(I know, Joe.  I have the same reaction when I get too close to the Cage Potato logo.)

It’s hard to be the Cage Potato sometimes.  Partying with MMA royalty like Forrest Griffin and Urijah Faber.  Drinking for free at an open bar while chicks in bikinis gyrate beneath a giant flashing sign that says “SEXY.”  Giving out free Hall of Fame t-shirts to the pleading masses.  Oh, wait a minute.  That isn’t hard.  That was just my Friday night.

If you can’t tell from the above paragraph, last night’s Fight Magazine/Cage Potato VIP Party was a complete success.  I arrived with an all-star blogging crew that featured Fightlinker’s Ryan Harkness and MMA Frenzy’s Kris Karkoski precisely at 8:30 pm.  It might seem a little lame of us to show up exactly when the party was scheduled to start, but in our defense: a) that’s when the open bar started, and b) Joe Stevenson had already been there for ten minutes by then.  That’s right, “Daddy” knows how to party.

What surprised me most when I made the rounds wearing my Cage Potato t-shirt at the Sugar Bar last night was that not only did tons of people come up to me and tell me they’re avid readers of the site, but that one of them was this guy.

(Eddie Bravo took this photo.  There seemed to be some flash issues, but I don’t blame Eddie.)

That’s right, Bruce motherfucking Buffer is a member of the Potato Nation.  He reads the site regularly, so doubtless he’s already aware of our love for The Buffer Turn.  Just in case he wasn’t, though, I went ahead and told him again last night.  At length.  And since now we know that the Buff is one of our loyal readers, I’d like to pause for a moment and address him here.  If you’re not Bruce Buffer, this might be a good time to go get a snack or something:

[Hey Bruce.  ‘Sup.  Great work MC’ing the ring girl contest last night.  Could you do us a favor?  How about tonight, during the introductions for one of the fights, could you look at the camera and give the Potato Nation a wink, just to say hi?  It doesn’t have to be during the main event.  Maybe the Pete Sell/Matt Brown fight.  What do you think, too unprofessional?  Yeah, you’re right.  Forget it.  Unless you don’t want to forget it…]

Welcome back.  Anyway, our party drew an enormous crowd last night, to the point where it got a little uncomfortable.  It’s especially difficult to navigate a sea of sweaty people while holding a giant cardboard box full of t-shirts, but I just walked behind a girl who looked like she was going throw up and it was amazing how people cleared a path.  I took this picture to demonstrate how packed the place was, then I realized this morning that I had captured a certain Brazilian fighter having one hell of a time.

(Can you spot Babalu?)

I also got to meet loyal Cage Potato readers Carious Lesions (good luck with dental school, by the way) and Vrax, who got this charming photo of himself with Jay Hieron.

(Oh, is that a Cage Potato logo in the background.  Weird.  How’d that end up in this picture?)

By the time the night was over, we all had a great time and drank way too much.  Especially Ryan from Fightlinker, who disappeared early on and then sent me a series of incoherent text messages trying, without success, to explain where he was.  I assume he is dead, or at least woke up this morning in a parking lot.  As for me, I just woke up wishing I was dead.

If you need me between now and fight time, I’ll be napping in my hotel room and watching "Georgia Rule" on HBO.  Oh, Lindsay Lohan.  You minx, you.