Saturday and going to the Red Dress party in Portland with Julie & Trixie.

It is the last Saturday of June already and tonight I an going to the Red Dress party here in Portland. Julie and Trixie are going and they had an extra ticket and invited me, which was really nice of them. Now of course I wanted to look my best so I figured I would wait till later in the day to get ready which gave me extra time to do things around the house, mainly yard work which of course is something I leave to my male side. I did go to the gym in the morning, yes 1 1/2 years of going now. I worked in my yard till about 3:30pm before going in and cleaning up and getting ready. Tonight being special I took extra time, yes I spent over 1 1/2 hours getting ready as I wanted to look perfect. Of course I would be wearing my red dress, this is actually a dress I bought back in 2020 for the red dress party that year but it was canceled that year due to COVID and this is the first year they have had it sense 2019. Now I have worn it a few times but tonight was what I bought it for. Of course I did a bold red lipstick and a smokey eye look and yes I did false eye lashes tonight. I was happy with the look. I had some time before I had to leave as I was planning on being at Julie’s at 6:30.

I arrived and Julie and Trixie were both ready and looking lovely in their red dresses also. We had time so we sat and talked as the doors don’t open till 8pm. It was so enjoyable; we did get a quick selfie before we left. We left about 7:15 and got to the Memorial Coliseum and parked in the parking garage. We got to the coliseum about 7:45 and stood in line waiting for the doors to open, well while we stood there I got a lady working there to take out picture. There were probably only 40 people in line by the time they opened the doors and we went in. It is in the basement of the coliseum and has several big rooms down there. We wandered around a little to see where everything was and yes we got some food. The food was good but not as nice a selection as in years past, it was basically chicken, pasta, soup, and macaroni salad. The food and drinks come with the ticket price. We wandered up to the little bar section and got drinks and sat down to eat and people watch, yes at some point everyone comes to this point so we got to see all the red dresses. Now there were 2 people wearing the same dress and they had to get a picture but it is surprising with all the people who come to these events, in years past a couple thousand, you rarely see the same dress. There was even one lady who was wearing the red dress from the original Star Trek series I almost went and asked to get a picture with her as I loved that show.

Later on we moved to the other room and they actually had a small casino set up, Roulette, Craps and a several blackjack tables. They gave you $100 to start with but you could buy more chips if you wanted, and no it was not gambling for real money. When you were done they would give you one entry ticket for every $50 you had and you could put it in one of 5 boxes to win a gift basket. It was fun, Trixie played roulette for almost an hour and won some chips before coming over to the blackjack table Julie and I were at. We played for maybe 1 1/2 hours and Trixie had enough for 4 tickets, I lost my chips and at the end Julie started letting her chis ride doubling her bet each time and won several hands in a row and wound up with $650 so she got 13 tickets to enter the drawings. It was a fun night although not as busy as in years past. Normally it is hard to move through the crowd as there are so many people but that was not the case tonight. Just from how it looked I would guess there were only a 1/3 of the people compared to 2019. Now it could be because they didn’t promote it as well this year. It was still a fun event.

We stayed till a little after midnight before leaving. It was such a fun night, Thanks Julie and Trixie for inviting me to join you. I have said it so many times but being able to go places and do things with my friends like every other person is so special as for many years I believed this part of my life would be in my house and never shared with other people. Some of the ladies in this group are the closest friends I have and more like family. On the drive back to Julies we talked about the night. It is always sad to see the night come to an end. I dropped Julie and Trixie off and drove home.

Thanks for reading my blog and sharing this part of my life with me.