the night i learned natalie loves 'jessie's girl'

There's something in the water for 2011 where elaborate bachelorette and bachelor party schemes are in the works. That's why it's easy to appreciate a simple celebration done right.

Friday night, we celebrated the bachelorette party of my longest friend in the history of my life. It was done right: classy with a touch of 'what the heck?'.

Lucky lady.

Maybe this post is just an excuse to rave about my new favorite restaurant of the week in Chicago: Quartino's. Holy moly good. The maid of honor had requested an "isolated" table (genius move on her part) and we were seated on the second level, in a back room with a tv that constantly looped a heavily-overacted black and white film. What makes Quartino's special is that it's an Italian tapas-style place. Typically I'm not a tapas lover. I like my food to be mine. I'm a fantastic sharer in most everything except sharing what's on my plate. However, at this place, they encourage sharing and it only adds to the experience.

Try the pesto gnocci (I can taste it now), the cheese fondue (the best cheese in the biz), the penne a la vodka, okay - well really, try everything. Because you can and because you'll be glad you did.

From there, we just bounced from bar to bar to bar and ended up on a karaoke stage, rousing up a whole room of happy people singing bum bum bum to Sweet Caroline.

My reliable sources say the bachelorette had a fantastic time and really, why wouldn't she? I was there. Joking (or am I?).