• Alex Kuczynski learns two words every man wants to hear: scrotal waxing. [Papermag Blogs]
  

It's a rare individual brave enough to stand up to the prevailing orthodoxies of the age and say, "This is not right. This is not justice. I demand equality." One thinks of Gandhi, of Dr. King, and, as of today, Alex Kuczynski.

Noted without comment: At left, Special K's advice to the readers of Wired's "mr. know-it-all" column. At right, a photo from today's Liz Smith appreciation. Enjoy.

Perhaps inspired by our recent compare and contrast feature on Alex Kuczynski, a WireImage photographer passes along a photograph of the boutique diagnostician snapped this summer. It seems a little less, uh, stylized than the stuff from Avenue. Maybe she's had some work done.

In our continuing effort to understand the new Alex Kuczynski, the Times reporter who is now composed of living tissue over a metal endoskeleton, we're reminded of a passage from Michael Gross' 740 Park, a history of the exclusive apartment buillding:

Remember those Highlights magazine features that showed two side-by-side pictures which were seemingly the same but actually had about five or six variations from each other? Well, thanks to the efforts of a reader, you can now play that game with Alex Kuczynski's face. Have at it!

To compensate for the horrific images of destruction we shared with you earlier, we're offering this horrific image, from the Alex Kuczynski Avenue piece we mentioned yesterday. It should, if nothing else, make you forget the horror of that broken building. You're welcome.

Defamer reports that NBC in talks to develop a modern version of seventies camp classic The Bionic Woman, "the story of a woman who had certain body parts enhanced or replaced by bionic technology." On a completely unrelated note, here's the cover of Avenue's October issue.

To the city below 110th Street, Harlem is simultaneously unrefined and a daringly sophisticated community, stretching the boundaries of humanity and culture in a way that few other American neighborhoods do. The kid on the corner feels uncomfortable that his mother won't, or can't afford to, shop there. But the people buying the condos at the nearby Lenox (where a penthouse recently sold for $2.4 million) and the Dwyer (condos priced to more than $1 million) may be happy they can find a hand-tailored suit at N, for prices starting at $1,000, without having to go two miles south.

You ever get the feeling that Times "method journalist" Alex Kuczynski is actually some kind of brilliant performance artist whose mission is to see how far beyond any level of parody she can go and still be taken seriously by a shallow, credulous society? Because that's the only way the brief Q&A in the current Publishers Weekly makes sense. Alex lets us know that it wasn't out of any kind of self-loathing that she went under the knife repeatedly; it was more about being a prodigy (she was the Mozart of writing about expensive jeans, you know) facing the aging process:

The first review of Alex Kuczynski's Beauty Junkies is in, and, well, see for yourself:

WWD's Memo Pad has gotten its well-manicured little hands on a galley for Times shopaholic Alex Kuczynski's plastic surgery book, Beauty Junkies — we're just shocked that a galley exists, suggesting that Kuczynski's book, which has been "forthcoming" for the past 12 years, is not a fabrication of the collective media imagination. Apparently Kuczynski spends no less than 30 pages detailing her own cosmetic procedure history, which includes an eyelift, collagen injections, Juvederm treatments, regular Botoxing, a nasty run in with Restalyne, and liposuction. Exhale. It's no more extreme than the regimen of your average lady who lunches, though pictures of Kuczynski certainly depict a more natural visage.

In her I Get Paid to Spend Money column today, Times painted lady Alex Kuczynski skips over to Henri Bendel, the Fifth Avenue temple that serves as a "limitless warehouse of luxury and desire." But this column is not about the onyx flash of Kuczynski's AmEx, nor is it really about her dissatisfaction with the store's lack of a "coherent identity." Instead, Alex wants to share her sadness, the incomparable misery of self-realization:

• Will Katie Couric make the evening news relevant again? Color us skeptical. [NYT]
• This week's new New Republic — now less wonky! — spends its cover and nearly 4,000 words analyzing Thursday Styles and its star columnist, Alex Kuczynski. (Turns out, the section and her column are both morally indefensible. Who knew?) The big question, however, is left unanswered: What does it mean for Israel? [TNR]
• Steve Dunleavy is taking all the Page Six stuff hard. "I bleed for the paper, I really do." Poor Steve. [NYer]
• And, shockingly, the News is reveling in the Post's misfortune. [NYT]

A fluffy goldmine of well-bred living in today's Times:

In today's Critical Shopper column, Times reporter Alex Kuczynski learns from an enthusiastic Anna Sui that "leggings are back." No, that can't be — can it?

This week's edition of Thursgay offers a panoply of hard-hitting journalism and reportage. Rather than take each item individually (although, trust us, we could), we're going to give you the gist:

A few weeks ago, the Times' critical shopper Alex Kuczynski wrote about her less-than-fantastic experience at Los Angeles' overpriced mecca of trendy shopping, Fred Segal. During her time there, she Kuczynski reported that the salesgirl who was helping her abruptly disappeared when someone else showed up, another salesman told her she was not allowed to take notes while in the store, and her overall bad shopping experience was bookended with many a Hummer and Maybach. No one ever said reporting for the Times was easy.

Ah, to be Alex Kuczynski: the house in the mountains, the great rack, the ability to use phrases like "drinking yourself stinko" without embarrassment. But all may not be well in the world of Special K. This week, she jets off to Vegas "at the urging of friends" to catch a Stones show (cue the anecdote about her encounter with Keith Richards). While there, of course, she gets a little shopping done. After hitting up the oxygen bar, as you do, she wanders over to Victoria's Secret where she discovers