Live8

Steven wound up with 2 VIP passes to Live8 in Hyde Park courtesy of his client at Nokia. He tried to get a number of colleagues to go with him, but when they all declined I was his date of last resort. We started out at the Park Lane Hilton with a coffee and champagne reception followed by brunch. The room had a glass wall overlooking Park Lane, so we got a good view of the gay pride parade. Then we walked over to the Live8 VIP tent (a special elite section of the "Golden Circle," but we won't get into how they named that). In the tent area was even more free food and booze, brought to us by our (Nokia's) personal ambassador of hospitality, Pedro. Also in the VIP area: Faye Dunaway and Vince Vaughn (who cruised me -- I swear!), each looking not so good. Probably lots of other British and Euro celebs we didn't recognize. The opening number was U2 singing Sargent Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band with Paul McCartney. Strange. Then Paul left (Bono's comment: "did that really just happen?") & they did 3 more songs. Can I just say "The Edge"? Thank you! Also saw Elton John, REM, Coldplay, Annie Lennox, Razorlight (? but adorable), Snoop Dog (actually a good performer -- who knew?), and... Madonna! Fabulous, as ever, but she did kidnap a formerly starving Ethiopian woman who had to be rescued from the stage half way through "Like a Prayer." We skipped out on Sting, Pink Floyd, Scissor Sisters, Mariah Carey, George Michael, Mick Jagger, and a few others. I think it's probably still going on. Anyhow, I took pics of gay pride, The Edge, Elton, Annie, Madge, et. al. which I was planning to share with you. Took 'em on my fancy Nokia camera phone. Remember Nokia, Steven's client and sponsor of the event? Manufacturer and purveyor of fancy camera phones? Yeah, well the pics just mysteriously disappeared off the phone. Zap. Poof. Gone. B-bye.