From our friend (that’s the implied author-reader we) Kevin Fitzpatrick at the Dorothy Parker Society, the usual good news of high-spirited gatherings and mixed drinks, or, chiastically, a gathering of spirits. From the club’s April newsletter (some links are mine):

Wednesday, April 30 — How much do you love the cartoons in The New Yorker? Want to meet the cartoonists? The Dorothy Parker Society is hosting an event at the Algonquin Hotel that will draw seven notable cartoonists to celebrate the publication of Sex and Sensibility: Ten Women Examine the Lunacy of Modern Love…in 200 Cartoons. Liza Donnelly, who has been a cartoonist at The New Yorker since 1982, edits the book. The party is Wednesday, April 30, 6:30-8:30 p.m. on the second floor of the hotel. In addition to Donnelly, the other cartoonists who will be in attendance are Barbara Smaller, Carolita Johnson, Victoria Roberts, Marisa Acocella Marchetto, Signe Wilkinson, and Julia Suits. Most of them have appeared in the pages of The New Yorker. To attend, please RSVP to kevin@dorothyparker.com by April 25. There will be a cash bar (and bring cash, the hotel does not take credit cards). The book will be available for purchase ($23). This is a perfect place for the party, as the magazine was cooked up in the same place we will be celebrating, and the wallpaper of the hallways is all classic New Yorker cartoons. If you can’t make the party, the book will be in stores this week. Info here.

Last week I made my first trip to San Francisco’s fine Cartoon Art Museum, which was featuring a stylish exhibition of cartoons from Donnelly’s book alongside plenty of artwork from the museum’s permanent collection; standing that close to original drawings by Walt Kelly, Otto Soglow, William Steig, Winsor McCay, and other geniuses is a thrill, and I’m not even a Comics Person. (I think I might be turning into one.)

A few days later, I went to Donnelly’s book party at the Museum of Sex here in New York, and many of the cartoonists (as well as other New Yorker, cartoonland, and publishing folks) were present, including all these people. It was a genuinely hot (and warm), thoroughly fun party, and I don’t know if it was the climate or the cartoons, but everyone was in extra-attractive mode. I stayed until the very end talking about drawing, podcasting (Victoria Roberts is awesomely tech-savvy), the shiny, rainbow-colored sex toys on display, and New Yorker history with all and sundry. You haven’t lived till you’ve discussed personal massager design with great political minds, believe me.

Also, from The Comics Journal’s Journalista!, a further Sex and Sensibility event:

April 13 (Red Hook, NY): Cartoonist Liza Donnelly, editor of the new collection Sex and Sensibility: Ten Women Examine the Lunacy of Modern Love… in 200 Cartoons, will discuss the book at Merritt Bookstores on Broadway, beginning at 11AM. Details here.