Who’s wearing the pants at Washington DC barbecue?

Illustration: Rod Clement.

It was a shorts-and-thongs affair as our man in Washington DC, Joe Hockey, hosted the Australian American Leadership Dialogue’s traditional barbecue at the Australian ambassador’s residence yesterday.

Who knew the much loved, shorts-clad ambassador who preceded him, Kim Beazley — who was along at the knees-up in the American capital — had such a great set of pins?

Andrew Forrest downing a beer with a shorts-clad Joe Hockey.

To the immense relief of the hundred-plus guests who gathered at the magisterial residence on the hot afternoon, the culinary-challenged Hockey did not cook. Barbecue duties were delegated to professionals, presumably to avoid a “diplomatic incident”.

The event marked the end of the 24th gathering of Phil Scanlan’s annual gabfest, which for almost a quarter of a century has been something of a rite of passage for wannabe Australian prime ministers.

The famously hardworking Hockey — who, manfully, took the plum foreign posting as an alternative to “getting even with people” back in Canberra — began the week in the Mediterranean. There the ambassador dropped in on billionaire Lindsay Fox’s floating “conception party”, and downed a few beers with billionaire passenger Andrew Forrest.

Hockey then jetted back to oversee the Dialogue, catching up with Andrew Robb, Steven Ciobo, Stuart Robert, private equity boss (and AALD board member) Ben Gray, along with Labor “roosters” Stephen Conroy and Hockey’s old Treasury nemesis, Wayne Swan.

Perhaps provocatively, the Queenslander Swan wore pants to the barbecue despite the ambassador’s insistence on dressing casually. They never could agree on anything.

Lock up your birds

Whatever wildlife remains in Venice should beware: Greg “The Shark” Norman (a hunting and fishing enthusiast with a House of Horrors in Colorado to prove it) has arrived in the ­Adriatic Sea’s most famous marshy lagoon.

Yes, billionaire Lindsay Fox’s “Love Boat” has reached its final destination. As you read this, the final night of Fox’s bacchanalian “conception party” is under way.

Going on the entertainment from previous evenings, the Fox clan are most likely singing. We’re told they make The Sound of Music look ordinary.

Gina Rinehart and her recently married daughter Ginia will need to return to their residence on the private cruise ship The Worldif they want to stay on the water.

With the “conception party” now headed for the history books, the billionaire party set are counting down the days till Fox’s 80th — on April 19.

And with more than a hundred couples having passed a week floating on the Med on the privately hired “Love Boat” — not to mention the arousing presence of testosterone bullet Hugh Jackman — is anyone the least bit surprised to hear that the “conception party” may have earned its name?

Not another word on that.

Next stop, St Tropez

Moving to another hotbed of billionaire friskiness, James Packer has moved his icebreaker Arctic P to Cannes, not far from Nice where the horrific terror attack unfolded.

James Packer’s icebreaker Arctic P.

The gaming billionaire’s entourage includes fiancee Mariah Carey, her five-year-old twins Monroe and Moroccan, the pop diva’s Russian publicist Stella Bulochnikov, and Stella’s daughters Mishka and Sasha.

The icebreaker is believed to be heading from Cannes for St Tropez next week before Packer sets off to Rio for the Olympics. Only three weeks away now.

Roll out the red carpet

ANZ boss Shayne Elliott welcomes his latest recruit, investment banker turned four-pillar chief financial officer Michelle Jablko on Monday.

ANZ chief financial officer Michelle Jablko.

She begins a week after her wounded knight in digital armour, Paul Edwards, returned to Docklands after three weeks convalescence.

ANZ’s other star recruit, Maile Carnegie.

And in just 11 days, lawyers will gather in the Supreme Court for the next instalment of former Bell Potter broker Angus Aitken’s defamation case against Elliott, Edwards and ANZ. That’s assuming Aitken’s time-challenged lawyer Mark O’Briendoesn’t get the dates for the directions hearing wrong — never a sure thing.

Jablko will have her pumps well settled under her desk by the time Elliott’s other star recruit Maile Carnegie arrives from Google as ANZ’s new head of digital. Carnegie, who starts at the end of the month, is married to Charles Carnegie, son of mining legend Rod Carnegie. Her brothers-in-law are venture capitalist Mark Carnegie and private equiteer James Carnegie, who runs Blackstone in Australia.

To be an appropriate cultural fit, Maile will need some one-on-one tutoring from Twitter warrior Edwards. Despite her digital pedigree, she’s managed just 11 tweets in the past year and a half. Even the almost 80-year-old Pope Francis does better than that.

Appeal lodged

Riverview old boy Oliver Curtis has lodged his appeal of his insider trading conviction.

Stockbroker Oliver Curtis being escorted to a prison van. Picture: AAP Image/Joel Carrett.

The next decision for Curtis’s legal team — led by white collar specialist Tim Grave from Clifford Chance — will be whether to apply for bail for the 30-year-old’s release from Parklea Correctional Centre in Sydney’s west.

If required, his millionaire dad Nicholas Curtis — who made a pile with rare-earths miner Lynas — could help with bail money, so his son can get home to North Bondi as his publicist wife Roxy Jacenko undergoes treatment for breast cancer. In a melodramatic twist worthy of Thomas Hardy, her dreadful diagnosis was revealed the day before the appeal was lodged.

Swanning about

“Tonight’s match will be as nail-biting as the federal election,” SCG Trust chairman Tony Shepherd told his fellow diners. “But it won’t take nine weeks to see who wins.”

Cyril Rioli of the Hawks. Picture: AAP Image/Paul Miller.

He was right on both counts. Thursday night’s top-of-the-ladder AFL clash between the Swans and Hawks was a ripper all the way to Cyril Rioli’s last-minute winning goal.

Joining Shep and his fellow trustees, trainspotter Barry O’Farrell and his good friend Nihal Gupta, was Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbulland wife and fellow Swan supporter Lucy.

Fellow Liberal power couple Marise Payne (the one with the tanks) and Stuart Ayers (the one with the fields) were also along, as was greyhound liberator Troy Grant.

NSW Premier Mike Baird was absent, but sent chief of staff Bay Warburton and policy adviser Clive Mathieson (Swans fans) and communications tsar Imre Salusinszky (brazenly, a Hawks fan).

Over at the President’s Club, Swans head and Moelis chief Andrew Pridham entertained Fairfax boss Greg Hywood and Nine’s glamorous new recruit, Helen McCabe.