Gabriella Van der Vyer

Some really fun things have happened in the last 24 hours, y'all.

Let's begin with the scene I caused in the middle of our Christmas party last night. Even though I had it set to be recorded, I really wanted to see the announcement of the Heisman winner live. So we paused our revelries to watch the last 10 minutes, and boy was it worth it. We're all in silence as the envelope is opened, followed by a lot of screams and cheers coming from yours truly after the name Sam Bradford was announced. Everyone kind of stared at me like I had gone crazy, but I wasn't worried.

There aren't a whole lot of details to share about the party otherwise. I mean, it was full of baked goods, wine and champagne, and "put your chin on the table." Yeah, that about sums it up. We might have even watched part of Elf sometime in there.

Today was Christmas shopping day with Justin and Jericho. We met up this afternoon in Chinatown and set off on a knock-off expedition. Sadly, their 9-room purse emporium had been shut down since last weekend (oopsy!), so we had to settle for following enthusiastic salesmen/women into nondescript storefronts. The decision had been made well in advance that we were absolutely not climbing into any vans.

With a little background knowlege on good fakes and a lot of bargaining skills, we ended up hitting the jackpot. I got a very good-looking Chanel 2.55 bag that I will proudly be rocking this holiday. Hmm, I probably shouldn't have announced that it's fake on the internet. Oh well, I'm not concerned. I really wanted to find some black Ray-Ban Wayfarers, but I had no luck there. I even busted out a photo of Rob Pattinson at the MTV Movie Awards on my phone to show the salespeople.

Speaking of RPattz, there was another great purchase I made in Chinatown: High School Musical 3, Australia, oh and TWILIGHT on DVD. Too bad it won't let me fast forward, because if so I'd be watching the baseball scene over and over and over again. And that part where he's rocking the Wayfarers in the parking lot. But I digress...

Our next adventure took us beyond Chinatown down to the Young Designers Showcase in SoHo. This is basically a bunch of trunk shows piled into one gymnasium-style room. The talent in this place was sensational, and they made everything from hand-stitched pillows to crazy "Project Runway" style fashion to the most gorgeous jewelry I've ever seen to really random crap. I picked up a few Christmas gifts, along with a great hat/headband type thing for myself that I simply fell in love with and could not pass up.

Around this point in time is when Justin and Jericho revealed to me that they (along with our friend Christa) had decided yesterday that we needed alter egos. These characters are the much wealthier, highly entitled and somewhat snooty versions of ourselves that can be implemented when shopping at high-end realtors. (Or whenever the mood strikes, really.) Their names are Kennedy Vaughn, Duncan McDougal and Anastasia Beaverhausen - yes, it is a Will & Grace reference. Now, my first name was chosen for me during an earlier discussion from which I was absent. They picked Gabriella because, "It just sounds bad ass. It suits you." After a little research and brainstorming, Gabriella No-Last-Name became Gabriella Van der Vyer. I know, you're jealous of how awesome we are.

So Kennedy, Duncan, Gabriella and our friend who doesn't have an alter ego then went for dinner at Little Italy. And by dinner, I of course mean some random pasta dish and lots of sangria. Gotta go big or go home.

There was one final stop on this holiday express, and that was the Union Square Holiday Market, which is basically tents set up around the square where they sell all kinds of crazy crap. Some of it is quite strange, and some of it is straight up awesome. Since we had already done considerable damage to our pocketbooks at this point, we didn't spend quite as much time here, but it was still a lot of fun to peruse.

Now I'm kicked back, blogging, Facebooking and watching Twilight in the comfort of my apartment that happens to smell like Henri Bendel's "Holiday" and "Winter Spruce" candles, aka the best scents in the world. I'm also fantasizing about the fact that only four days of work stand between me and kicking off my winter holiday.