E! Turns 20 with Hollywood Birthday Celebration

What happens when an entertainment company like E! turns 20-years-old? It has a star-studded poolside birthday party in Hollywood of course, not some Malibu or San Diego vacation rentals. On the rooftop at The London in West Hollywood, the event featured celeb guests who are often featured in E! programming, yet for tonight they all came together to celebrate the last two decades of entertainment gossip, red carpets and reality TV in true Hollywood style.

Meanwhile down in the lobby, stars walked the red carpet on their way up to the party like E!'s Ryan Seacrest and the Kardashian family as well as other celebs including: Ne-Yo, Lil Jon, Stephanie Pratt, Sophia Bush, Jana Kramer, Donald Faison, Katharine McPhee and Bon Jovi's Richie Sambora. Who was I most excited to see though? David Arquette! Sadly, he didn't end up showing.

E!'s Chelsea Handler was also a no show and Sophia Bush of One Tree Hill told the press that she was planning on buying the comedienne a Belvedere, so was sad that she wasn't there. I wonder if Sophia knew it was an open bar and CIROC was the only liquor flowing. (Continue reading my story at Huffington Post and watch the video )

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Addicted to a humidifier

I never thought about owning a humidifier, never mind blogging about it, but here I go. Whether it's because of allergies, the desert climate, traveling so often on planes, a dry apartment or haven had a broken nose, I've been congested and having trouble breathing at night. Back when I was at The Housewares show in Chicago though, I mentioned seeing a lot of cool mist humidifiers on display and after talking with the folks at Crane, I decided to start using one regularly and It's done wonders for me! I'm now addicted to my humidifier and look forward to breathing in it's clean fumes.

Since I was going to get a humidifier, I figured I might as well make it a fun looking one and not like the giant boxes that I grew up with, so I selected Crane's Pink Ribbon tear drop shaped humidifier ($35, Amazon) for my bedroom. It features the Pink Ribbon since partial proceeds go towards the fight of breast cancer too. I found that it's really easy to fill up the tank and clean it. It also has a dial where you can select the different speed and intensity of the mist. I'm really loving how it starts blowing out air as soon as I turn it on, and the minute I breathe into the steam, my congestion clears. I've been using it almost every night when I go to bed. It's also energy efficient, as it uses less energy than a regular household light bulb.

Benefits of a humidifier:

• Reduces headaches, discomfort, tiredness and sickness associated with dry air
• Due to the outbreak of swine flu more doctors are recommending cool mist humidifiers again because they are a more natural remedy for colds than overusing medicines.
• Can help you recover sooner from a cold
• Reduces levels of dust
• Helps you sleep better
• Reduces chapped lips, dry, red eyes and itchy skin - as much as 60% of the human body is composed of water. When the air around you is dry it will draw moisture from any available source, including human cells, membranes and even your skin and lips

The one I had at home wasn't enough though as I've now taken to traveling with the Air-O-Swiss travel ultrasonic humidifier ($49.95, Amazon) for "healthy air anywhere," which I received free for review. If you're picturing me lugging around some big machine, it's not as cumbersome as you'd think, but is really meant for traveling since it is lightweight and comes in a tiny travel bag. It also utilizes empty water bottles as the detachable water tank, thus a good chance to reuse those bottle that you end up drinking when traveling anyway. One water bottle usually lasts through the night if not longer and it automatically shuts off and the light turns red when empty. I simply put it on the nightstand near my bed, fill a water bottle from the sink and it quickly spews out cool mist into the room as soon as I plug it in. Maybe it's the air condition or heating vents in the rooms, but I'm always stuffy in hotels, so this has been a great solution. The photo above was taken in my room on my recent trip to Vancouver.

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Trying the Balblair Highland Scotch

Last night, I was invited to a special tasting of Balblair, a Highland single malt scotch whisky as it made it's U.S. debut in LA. I like Scotch, however, I don't always drink it and am far from a connoisseur, unlike the guys from the LA Scotch Club that were there or even my girls Esther and Caroline who are known to order Scotch when out. My father actually trained himself to drink Scotch since it causes less of a hangover due to the lack of sugar. I guess I need more practice then as I still make that scrunched up face like I just sucked on a lemon after I take a sip.

While at the party and hanging with eStarLA, Gourmet Pigs, ShopEatSleep, StreetGourmetLA and Lost Angeles, I also got to speak with Andy Hannah of Balblair. He told me that only seven men work and operate their Highland distillery and that it is one of the world's oldest working distilleries dating back to 1790 of the Clan Ross. I also asked him what Balblair means and apparently it's an old highland term for Battlefield. I like that.

Balblair comes in different vintages (yup, like wine) and being sold in the states now are their '91 and '97 vintages. I was told to try the 1991 as it was smoother, while the 1997 is spicy and fruity. Being a Scotch novice, I went with smooth and tried the Balblair '91 and definitely agreed. It was so smooth in fact that I didn't make my typical lemon face afterwards. The Balblair '91 is golden honey in color and retails for $129.99 a bottle. It is described to have chocolate, toffee and leather hints, yet has a vanilla oak fragrance to it. Soon I was talking like Anchorman's Ron Burgundy and singing, "I love scotch. Scotchy, scotch, scotch. Here it goes down, down into my belly..."

The 1997 was indeed spicier, more amber in color and it lit my tongue on fire. After the burn settled it was also enjoyable and is more reasonably priced at $64.99 a bottle. If you don't want to invest in those prices though you can order a Balblair neat, on the rocks or in a cocktail at The Edison, The Thirsty Crow, The Palm in downtown, Checkers Hotel and Gassers in Redondo Beach. For my New Yorkers, you can also try Balblair at the Soho Grand and Tribeca Grand hotels.

Cheers!

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CPK Small Cravings are a big deal

My blogger friend Jon at LA Snark recently offered me some free CPK bucks (gift certificate) to try out California Pizza Kitchen's new small cravings menu, which is their new small plates menu that ranges in price from $4-$7. I've always been a fan of the chain, so I said sure, why not?! Even though I like their five cheese and tomato pizza on honey wheat dough, I had never really tried anything else besides their pizzas and wine, so I wasn't sure what to expect.

My husband chose the The Sweet Corn Tamale Ravioli, which wasn't what I thought it would be. I figured something with a red chili sauce that I wouldn't like, but it came out with a creamy Alfredo sauce, with sweet white corn on top and I ended up stealing his plate. The dish looked like typical pasta ravioli, but it had the consistency and taste of the corn mold from a tamale. It really threw us for a loop--in a good way. If that dish was served to us at some chic LA restaurant, I would have said it was inventive and then been surprised it came from CPK.

I also ordered The Wedge Salad from the same menu, which was a nice portion, not too big and not too small. It came with a slice of iceberg lettuce topped with blue cheese dressing, applewood smoked bacon, chopped egg and really fresh tomatoes. Best of all, no onions, yick.

I'm seriously not blowing smoke up anyone's %&* when I say that I'd definitely go back for both of those plates in the future. Especially since the one near me has take out, which you can order ahead of time online (I'm lazy like that) and then pick up. You can do it through their iPhone app too, but that would require that I borrow Raphael's and he doesn't always like to share it.

Oh, and a funny thing, after we ordered our two small craving items, a cup of soup, wine and individual pizzas our waiter commented, "wow, that's a lot of food!" Hmph I could have done without that color commentary from mister skinny wannabe actor, especially since we were hungry and ate almost all of the meal sans a few slices of pizza that we took home with us and had for lunch the next day.

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Race to Erase MS celeb gala with Paris Hilton

On Friday evening at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza, the 17th Annual Race to Erase MS gala co-chaired by Nancy Davis and Tommy Hilfiger was just getting started with a star studded orange carpet, followed by a dinner, live auction and performances by Heart and Avril Lavigne. (Read more in my Huffington Post article)

Outside of what is mentioned in my piece though, I wanted to tell you how impressed I was with Heart's performance. Man, she can still belt it out! Now wouldn't you, barracuda?

And although I'm hardly a fan of Paris Hilton's I couldn't help but sneak a photo of me with her in the background. HOT! ;)

Here are some more of my "orange" carpet photos with Avril Lavigne, Buzz Aldrin, Tom Arnold, Brooke Burke, Anne Heche, Kelly Rutherford, The Bachelor's Melissa Rycroft, Dancing with the Stars' Louis Van Amstel and Tony Dovolani and Olympian Apolo Ohno

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A Wedding in Tampa

Last weekend, I had a mini high school reunion of sorts as I traveled to Tampa for my friend Dawn's wedding, who moved to the Sunshine State a couple of years ago and met her husband. Since I love weddings, I thought I'd share some of the fun details from her big day with you.

In the gazebo where she was wed, these lanterns kept fluttering in the gentle breeze, which looked both elegant and also provided an Asian nod to her groom's heritage.



On each seat rested a wooden hand fan and program.


At the end of each row hung a pail filled with pink rose petals. In lieu of a flower girl, guests at the end of the row were asked to throw the petals on the runway before the bride passed. I had never seen this done before and liked the new tradition.

Instead of the traditional and over used party favors, I was particularly drawn to the handmade jams sealed in jars on the table with their personal sticker and Wedding date on the lid and tied together with a ribbon. TSA unfortunately confiscated these jars from me on my way home though :(

And what wedding recap would be complete without a photo of the wedding cake? And it was yummy too.

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