got to wear my favorite summertime dress that's too dressy to be a normal summer sundress, but not dressy enough for formal things. It's a nice in-between, summertime cocktail dress, and I didn't even care that it zips up so tightly that it's hard for me to breathe. (Okay, I cared a little.) I actually wrote about buying this dress last year, and my love for it has only grown.

Aside from my dress joy, the rest of the party was great too! I originally coordinated with a coworker/friend so we'd meet out front and arrive at the same time, just in case no one else we knew was there yet. It ended up not being an issue—I easily bounced between groups, as the room was filled with familiar staff and members. (Perks of working at a fitness facility: 1-Daily friendly interactions with not just staff, but also dozens/hundreds of members. 2-Attractive crowd.) So easy to mingle, and as someone who is usually awkward with groups of new people, I really appreciated the familiarity!  I did have my "anchors" that I would return to more often, but overall, I branched out from my normal routine of sticking solely with one core group.

For the sake of my "Things in L.A." list, I'll return to the Promenade another time to fully complete the task. But it was a successful night regardless.

With one of the guests of honor. She's tiny and makes me look like a giant.