Dear George:

Thanks much for your very good advice, and for your expert assessment of Harvey Weinstein's throw-weight. I also blush at the idea that in Hollywood, when the lights go off—and by the way, Graydon insisted on calling it a "power surge," not an "outage," God forbid—the natives might actually grope one another, to say nothing of wedging themselves between undulating actresses. I guess my reflexive awkwardness about matters of the heart (and groin) points up a telling difference, when it comes to sex, between a state-of-the-art New York tabloid gossip columnist and your D.C. broadsheet counterpart. I have a clear sense that the powers that be at my newspaper don't want me to write too thoroughly about the sex lives of politicians and government officials—our movie stars, as pathetic as that sounds. And I sometimes wonder if loyal consumers of the Washington Post really want to read about it. (OK, never mind. Of course they do.) But my first instinct when confronted with flagrant canoodling is to avert my gaze. Obviously, I need to steel myself for the kind of clinical scientific observation necessary to do this job properly. I must also try to keep my wits by embracing the 3 vodka-and-tonic limit. You say spring roll, I say clammy pizza slice. I have to admit, I am totally exhausted after the weekend round of partying and seeing the same people at every event over and over—kind of reminds me of the bar of the Sheraton Wayfarer (or whatever that hotel in Manchester, N.H., is called these days) the week before the presidential primary. Except that here the aesthetic standards are far less forgiving—Harvey Weinstein notwithstanding. Well, I have to focus on cobbling together a column for tomorrow's paper and then head for LAX and the red-eye back to Washington. I look forward to getting home and to continuing our exchange tomorrow from a more reasonable time zone.

Cheers,
Lloyd