[5] This is your humble correspondent on her way into Vanity Fair's Oscar party. You'll notice I found a last-minute replacement for the old white pantsuit. There's a story [6] in today's paper about what it's like on the inside of the celebrity circle of cool, gleaned from crumpled, inky bits of paper -- that's what I found in my pockets the morning after. Here's a bit of that piece:

“There was joy in the room at the Vanity Fair party at Morton’s

, by now an Oscar night tradition that has cowed the competition. The restaurant filled on Sunday night with the likes of Helen Mirren [7], Forest Whitaker [8], Jennifer Hudson [9] and Peter O’Toole [10] (who was perched merrily on a banquette most of the night). It was as if the 

industry breathed a collective sigh of relief that the Martin Scorsese Story now had a beginning, a middle and a happy end: spurned for his most brilliant, early work ('Taxi Driver,' [11] 'Raging Bull' [12]), left to wander in the cinematic wilderness - or, at least, New York - for decades, and now, finally, the prize for 'The Departed,' a return to his gangster roots. "I didn’t think it was the kind of film that they would choose,” Mr. Scorsese said of 'The Departed.' [13] But they did, 

for two of the biggest awards: best picture, best director. Hollywood, all is forgiven. "For me, it’s good that it came now," said Mr. Scorsese, referring to his seven previous nominations, and snubs. "Now I’m concentrating on the work." And that's a strange thing about Hollywood. It operates very much like an exotic tribe, with its own social code and pecking order. Within the tribe, there was widespread accord that the director had been overlooked for too long...(Read the rest) [14]