Today I went to the Javits Center for a gift convention. Yes, you heard that right. Gift. Convention. It was for work - basically doing research. I could have gone Monday or Tuesday, but work has been so busy lately, so I wanted to get it out of the way.
Before heading off to 34th Street and Nowhere, I perused the gift convention website to see if any brands popped out at me. I’ve never been to one of these things, and who knows, maybe they give you free stuff, so why not check out places you know you like? (Turned out to be wrong about the free stuff, by the way. Bummersville). Anyhow, seeing the list of vendors didn’t exactly get my blood boiling. I didn’t recognize most of the brands and the ones I did - Crabtree & Evelyn, Anne Geddes - aren’t quite my thing. I figured I’d speed walk through the place, pick up a handful of press kits and call it a day in an hour or so.
First off, an hour in the Javits center? Not really doable. That place is GINORMOUS.
Second, well, there was an entire section of awesome design stuff. Some of it was pretty mainstream and things I had seen before - some organic linen companies and whatnot. But there were several booths of up-and-coming designers, real artists, and many of them New York-based.
If you know me, you know that I go for only one type of guy: Skinny Williamsburg hipster who probably went to Pratt and is a designer. If he’s not gay, I love him.
OMG! This place is crawling with men! And, you don’t even have to be tipsy to get up the courage to talk to them. Genius. Fucking genius. All I had to do was smile, ask about their product, listen to them talk, and then…they gave me their card. I had four phone numbers just. like. that. Okay, so, maybe it’s totally weird to snag a date that way. After all, my e-mail would have to start with the humiliating sentence, “Hi, we met at the gift convention at the Javits Center last week…wanna get a drink and maybe make out?”
Yeah. Maybe better left unpursued.
