The Champagne Is Not Korbel

And then there were four. To complete the trip, our fourth partner, Stacy, arrived by train at 4:00 pm on Thursday. Our pitch meeting ended later that anticipated, but exactly at the right time to get to the train station and pick up Stacy. Of course, the directions to the train station were on John G's bed in the Quality Inn. Somehow, we managed to navigate without any wrong turns to Union Station where we circled and circled and circled looking for Stacy, who swore she was sitting on a bench right in front.

We finally dropped Melissa off so she can search for Stacy. She returned to the car with the same conclusion that John G and I had: Union Station is not a train station. That would explain the lack of train tracks. Stacy was in fact at King Street Station directly across the street. That would be the station where all the trains were sitting. The one with the very big clock tower.

With the four of us at long last finally assembled, it was time to begin the important work of this business trip/offsite: CELEBRATING!

"I have had a lot of great vintages of Dom Perignon, but I do not remember any as impressive as the 1996. Even richer than the brilliant 1990, the 1996 is still tightly wound, but reveals tremendous aromatic intensity, offering hints of bread dough, Wheat Thins, tropical fruits, and roasted hazelnuts. Medium to full-bodied, with crisp acidity buttressing the wines wealth of fruit and intensity, it comes across as extraordinarly zesty, well-delineated, and incredibly long on the palate. Moet-Chandon deserves considerable accolades for this prodigious example of Dom Perignon. Anticipated maturity: now-2020+"
-Wine Advocate

I had been saving a bottle of 1996 Dom Perignon I received from a good friend (and VP at Waggoner Edstrom) as a 40th birthday present for a very special occassion. What could be more special than celebrating the start of a great new PR agency? And so our night of celebration began with a toast (followed by more toasts) to our imminent success.

With a champagne buzz lifting our spirits very high, we headed off to the Dahlia Lounge for dinner. Melissa chose the Dahlia Lounge because it was the site of the first PR activity we conducted in Seattle. Of course, she attended the round-table that she put together. I fell ill and had to miss it. But the Dahlia Lounge has sentimental value, and was the perfect place to continue our celebration, especially since two former colleagues and good friends who now call Seattle their home would join us for dessert and drinks. Ellio and Patrick worked with Melissa and were part of the great iPass team at Hoffman in the glory days. The vibe of success was now all around us!

Dinner was fantastic. The conversation was lively. And it was really good to catch up with Ellie and Patrick (the use of "Ellio" previously is not a typo, but her name really is Ellie). It was also great to be in the company of all my partners, telling war stories, laughing and generally having a great time.

We had to end the night earlier than we would have preferred as we had to be looking sharp for our headshots Friday morning. But that, my friends, will be the subject of another post (at least one).