February 29 – You know how when you have stuff with you, you leave it in the trunk of the car or put it in coat check when you go to a party? For some reason, Oscar winners were schlepping their golden statuettes around the Vanity Fair party, while clutching glasses of champagne and plates of food, keeping double-taped décolletage within the limits of propriety, smiling, air-kissing and posing for photos. Truly an extraordinary performance when done with grace; extra points if drunk.

The Vanity Fair party draws just about everybody in Hollywood – way too many to list here – from Benicio Del Toro to Catherine Zeta-Jones. Soon-to-be-unemployed Gucci designer Tom Ford was multitasking, keeping an eye on the hundred or so of his dresses adorning famous bodies in the room while making lunch dates to cement his future in the film industry. Even Nicole Kidman can’t say no to Oprah Winfrey – trying to skip out unnoticed as the party wound down, Kidman ran into Winfrey, who greeted her warmly, and insisted they pose for photos.

Boatloads of musicians - Beck, Gwen Stefani, Elvis Costello, Steven Tyler, Ricky Martin, Tony Bennett, Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, and White Stripe Jack White, who seems on-again with Renee Zellweger - were all on hand.

The party went on until late, many stumbling out, shall we say, happier, at 3:30 a.m. than when they arrived. Ever-brilliant Joni Mitchell had a simple solution for getting through the schmooze-a-thon: the chain-smoking queen of songwriters and two friends arrived at the party already in, shall we say, good moods.