On the surface, the party was for Melanie’s 23rd birthday. However, this party was in October, and Mel’s birthday is in June. So why’d we do it? The best reason of all: romance.

See, Mel and I and a bunch of other people who’d just moved to L.A. were hanging out together, and one of the guys in our “group” was this guy named Conor, who was clearly into Melanie and vice-versa. HOWEVER (and have you ever had this with friends?), they were both such huge wusses that neither of them would make the first move! Everybody would talk about it behind their backs, too. We’d all try to come up with reasons to leave the two of them alone, and then…well, nothing would happen!

I’ve never seen two such incredibly shy people in one room before in my life!

Soooo…. I decided to “take the bull by the horns” myself, and throw Mel a surprise birthday party behind her back. I sent out emails to people, and guess who I put in charge of keeping Melanie busy while everybody got together for the big surprise?

Yep, Conor.

He didn’t want to do it at first (that shyness again), but I told him he’d be doing me a huge favor. So the night of Mel’s “birthday,” he took her out for a casual dinner at this tapas place that I told him Mel liked, and guess what?

They hit it off, broke through the shyness… started talking for real, and basically had so much fun that I had to text Conor at the restaurant after he was 45 minutes late for the time he was supposed to bring Mel back to the apartment where the party was and ask “Where ARE U?”

Anyway, they finally did show up. Mel was super surprised. She and Conor were a couple from that night on, and guess what?

They got engaged two months ago.

Heck of a party, huh?