April’s Perfect Party

It’s the question on everyone’s mind: How do I get invited to this perfect party of yours? Well, each month we sift through the résumés of thousands of impressive candidates, but only those who impress us in one of the following eight ways appear on the final list. 1) Describe your sexual orientation as “omnivorous” and hail from a band called The Balls, like Storm Large, performing this month with the Houston Symphony in UK Rocks: From the Beatles to Coldplay. 2) Scare the crap out of us, like Burak Guneralp, the A&M professor who claims that due to urban expansion, Houston should expect more flooding in the coming years—irrespective of global warming. 3) Complete an impressive project, like KHOU reporter Scott Noll, whose exhaustive map of the deadliest spots in Houston for alcohol-related crashes was as noteworthy as the number of stories his station has coincidentally run right after they appeared in Houstonia. 4) Furiously deny reality, like Top Gun Shooting Range owner Dave Gardner, whose support of open-carry laws should be wavering about now, considering that three local children shot themselves over four days in March. 5) Do something good for the city, like Hank Rush, the CEO of Star of Hope, which is opening a new shelter for women and children later this year. 6) Create something wonderful, like artist/teacher Rebecca Bass’s art cars, whose festival has moved from its usual sweltering May date to April 11. Thank God. 7) Write a weirdly tone-deaf story about Houston and oil prices for the New York Times, like Texas Monthly’s Mimi Swartz, who seems overly concerned with how the rich will weather the current crisis. 8) Or just be Jackie Collins (appearing at a fundraiser for the Barbara Bush Houston Literary Foundation April 23). That works too.

Published in the Real Estate 2015 issue of Houstonia Mag.