Week of Beauty

We kicked off 2012 with a pretty intense month of January, Shore Fire’s most successful January on record, actually! So what better way to relax while still being productive than bringing the beauty salon to us? The kind ladies of our Brooklyn Heights neighbors, Plaza Nails, brought their equipment to give the office manicures. Here are a few shots of the manicures in action:

VP Mark Satlof enjoying a basic buff. No polish!

Lauretta Charlton taking advatange of a new color in the office before heading off to a wedding

The best part about the nail day was the spontaneous decision to include pedicures as well! When faced with the obstacle of adding a place for warm water into each office for a pedicure, Carrie Tolles offered an interesting yet creative solution by bringing out her crock-pot, conveniently located in her office. See for yourself below:

Carrie Tolles and her handy crock-pot (Nice book, Carrie!)

To sweeten the deal even more, we finished off the week with a couple of days of massages by the incredibly talented (and very friendly!) Karen Clifton Mahoney of Karma Massage. Karen hauled her chair over to Suite 1600 and turned everyone’s muscles to putty. Caleb Shively said it best when he described Karen’s work as making him “feel like a kid again.” We all left the room relaxed and revitalized, just what we needed. Speaking of Caleb, he followed instructions perfectly by bringing comfortable clothing. Check out these photos of the days of relaxation with Karen and be on the lookout for Caleb’s sweet pants:

Now THIS looks relaxing!!! Anthony D'Amato getting a head massage

Madelyn Frascella enjoying a little work on her back and shoulders

Caleb Shively's Venice Beach weightlifter pants

Thank you, Marilyn, for giving us a great week of relaxation! This was such an awesome way to kick off the new year! Bring on February!

Happy Birthday, Lauretta!

Last Friday we finished the week with a grand celebration of my pool partner Lauretta Charlton’s birthday. What made it so grand? Well besides the fact that Lauretta is awesome, which makes her birthday awesome by association, the cupcakes from her choice of The Chocolate Room were practically intoxicating from sweetness, leaving a sugar high to last for  hours. Well, maybe not hours but they sure picked up the end of my day! I do believe it was another crowd pleaser. Good choice, Lauretta! Hope you enjoyed one before your karaoke birthday celebration! And I hope you had an excellent birthday!

Happy Birthday, Lauretta!

Happy Birthday, Rebecca!

Yesterday we celebrated our fabulous VP, Rebecca Shapiro’s, birthday. Though it was quite a cold day, Rebecca went with a tasty Haagen-Dazs ice cream cake, with a cookies and cream/chocolatey peanut butter mix. Seemed to be quite a crowd-pleaser! Personally, I was thrilled that the ice cream cake wasn’t hard as a rock when we were ready to devour! The art of timing ice cream cake preparation is not an easy one, ask Madelyn! Hope you enjoyed your birthday, Rebecca! And as always, I hope you enjoyed the cake! :)

Classic candle shot taken by Sr. VP, Mark Satlof

Shore Fire Holiday Party at the Hi-Fi, part deux

Here are more pictures from our Holiday party.

Shore Fire Holiday Party at the Hi-Fi, part 1

Last night, Shore Fire trekked all the way to Manhattan’s Lower East Side to celebrate the Holidays. Good Friends, “El DJ”, an open bar, and Bhi Bhiman made for a  very memorable night. Special thanks to the Hi Fi for hosting us.

If you see yourself in the below pictures, leave us a comment! Check back for more pictures later today.

Time flies and Fruit flies

When super talented singer/songwriter Nikki Jean and I lunched at The London Hotel’s Maze restaurant, we were tickled to see star chef Gordon Ramsay, looking thinner and younger than on his TV show, as he walked briskly through the restaurant to his kitchen. We had a great lunch (NJ proclaimed her fare as ‘the best grilled cheese sandwich ever’) but were surprised to spy a coupla cute little bugs (both flying and crawling) at our table. Hey, if we had wanted a picnic, we would have gone to Central Park… If Chef Ramsay had returned from the kitchen, we would have enjoyed pointing out our little insect visitors to the picky prickly owner!

A Double Cheesecake Birthday

Yesterday we celebrated a double birthday in honor of the lovely Carrie Tolles and the delightful Mark Satlof! For cakes, they went for a pair of cheesecakes (plain and strawberry-topped) from the legendary Junior’s of Brooklyn.

Carrie and Mark blow out their candles.

Carrie and Mark open their cards while Daivd, Andy, Tyler, Kyle and Jessica look on.

The staff dig in.

Happy birthday, you two!

The big birthday is July 3rd, NOT July 4th

Around here at Shore Fire, the big anniversary isn’t Independence Day, July 4th. No, early July for us means it’s time to celebrate Shore Fire founder President Marilyn Laverty’s July 3rd birthday. Marilyn’s seen in this video, with the Shore Fire staff gathered in our conference room for an ice cream sundae smorgasbord. The wishes are heart felt if the voices are a little out of key. Happy Birthday Marilyn!

You Wanted The Best…Shore Fire Is Alive

You know we all love music. What you didn’t know is, the majority of our staff plays music regularly either in a band or at home with/to their cat or indoor plants. Some of my favorite memories here include walking into a colleague’s office and them picking up their guitar to play a Chuck Berry riff while we wax best practice, our favorite new bands and music blogs, and, of course, the merits of good bacon (in that order.) It’s important for us to know what we’re talking about; being music publicists, knowing the technical aspects of the craft is very helpful.

Also important: having fun.

In the spirit of fun, we decided to toss a party, a battle of the bands, as it were, during which all of the staffers with current bands showed their swag at Union Hall in Brooklyn. Shore Fire came alive! Here are the highlights:

Anthony D'Amato

First up: Anthony D’Amato. Armed with just a guitar, winning vocals and shining lyrics, Anthony really set the bar very, very high. He’s touring. He has a website. He has an album. You should buy it.

Ghost Bunny (with Chris Taillie, far left, on keyboards)

Second there was our very own Chris Taillie and his out harey outfit Ghost Bunny. I had a great conversation with the drummer about the various reincarnations of the band’s name after Ghost Bunny dies. My favorite was Jesus Hare: 33 years in the making. Ghost Bunny has an intricate, multi-layered sound that will appeal to fans of Muse and Nirvana.

Arvel (with Madelyn Frascella, far right, on bass)

And, I am SOOOO not playing favorites, but Madelyn!!!!! Ladies and Gentleman Madelyn Frascella can handle the bass. She is badass. MOVE OVER Gene Simmons, Flea, and Robert Trujillo. Her band Arvel is totally rocking and they brought serious fun to the stage with their alt-rock indie revival sound.

Firenza (with Chris Brudzinski, left, on guitar/vocals)

Another awesome thing about working with all of these stellar people is that we share iTunes and I’m constantly trolling for new music in my colleague’s iTunes library. Chris Powers has some the best Brit Pop, indie, Shoegaze. I knew I was going to love his band live and Firenza’s power pop delivered.

The Middle Eight (with David McTiernan, far left, on keyboards)

Last but certainly not least: THE MIDDLE EIGHT! The venerable David McTiernan spins his classical background into blissful neo-classical indie rock.

Let them eat cake, delicious cake

Last week we gathered to celebrate the birthday of Chris Taillie, Shorefirian extraordinaire and all-around awesome person.

Here, Chris poses for the popular blowing-out-the-candles shot. The delicious cake was a confection courtesy of one of our local favorites, One Girl Cookies, and was a combination of the birthday boy’s choosing: vanilla cake, chocolate buttercream frosting and a filling of raspberry jam. Yum!

Here, Chris enjoys a slice with David, Jessica, Carrie, Mark, Brendan, & Kyle. Happy Birthday, Chris!