Perfect Party: The Intriguing Eight

Image: Chris Danger
Here at Perfect Party headquarters we love a fresh idea, which is why UH architecture professor Susan Rogers—who, with her students and Recipe for Success, is building an urban farm in Sunnyside—has secured an invite to our exclusive soiree. So has Karina Barbieri, co-chair of this month’s Margarita Madness! Celebrating La Quinceañera at the Center for Contemporary Craft, which has the greatest party theme in the history of party themes. Also, come on down, Levi Goode, president of Goode Company Restaurants, who’s hatched the excellent plan to triple the size of the Armadillo Palace on Kirby; Paula Waggoner-Aguilar, owner of The Energy CFO, a young San Antonio–based consulting firm that just opened new offices in Houston; David McGee, the Houston painter with two spectacular works on view at the Menil Collection as part of “The Secret of the Hanging Egg”; Major Dodson, the local kid actor who’s wisely hitched his star to juggernaut TV show The Walking Dead; and J.B. Bickerstaff, the new Rockets coach who has brought a renewed defensive mind-set to the team. As for our last guest: this invitation involves an idea of our own. We have to make an example of someone from the national media here, and it’s going to be Seth Partnow, who recently wrote the story “Houston, We Have a Problem: Three Ways to Fix the Struggling Rockets” for the Washington Post. The idea is this: Stop saying, “Houston, we have a problem.” Just stop it. At our party, we’ll explain to him that the phrase fills Houstonians with a howling, impotent rage; he’ll blame the headline on his editor; and then we’ll have a drink. Call it a cathartic way to kick off the New Year.