Whew!

Holy cow what a day yesterday. You'll never believe what happened.

We get a message on Thursday night from our agency*, asking us a huge favor. It seems that the man whose wife is the president and founder of the orphanage in Colombia was in our area for the weekend, and do we think we might be able to entertain him for a bit ?
....
WHAT??!!!

FOUNDED. Did you hear that part? FOUNDED THE ORPHANAGE. Started the foundation that currently houses the child we are to parent and is currently the president and queso grande of said foundation. Since the agency is not in our area, and since it was kind of late notice, they were scrambling to find someone to do it. My husband and I look at each other eyes wide with a non-verbal "oh crap." look. What do we do? How could we say no? ("Yeah, no thanks not interested, but could you make it snappy on that orphan we're waiting for?") Why would we say no anyway, it could be fun and a great opportunity. So we say yes.

He's "lovely" and "easy-going" she said. He likes music, and cocktails. Okay, we can do that. We'll be in Manhattan for goodness sakes, an endless supply of both. DH (Did I tell you how much I LOVE that man) with his excellent social planning skills, finds something good near where he is staying. We get his phone number. DH and I play a round of "you call him" "no you call him". I call him. He sounds lovely and easy-going. We agree to meet at the apartment is staying at 7pm. I go shopping for a new pair of shoes. I give myself a quick manicure/pedicure. We shower, get dressed and go.

He greeted us warmly at the door and showed us in. The apartment was amazing, with an unbelievable view of central park and the west side. He made us martinis with Bombay Sapphire Gin. Yes indeed, he likes his cocktails, and we loved him for it. He laughed when I told him "we like hanging out with YOU" when he offered to make me a vodka tonic, my favorite drink. It was awesome. Though I was thoroughly tipsy pretty quickly, as we hadn't eaten dinner. He was charming, in true latin male fashion. He showed us pictures of his new grand daughter, and I asked if he could go back and "put an order in for one of these" for me. The drinks did wonders to loosen us up and DH and I got less nervous. At 8 we headed over to the Carnegie Club. On Saturday nights, a gentleman croons Sinatra favorites to the music of an 11 piece orchestra. We sat and listened while we lounged on couches and leather chairs. We drank some more, ate cheese and shrimp cocktail, and DH even had a cigar. Judging by the number of times our guest said "Very good, no?" I think he liked it. I even heard him sing a little.

We put him in a cab back uptown around 10. I got a kiss goodbye. Still thrilled over the success of the night, DH and I walked a few blocks before we hailed our own cab. I can't believe we did it. I am not very good at the social thing, having to make chit chat with a stranger scares the hell out of me. But I think we did okay. I think he'll at least be able to tell his wife that we'll make decent parents, even if the wife does have an affinity for vodka.

*technically not an agency, but close enough for the purpose of the story