It’s almost New Year’s Eve and I still don’t know how I want to spend the countdown. Do I wanna do it at a low-key celebration at someone’s house? “…3, 2, 1. Happy New Year. Yay.” Or go the total opposite route and do it up big with 20,000 other Angelenos in Downtown L.A.? “Happy New Year” with an exclamation point.

I know it sounds like a nightmarish prospect but with performers like The Black-Eyed Peas, The Flaming Lips, Crystal Method, Death Cab for Cutie and Jason Bentley, Giant Village NYE 2006 will definitely be the hottest place to countdown. A party that’s five years in the making and growing with every New Year celebration, the Village (a.k.a. L.A.’s Time Square NYE party) takes up six blocks, six stages and three lounges, and this year’s event promises to be the biggest ever.

General admission is $80 and you can enjoy a pretty swell evening on that ticket. Or you can go VIP. Apparently there are two VIP sections. The one in the Pegasus Indoor Lounge for $150 gets you: a separate VIP entrance, open bar in the Pegasus Indoor Lounge with music by John Digweed, and in & out privileges to all three Giant Village Hotels and complimentary access to their New Year’s Day Party on January 1, 2006, from 12 noon to 10pm.

The $120 VIP party in the Grand Pavilion gets you access to the 3,000-capacity VIP Pavilion covering an entire block of Grand Avenue and overlooking the Grand Stage (where the Black Eyed Peas will perform), as well as private entrance, premium open bar, private lounges and restrooms and direct access to the Village.

The only thing keeping me from this event? I can’t think of how to get there. With 20,000 people converging on downtown, where does one park? The Giant Village Web site offers parking lot suggestions (under “Details”) but I can just imagine the horrendous traffic with 20,000 people on all those one-way streets trying to get home at the same time. I don’t want to kick off the new year with road rage.

There are four hotels surrounding the Village (three offering direct access to the festivities) but at $200+ a room? Eesh! I suppose I could count on making fast friends and crash in theirs. I’d have to since there’s no way I’m driving myself and Metrolink doesn’t offer service for New Year’s Day. (WTF? You’d think with an event this huge generating lots of revenue for the city, they’d make an exception, but nope.)

The more I read about Giant Village, the more I want to go. Maybe I’ll just buy my ticket and worry about how to get there later. If anyone wants to go, let me know. Maybe we can carpool. 🙂