November 4, 2002
WARNING: Yahoo Behavior ahead.

Just back from the sneak preview grand opening at the Westin Kierland Hotel, complete with the Bob Boze Bell suite ($485 a night!). Five rooms and a foyer, with kitchen, two bedrooms, three baths with walk-in closets and a terrace that looks out over the golf course and points directly at our house (about 25 miles away), Eight of my paintings on the wall (all prints) and a big-ass photo of me in the foyer. Of course the room was comped for my involvement in adding to the art (they spent $1 mil on art and I got $2,400 of it. Ha.). We made one mistake. Kathy took a bottled water out of the refreshment frig—$6. Imagine telling someone from the 1950s that you paid $6 for a bottle of water. Amazing. Other than that and tipping ($20 cash) it was a free ride.

Ed Mell showed up with Rose Marie (she looks just like Catherine Zita Jones), and Russ and Wendy Shaw showed up because I called them. Ed has a suite named for him just above mine, but didn’t opt to stay in his and they booked it. So we sat in our living room and debated whether to go up to the fifth floor and knock on the door at 11 p.m. and say, “Excuse me, I’m Ed Mell and you’re staying in my room. Can me and my friends have a look around?” But, alas, some of us are getting older and less immature (although Russ and I were chomping at the bit to do it, and even considered pretending we were both Ed and doing it anyway). Many laughs.

Ed put it all in perspective when he mused, “You know, in about ten years they’re probably going to look at these two suites and say, ‘Who are these guys and why did we name a suite after them?’” AMEN.