Sir Richard Branson’s Keynote Speech at the City Gala Held at the Playboy Mansion

I said ‘See ya’ to the Hollywood entertainment scene when I found my love of traveling, but I couldn’t say no to the City Gala charity event that was being held after the Grammy’s at what is said to be the “last party at the Playboy Mansion”. Especially since one of my travel inspirations, Sir Richard Branson, was the keynote speaker.

Although I had to ignore my 9 hour jet lag, and attempt adapting from the -20 degree Arctic weather to the blazing hot 90 degree LA heat in order to rush to find a gown, shoes, and other items to make myself not look like I was just traveling for 2.5 weeks, I pulled it together in time to even go behind the scenes at the event.

A friend of mine, well, best guy friend since high school, has a clothing company called Hemp Blue (denim made with sustainable hemp material), which put on a fashion show after Sir Richard Branson’s speech, which meant I got to run around the Playboy Mansion before everyone got there. Did you know that there’s a petting zoo there??

Anyway. It was a lovely black tie affair, and I was extremely excited to hear Sir Richard Branson speak, even if I was the only one who actually follows his news/inspirational posts and wasn’t just trying to take a selfie with him as he spoke on stage.

Here’s how bad I am at Hollywood and the entertainment industry: I have no idea who the notable actress was who interviewed him, or who any of the music performers were (I think one was “P.Diddy”, and I’m pretty sure Grammy host LL Cool J came on at the end), but I can tell you a re-cap of Richard Branson’s speaking session, and exactly who honoree, Buzz Aldrin is. In fact, one of my favorite moments of the night was when some drunk guy yelled out, “Dude! That guy’s been on the MOON!” when Buzz Aldrin took the stage.

After Richard Branson spoke about where he came up with the name “Virgin” (he was literally sitting in his basement when he was 15 with a bunch of his female friends who were all, uh, virgins…) and what his plans are with Virgin Galactic, he insisted on walking closer to the crowd to answer questions, and even got down to take a selfie with all of his fans!

Apparently I forgot to take a ton of photos while attempting to blend in with the classy society folks (JK, I was too busy SnapChatting) but the good news is that I had no shame in taking a video of Richard Branson’s whole speech, and a SnapChat re-cap of the entire day and night!

Oh, and if you’re wondering about that last Snap…that’s me filming Playboy’s head of “talent” casting director Sam Rhima before I almost punched him in the face for flicking his card at me and saying, “I’ll see you soon”. But instead of violence, I turned to something worse…social media 🙂