Brian Lawrence Live

Wed., May 7
I was invited to this year’s Greater Baltimore Committee annual gala at the Hyatt by the folks at The Classic Catering People, who had reserved a table. We had a fun table, though there was little opportunity to chat as there were speeches going on pretty much throughout the dinner. But I did get to talk a bit with Eddie Dopkin from Classic and Marc Kantrowitz, managing director of the Charity Tennis Classic. My pet peeve: due to another event, I missed the 5:00-6:00 cocktail hour, and when I arrived at 6, they promptly closed all the bars and refused to serve any more drinks for the rest of the evening. “OK,” I thought, “They’ll serve wine with dinner.” Well, no. Iced tea only. Really? I proceeded to get up and go two flights up and buy some drinks from the hotel bar and bring them back to the table. But seriously, do they really need to put the kibosh on liquor promptly at 6 o’clock? What’s up with that? Then there were a list of speeches and awards to sit through— a total snoozefest. Do they really expect people to sit through a program like that these days? With no booze? Thankfully, the after-dinner speaker was MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, who was worth the wait. However, as soon he finished, all 900 guests bolted for the doors. A follow-up act had been booked— a George Bush impersonater (a rather tasteless choice, I thought). Too bad no one wanted to stick around for his performance. Everyone fled, and the last thing I heard was him begging people to come back, from the stage.