The party ended at 8 p.m. and I was checking my watch and hyperventilating in traffic because I wanted to be able to sip champagne and nibble an hors d'oeuvre or two in the historical rooms of the residence.

I arrived at about 7:30 and passed through the metal detector. I was expecting more security, but a nod to the guards and a flash of an e-mailed copy of the invitation was enough to get me in the door. The place is a study in high ceilings, gilding and photographs of assorted Bush family members. There is even a rather large photo of a stiff-looking George W. Bush in one of the rooms that reminds me of the kind of picture that might come with the frame. Nothing much personal about it.

There were multiple bars serving champagne and tasty hors d'oeuvres, including chocolate petit fours topped with edible gold leaf. I grabbed a couple of napkins embossed with "United States of America" and stuffed them into my bag. After all, how often do you get to go to the Ambassador's pad? I was tempted to try and find the bathroom and check out the medicine cabinet. (Just kidding.)

As I was leaving, I received a copy of Traub's book, which is called "Like No Other Career." Since leaving Bloomie's, Traub has created an investment group, served as a consultant and generally been a wise man in the fashion business. In return for getting to snoop around the Ambassador's residence, I promise to read the book.

So here I am, with nothing to tell you other than the macaroons at the Dries Van Noten show this afternoon were especially splendid. I did hear that one editor at the show was so moved that she went immediately to the Dries store to buy a dress. Didn't matter that she was actually swooning over the spring 2009 collection. She apparently needed a Dries fix right away.

A Thai princess at the Givenchy show in Paris.

The Givenchy show was this evening and I will be telling you all about that in a story scheduled to run on Friday. But I will say now that I'm worried that the really splendid collection the designer had for fall 2008 was some sort of aberration. His inspiration for spring was cowboys and the West and, well, I just would have thought there might have been one person on the Givenchy design team who might have spoken up and said that perhaps it was a bad idea, that it was a stretch for a brand founded on principles such as urbane chicness and little black dresses. But I just report on this stuff. I'm not sketching and draping.

While at the show, I kept staring at the LVMH executives in the house. That's the parent company. I was trying to see if they would drop that look of "Isn't it just splendid" to reveal some sense that they understood how hard it was going to be to peddle this stuff at a sorry economic time like this. But they maintained their poker faces. Is there some sort of drug that can plaster a poker face on your mug? Is there a pill? Because heaven knows I need to take it. I find it hard to mask my dismay when a model comes marching down the runway with a big acrylic bow on the top of her head. Wha???

The audience was a dreamscape of kookiness, by the way. My favorite was the woman in the forest green patent leather dress and dangerously high heels. She was a walking fetish. How do you maneuver in a patent leather dress without creaking?

Also at Givenchy was a very pretty woman in a fuchsia satin dress and jeweled shoes. I was told by the PR rep at Givenchy that she was a Thai princess. It's not often that I'm in the presence of royalty - the real kind, not the attitudinal kind - so I figured I'd record the moment. If I were royal, I'm not sure I'd be shopping the Paris runways for faux chaps a la Givenchy. But maybe there's some Thai tradition that requires high-priced cowboy gear that I don't know about.

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