Ryan Forbes

Legendary Bingo's Jeffery Bowman with hostesses Calpernia Addams, Willam Belli, Roxy Wood and Porsha Hayy

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*10 Best Gay Bars in L.A.
*10 Best Drag Clubs in L.A.

"I just touched your boob." When was the last time you heard a bingo caller say that at a bingo game? When was the last time you played bingo?

If you have recently, and you're not on social security, you were probably at Legendary Bingo at Hamburger Mary's in West Hollywood. The irreverent twist on the old-fashioned game, held four times a week (and once a month at the Magnolia Lounge in Pasadena), turns 15 this year -- that's 30 in drag queen years.

To help celebrate, founder and producer Jeffery Bowman is hosting a three-day party, which kicks off at Magnolia Lounge April 8 and continues at the WeHo hotspot April 9 and 10 with bingo games, a champagne toast, drag and burlesque performances and celebrity guests, including the casts of ABC's Suburgatory, CBS' Golden Boy , Sheryl Lee Ralph from Smash and others.

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James Bartlett

Tonga Hut

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*4 a.m. Last Call for Alcohol Proposed For Calif. Clubs by Sen. Mark Leno
*Top 10 Bars With the Hottest Women in L.A.
*10 Bars Most Likely to Get You Laid in L.A.

The rules state you have a calendar year to complete the task. Amos Clarke is nine months in, "but I've only been making serious inroads over the last couple of months," he says. Tonight, he's at the Tonga Hut on Victory Boulevard in North Hollywood — and down to the last five drinks on his "Grog Log." The log, which looks something like a treasure map, features 78 cocktails, and once Clarke crosses the last one off the list, he'll be inducted as a member of the prestigious Loyal Order of the Drooling Bastard.

Clarke, who just turned 50, is a Brit who came to L.A. in 2004 "to follow in the footsteps of Charlie Chaplin, work in the glorious local conditions as a television director of photography, and seek fame, fortune and love." He has worked on a number of reality TV shows (Ice Road Truckers, Wicked Tuna, Storage Wars), but tonight he's with his "beautiful young bride, Julissa." Dressed in a red-flowered Polynesian dress with a flower in her hair, she's his supportive witness — and ride home — after his moment of "infamy."

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Paul T. Bradley

It takes an intrepid East Side researcher with a true flair for adventure to go exploring west of Vermont Avenue. There lie the wilds of East Hollywood, with your devil-may-care Jumbo's Clown Room crowd or the feckless faux-divers at Harvard and Stone, partying on the very knife's edge of Angeleno Civilization. Sure, there's the Undying Lands on the far West Side, but what about that region that sits in that uncivilized middle: Tourist Country, where one hears tales of flashing lights and mindless drones staring at star-like ground art?

That strip of land between Vine and Cahuenga on Hollwywood Blvd is little known to educated folks and knowledge of its residents and nomadic travelers has been lost to time. Which is why we went out on a Friday night to see who the hell goes there and why.

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Liz Ohanesian

See also: CuriousJosh: Edwardian Ball Slideshow

Back in the old days, when the Edwardian Ball was known as the Edward Gorey Ball, it was a small affair. Justin Katz and his band, Rosin Coven, provided the music to go along with story narration. They used a slide project to showcase Gorey's images. A few years later, Vau de Vire Society, a San Francisco-based performance troupe that incorporates circus arts into their work, joined the fold.

Vau de Vire Society is a performance art troupe that is heavily influenced by circus arts. They've performed at loads of nightclubs and music festivals across the country. They have also worked with bands like Dresden Dolls and Alkaline Trio. Sometime in the middle of the last decade, they joined forces with Rosin Coven for the ball. "It was a match made in heaven," says Gaines. Katz describes Vau de Vire's involvement as "the turning point" of the ball. "It's really when the theatrical, circus performance nature of what we do with Edward Gorey's work ... really exploded," he says, "almost literally with the amount of fire we packed into a tiny club."

Now, the Edwardian Ball is a massive undertaking involving events in two different cities. The San Francisco fete, which took place in January, runs for two days and brings in about 4,000 people. Saturday night's party at the Fonda Theatre marks the fourth time in five years that they brought the ball to Los Angeles.

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Star Foreman

*Check out our entire 2013 Couples Issue here

Marissa Lopez and Gil Gastelum's broad kitchen table, covered with a brightly colored oilcloth and set with a fresh basket of pan dulce, is the heart of their Arleta home. For one hour each night, it's also their refuge.

"She doesn't allow phones when we're eating," Gastelum says.

"I tell him, 'It's one hour,' " Lopez explains, looking at her husband with an affectionate smile. "You need that for your sanity."

Aside from dinnertime, Lopez, 33, and Gastelum, 42, keep a less conventional schedule — late nights at clubs and regular trips out of town. It comes with the territory: Lopez is director of writer-publisher relations at performance-rights organization Broadcast Music Inc., which means coordinating and attending frequent songwriter showcases and performances. Gastelum, who owns the indie label and musician-management company Cosmica Management & Records, also attends shows several times a week with his artists — acts including La Santa Cecilia, Maria Del Pilar, Charanga Cakewalk, Carla Morrison and Gaby Moreno.

Sometimes, if they're lucky, Lopez and Gastelum end up at the same show.

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Photo by W.B. Fontenot

Paul V.

Paul Vitagliano, better known as Paul V., is a self-proclaimed "promosexual" — a term he coined and has zero shame about owning. Thanks to social media, of course, self-promotion has become an essential component to party throwing, deejaying and writing/blogging — three things the 50-year-old Vitagliano has been doing for decades.

"I'm proud that what I do is a public convergence of nightlife and activism," Vitagliano proclaims, washing down chips and salsa with a lethal margarita at Casita del Campo, a gay favorite in the Silver Lake neighborhood where he's lived for decades.

In many ways, Casita represents the pan-sexual world that Vitagliano helped bring together in L.A. The crowd here is both gay and straight but always colorful, thanks to the Cavern Club, a theater in the basement, which showcases gay and drag shows helmed by Vitagliano's friend Mr. Dan.

Together, the friends co-hosted the legendary Dragstrip 66 dance party, which started at another Silver Lake restaurant, Rudolpho's, and moved to the Echo and then the Echoplex before ceasing as a monthly in 2010. Now, with Phil Scanlon, Vitagliano is raising money on Kickstarter to film a documentary about its glory days.

The 20th-anniversary party and the "very last Dragstrip event ever," planned for Jan. 12 at the Echoplex, will be part of the documentary.

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Micah Cordy

Golden Stag at the Park Plaza Hotel

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*Our Calendar Section, Listing More Great Things to Do in L.A.
*5 Artsy Things to Do in L.A. This Week
*Top 10 Films of 2012

Who says that 13 should be an unlucky number? Help ensure the coming year starts off on the right foot with these celebration suggestions, from comedy clubs to Prohibition-style speakeasys.

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Anne Fishbein

John Terzian at SHOREbar

It's Halloween weekend and John Terzian is zoning. Not off drugs but work. As founder and owner of the h.wood Group, the 32-year-old L.A. native owns three nightclubs, with another one in development. And because the entire city comes out for Halloween, this is one of the busiest times of the year. 

Dressed in a black blazer and jeans, Terzian vets emails and texts from the back of a shiny new Range Rover. The workspace is like a mafioso's rolling office -- the Harvard Westlake/USC mafia. 

Armed with his BlackBerry, Terzian sets up guests with accommodations as his driver shuttles him to SHOREbar. The Santa Monica spot, which opened six months ago, has a vibe a million degrees from his Hollywood locations. 

"You have to know where you are," he says between texts. "My whole point was not to bring Hollywood here."

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Grouper

This is what Grouper thinks Groupers look like. I'd just like to point out that the guy on the right is drinking something blue.

I've written a few things about online dating and encouraged numerous friends to try it, but, having been in a series of relationships since college, I had never done so myself until I tried Grouper a few weeks ago.

I had also never been on a blind date, and certainly not on a blind group date. Grouper pairs two trios of friends (eg three straight girls and three straight boys; three lesbians with three lesbians etc.) for drinks based on their Facebook profiles, but pairings within the group are not predetermined. CEO Michael Waxman started the company in New York City in early 2011, received some funding and advice from inimitable start-up accelerator Y Combinator last winter and expanded to Los Angeles (and nine other cities) a few weeks ago. Each date costs $20 per person, but Grouper pays for your first round of drinks.

Waxman says he started Grouper "because it was something I wanted. I wanted a way to meet new people that wasn't as lame slash sketchy as online dating or a networking event." Of course, he met his current girlfriend on a Grouper.

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Lina Lecaro

Arquette presides

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*5 Artsy Things to Do in L.A. This Week
*Our Best of L.A. issue and our Best of L.A. app
*Our Calendar Section, Listing More Great Things to Do in L.A.

When it comes to wacky, wonderous, slightly weird entertainment with an old-timey twist, David Arquette knows his stuff. The quirky actor has an affinity for puppets, burlesque, retro standards and magic, and at Bootsy Bellows, the new nightclub he co-owns with John Terzian and Brian Toll, he finally has a fitting forum to showcase them.

The club -- named after the pin-up model persona of his mother, a former burlesque dancer who died in 1997 -- has been in the tabloids regularly since it opened several months ago thanks to Arquette and his partner's celeb connections (and a secret back room where impromptu jam sessions often go down), but it is on the main stage where Arquette hopes to bring back the glitz, glamour and madcap pizzazz of the Sunset Strip in the 50's and 60's for all to enjoy. Back then, drinking and dining was often accompanied by shaking and shimmering eye candy and live music, and Arquette's show is sure to offer this and more each week.

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