I Had To Wash My Hair Anyway

Sad to say I was not invited to the White House Correspondent's Association Dinner in Washington Saturday night.

I chalk it up to being at the NAB convention this week just when the flood of invites to the dinner and afterparties by Bloomberg and Vanity Fair would have hit like a tidal wave. I'm not technically a White House correspondent, though I have reported from there a time or two.

I don't take it personally. OK, just a little. Media organizations generally reserve tickets for their own reporters and executives, with a few set aside for the annual competition to get a Hollywood or Washington star, which I'll even admit aint me.

I was invited to a Sunday brunch the day after the dinner by TV vet John McLaughlin and his wife, however, which I appreciated.

I went to the dinner once or twice back in the go-go 90's, but I think somebody mistook me for John Egerton the southern food writer who edited the first volume of works by southern food writers, "Cornbread Nation 1." I am southern, after all, and I am a writer. This is the only time you will hear me complain about having too many g's.

Monica Lewinsky was a big get at the dinner a few years back, as were the West Wingers–the actors not the actual staffers–back during the Clinton administration. Bo Derek drew stares at the Vanity Fair party, I think it was.

Among this years guests are Cheryl Crow, Sanjaya–People magazine got him, I'm told–and Larry David.

Over at ABC, for example, the non-journalists who will get to schmooze with the journalistic high and mighty include James Denton and Marc Cherry of Desperate Housewives, Apollo Anton Ono, ex-of ABC's Dancing with the Stars, and even a Bush–Reggie, actually.

For anybody who wants to invite me in the next 23 hours and 14 minutes, e-mail me at jeggerton@cox.net.

Just kidding…not.

By John Eggerton