THE LONDON DEVESONS

TEMPERATURE FORECAST FOR THIS WEEKEND: 97°F. Aye carumba!

We were woken this morning by a call from London, asking Max to go on TV! BBC World News wanted an online expert to discuss the response of the blogosphere to Obama's win and who better to ask, but Maxy, who reads blogs for fun?! And what better timing than just after he's bought three fancy suits?!

So off Max went to work, all smart and nervey. It turned out that they never used him in the end. He was kind of on call all morning, and then it became clear that they were dropping the item, much to Maxy's relief.

But it was handy that he was in his suit already, because this evening we went to the Young Smithsonian Benefactors' Polo Kickoff Party at the Argentinian Embassy!! Fancy Danielle, who I met when having a manicure in Georgetown, has been including me on group invitations to many swanky dos on Facebook, which I've duly deleted and forgotten about.

But then I remembered that this is the year of saying yes to unlikely things and thought that it might be fun to get a peek into her world. So when she sent through this invite to the Argentinian Embassy and we saw it was only $60 each (which we figured was cheap for that kind of bash), we got a couple of tickets!

The embassy isn't on Embassy Row - the cool street of embassies that are in the style of their home countries - it's just down the road from our apartment. Having said that, I still needed to get a cab there, as my strappy shoes were hurting me before we left the flat.

Coincidentally, Danielle happened to be on the phone right by the welcome table, but hilariously didn't recognise me as I gave her a kiss hello, until she clocked the accent. We then met her girlfriends who all seemed nice enough and in very fancy dresses.

I wasn't really up for a night of being shiny and fun, but Max was on excellent form and held the Devo fort as we met a bunch of people. The embassy was disappointingly un-Argentinian and not that amazing - just kind of rococo fancy, like a small French chateau, or something. The party was across three rooms, with a big landing in the middle, and pitifully little food. I'm still not drinking, so the free bar held little delight and there were a lot of men in blue shirts and slacks there.

There were a couple of speeches - one by Danielle's friend who'd organised the event and one by a representative from the embassy who a little bit made me cry, because he was being all nice and sincere in a

room full of people I got the impression didn't really care much what he said. Then there was a slightly tame tango performance and then we wandered around the three rooms, wondering what the equivalent scene in London is and concluding that it's probably the Bouji's circuit and agreeing that we'd probably not be as welcome there, but our accents made us entirely acceptable at such a swanky do here. We did look the part, though, as this photo that wouldn't be out of place on the society pages of Tatler shows! (erm, the actual official photographer passed us by.)

We met back up with Danielle, but I found it a little difficult to think of things to say. I think it was a combination of me just feeling a little blah and us genuinely not having a lot in common. We did talk more to Justin though, a chap we'd met when we arrived who was sweating more than I've ever seen a person sweat - whether after strenuous sport or just on a hot day. It was crazy. He was obviously very high, but I just thought it so odd that he would do that when it makes him so conspicuous amongst the distinctly dry, non-sweaty crowd. He was literally dripping.

Anyway, he was trying to get Max on board with the hedge fund he's just moved back to DC from NYC to start up. Or at least in the record label he's started on the side. Danielle later told us that DC Magazine named Justin one of the 'Top 10 DC People To Know' and explained that he's in love with her friend who organised tonight's event, who's also on the list. It's a match made in heaven. And now we just need the other 8 in the set...!

There was talk of an 'after-party' in Georgetown, but I was so bored and so ready to leave that we made our excuses and got out of it. But Danielle's very keen that we go and see the 'Sex & The City' movie together, which I couldn't really wriggle out of. Just as we were leaving, two Japanese fellows allegedly called Ming and Kong got talking to us. But they were a little strange and I swear they were making up everything they were telling us - from their names to their story of how Ming had driven from Canada today to come to Kong's wedding that's happening in a hurry at the weekend. Just as we were leaving, we noticed that there was more tango going on in the other room, which this time was much more impressive, so the night wasn't a total bust.

I was very happy to leave and jump in a cab for the four blocks home, just in time to catch the grand finale of 'Step It Up & Dance' - a competition I've accidentally seen all of, thanks to endless daytime repeats that distract me from my work. We were also excited to see Kristen Schaal (Mel from 'Flight of the Conchords') as a new correspondent on 'The Daily Show'. She was really funny, but the whole programme has been on fire recently.