• by Kelly Samardak , August 26, 2010

Metro Long Island Launch Party, City Winery, New York
August 25, 2010

What's your morning routine? Does it involve a quick nude 5K? Perhaps a singing-into-the-toothbrush karaoke competition with your reflection? Or do you roll out of bed angry, hair frizzled, clumsily grabbing blindly for the coffee machine, eye crusties flinging wildly as you fight the morning?  Are you a walker, a driver, a strap-hanger?  Or do you get to wait, as many people I know have, for the LIRR, wondering if maybe, just maybe, today is the day they forgot to send the train out?  Well guess what, Long Island, now you have something to read while you wait.

Now, you would think that when launching a Long Island-focused paper, you would throw the event in Long Island, right?  I have a feeling you party where the agencies are. Maybe if they hit a big milestone they'll throw a Long Island-style bash -- I would make the trip out!

City Winery is quickly becoming one of my favorite work party places and normal life places.  I actually went there on a night that was my own to see Dr. John, and it was fantastic.  The way they create their wine removes (or doesn't let in?) the bad stuff that makes you all dehydrated and headachy the next day, so drink up! My beverage of choice last night was their syrah, while my date, Buddy Media's Jenean Chapman, stuck to the pinot noir.  And we weren't the only ones.  We showed up around 6:30 p.m. to find tables already full of empty glasses, the loud rolling cackle of fermented-grape laughter, and a table covered with delicious cheeses, cylindrical meats, and eventually crab cakes and lamb shanks.

The first person I met was Rudy Breedy, a peppy fellow and Vice President for Development at the New York Chapter of Arthritis Foundation.  We should keep in touch, my knees are horrid. After Rudy, I met an entire table full of people from Zenith (zeh, not zee) media: Lauren Campbell, Communications Planner; Craig Nowman, Print Negotiator Chase/Harrahs; Derek Schaub, Print/OOH Negotiator Verizon Wireless; Craig Tscherednikov, Print Negotiator General Business/Harrahs; CJ Arnedo, Print Negotiator General Business/Harrahs; Paul Beswick, Print/OOH Negotiator Verizon Wireless; and Brian Rappaport, Print Negotiator Verizon FiOS & HQ/Sports Media.

Later, by the food table, Ryan Davidson, planner at Zenithmedia, saved Jenean's life by testing to see if the brown blobs were indeed crab cakes (Jenean is allergic to shellfish).  Ryan is a nice dude and is actually about to move into Manhattan.  Island hopper!

One of the best finds of the night was the threesome from Capital Audio & Electronics.  I could totally see Tony Scuttaro and JoJo (and the other guy...) sitting in the driveway in those woven lawn chairs, drinking cold brews wrapped in vintage Yankees cozies, discussing meat prices, why Vinnie won't move out of ma's cellar, and listening to the game on the radio (with intermittent bursts of static). They were awesome, and promised that should I need one, Capital Audio & Electronics had the system for me! We also discussed jail and jail strategies, but we'll leave that alone.

Another great find were the duo from K&G Superstore on 42^nd and Lexington.  Bill Evans, Senior Vice President, was in town for a couple of days from Atlanta and "learning everything about Manhattan from THIS man," he said, clapping Terry Reynolds, sales manageron the arm.  Terry Reynolds also promised to help me discover a bad-ass bag that would scream "I OWN NEW YORK!"

I also met the very smiley Sunhae Haughney of Stickhead Media, who is helping METRO LI with their distribution; Michael Haar, Account Executive from GSB Digital; Oskar Bjorner, COO of METRO; Ron Wisniewski, Advertising Executive at METRO LI; and Sandi Hindin, Account Executive at METRO LI.

The mouth-watering vino, delicious food, and Long Island's finest kept me around too long to make my second destination -- Digital DUMBO, which, by the looks of Twitter, was another successful Brooklyn digi-networking event.  Tonight I'm heading to The Roger Smith hotel to cover Greg Verdino's "Micromarketing" book launch event, where "light appetizers" are promised.  I hope they're plate after plate of cheese puffs.

Photos are up on Flickr!

Send those invitations to kelly@mediapost.com!