Last night, as we regretted not wearing a thicker coat or comfier going-out shoes, it occurred to us that going from the Gotham/Bravo launch party for The Better Half at Room Service to the College Humor "One Last Desperate Gasp of Summer" bash at an East Village dive bar was the veritable party-hopping equivalent of jumping from a hot tub into a freezing cold swimming cool.

Which is to say, an extremely disconcerting adjustment that, in time, reminded us exactly why it is that we've always hated swimming so much in the first place.

Party the first featured an odd assortment of aspiring hairdressers, banker types and slightly older women wearing short mini-dresses who were attractive in a "your mom's cooler, younger friend" sort of way. After sort-of watching the show—i.e. guzzling champagne and trying not to stare at the outpouring (literally) of fortysomething décolletage—we spent the bulk of the evening making friends with the rebellious smoker types huddled outside and idly wondering why everyone was dressed as though for New Year's Eve while trying to flag down the cocktail waitress before she ran out of those trendy-but-delicious "sliders" (which, incidentally, bore an uncanny resemblance to "normal sized hamburgers.")

Before long, however, it was time to grab our gift bags (filled to the brim with useless items like hair masks, frilly pink tissue paper and Gotham magazine) and grab a cab downtown to the intersection of Houston and Avenue A. After generously leaving our Gotham magazine for the reading enjoyment of the following passenger, we bounded over to the bar, where we allowed the gentle giant of a bouncer to brand our hands with some sort of "light" ink think that still hasn't washed off. Upon entering, every partygoer was handed a colorful lei, which seemed to serve little purpose other than to facilitate an influx of preemptive "Dude, I got lei-ed at the College Humor party!" jokes.

Sadly, it seemed random bar sex with dirty, unwashed strangers wasn't in the cards for us. Before an hour had passed, we came to realize that the cramped quarters and unmistakable hash aroma were a sorry substitute for the roomy banquettes and tasty chicken satay skewers we'd left behind. Our stomachs growling, we bid farewell to our apathetic hipster acquaintances, turned and left.

Back on the street, we finished out the night with yet another charitable act: wehanded our leis, the hair masks and a couple of bucks to a homeless man in an effort to spread some of the seasonal holiday cheer. But the ungrateful vagrant merely laughed scornfully, as if to say, "Hair masks. Yeah, that'll keep me warm tonight."