• Dave Eggers, Sarah Vowell, Jon Stewart, John Hodgman, David Byrne, singer-songwriter John Roderick, and (exhale) Sufjan Stevens congregate at Beacon Theater to raise money for Eggers's kiddie training center 826NYC. About as close to a literati wet dream as you can possibly get without importing a Jonathan from Brooklyn. [Upcoming]
• Princesas, a film about the existential dispair of two Spanish whores, opens today at IFC. We'll go out on a limb and say this probably isn't the best date flick. [flavorpill]
• Didja hear? This band will totally change your life: The Shins play hipster playpen McCarren Park Pool tonight. [Paper]

• First two nitwits attempt to navigate the entire subway system in one sitting, now 192 Books looks for a bunch of nitwits to participate in a continuous reading of a new English translation of Don Quixote, an event expected to take a mere 48 hours. Please, please tell us you have something better to do. Even TiVo counts. [Upcoming]
• Eight-foot plywood phallus + fetish objects fashioned from toilet plungers + nipples recreated in yarn= a great place to get your riot grrl on (or to get on a riot grrl). All at Exit Art's Wild Girls, which ends this Saturday. [flavorpill]
• Ian Svenonius (Nation of Ulysses frontman) and Calvin Johnson (founder of K Records, invented "twee") team up at Tonic for a DJ set. For free! Don't act like you're not into it, 'cause we know your ass is broke. [Paper]

Today's LAT Column One story on marijuana law specialist Allison Margolin, "L.A. dopest attorney," should send producers scrambling to option the rights to the Harvard-Law-by-way-of-Beverly-Hills-High grad's Legally Blonde meets Half Baked life story. Writer Maura Dolan has even outlined the opening scene of the inevitable screenplay, complete with dual dog-grooming, feet-rubbing "Boy Fridays" (one to eventually be portrayed as her best, poodle-stroking Gay, the other as the uptight law student with a deep commitment to reforming outdated anti-drug laws), a pre-trial automotive complication, and perhaps most crucially, the Telling Accessory belying the sharp legal mind we'll come to know and love:

• Madonna's tour was ridiculously inaccessible, so B.B. King's hosts the next best thing: a bunch of impersonators singing the same songs for a fraction of the price. After a few drinks, you won't even be able to tell La'Shelle from the Material Girl. [Paper]
• It's not your last chance to see Rocky, but it is your last chance to see Rocky at the Bryant Park Film Festival, which ends after tonight's showing. See how many times you can scream, "Yo, Adrian!" at the screen before someone throws an empty beer can at your face. [Upcoming]
• Matthew De Gennaro likes to play the wire; David Grubbs digs minimalist piano ballads. See their experimental madness tonight with Alog — a Norwegian duo that works in "detail-rich puzzles of samples, field-recording snippets, and live instrumentation." Just another offering from your high-minded friends at Flavorpill. [flavorpill]

Friday:

• Everything I Know About Drugs I learned from Hollywood [LAist]

Among our popular local pastimes, few delight more than collecting and trading secret In-N-Out ordering tips you'd never find on the regular menu. Who, for example, could forget the now legendary 100x100 affair, which was directly responsible for four delicious cardiac arrest deaths plus a number of beef-and-cheese poisonings. Now, the Los Anjealous blog offers up several secret secret menu items available to you by merely dropping their names at the counter with a knowing wink:

• Ghostface, RZA, and the rest of Wu-Tang (RIP, ODB) take over Webster Hall tonight. Expect just as many people on stage as in the crowd. flavorpill]
• Head to the 'Slope and indulge blog-buzz band du jour Takka Takka; they perform with Slowlands at Union Hall. Catch them now before they hit the road with Clap Your Hands Say Whatever. [Brooklyn Vegan]
• Amongst the talent in tonight's Other Talent Show, Post scribe Mandy Stadtmiller will take the stage to reenact Andy Dick's insanity from William Shatner's roast. There might even be some ladybag-grabbing. How could you say no? At $6, it's bargain entertainmnt. Mo Pitkins, 34 Avenue A, 9:30 PM.

Saul Chernick wants to put ads in the Village Voice and on Craigslist offering individualized tattoos for Jews based on their religious experiences. He wants to conduct interviews, design the tattoos, go with participants to get inked and document the entire process as a work of art.

• Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings give a 1-2 R&B/Soul punch tonight in Jackie Robinson Park. See the sights above 14th street tonight! [flavorpill]
• We Googled (is that an acceptable usage if we really did use Google?) "Outside the Box" to try and figure out what it is, but we still have no clue. Anyway: free beer. [WUNYC]
• The Martha Graham Dance Company shakes its tail feather at Lincoln Center. Three more respectable events, and we'll finally stop with the David Blaine jokes. [Lincoln Center]

• If ballet alone doesn't interest you, try ballet and a little something extra: the Smuin Ballet showcases its moves to Sinatra and Bela Fleck, among others. [flavorpill]
• Fancy-schmancy bookstore Rizzoli sells pretty books for cheap. If you can't be smart, might as well look smart. [Paper]
• Radical Andy reads from his dreamy propaganda in which "the US government has been disbanded by a man who thinks he is dead...and where a boy who talks to trees can shape reality to his every whim." Eat your shrooms and put on your anarchist hat before you go. [WUNYC]

With the exercise ball endorsement racket not as lucrative as it once was, Nick Lachey has decided to look elsewhere for goods and services to which he can attach his name, which has evolved into a trusted brand synonymous with bad music and tabloid oversaturation. YFly, the latest venture to get the Nick Lachey stamp of approval, is a recent entrant into the crowded category of online communities. But where field leader MySpace may reign supreme with its sheer number of subscribers, it also suffers from a scourge of faked celebrity home pages. Not YFly, however, which guarantees "real celebrities, athletes, and artists - no posers!" among the "kick a** people" in its database. And how do you know your new friend is the "DaREALJessAlba," and not just some balding, middle-aged impostor preying on horny and gullible teenage boys? By marking their profiles "Certified Celebrity." Their brief FAQ explains how Lachey fits into the picture:

• This week at Bryant Park: Charade, with Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn. The free outdoor stuff can't last that much longer, so hop on board while you still can. [flavorpill]
• Risky Business inspires a crystal egg-filled art show. Because nothing related to Tom Cruise is safe from interpretation. [Paper]
• Mighty Sparrow and Toots and the Maytals rock out as part of the Carlos Lezama Caribbean Music Festival. Maxi Priest will be there; bonus points if you shamelessly sing along to that one song you know. [Prefix]

Friday:
• The Fringe Festival takes the city by storm. They may be whackos, but God Bless anyone who allows you to see a play without venturing to Times Square. [flavorpill]
• The Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Sonic Youth are all sold. Some of the high-schoolers will inevitably get grounded, though, so you should check Craigslist for extra tickets. Or try again tomorrow. [Prefix]

Former agent Jamie Gold lost his valiant battle with fame early this morning, winning the World Series of Poker (on a bluff, naturally), its $12 million purse, and the lifelong curse of being upsold to a multisong, private room lapdance by every stripper in Vegas who recognizes him as "that rich poker guy." Keenly aware of their newest ambassador's ambivalence for his forced role as the Face of Poker, World Series organizers made Gold as comfortable as possible by supplementing their monetary spoils with a treat harkening back to his Hollywood life as an agent, hiding a fleshy, newborn baby inside the pile of his prize money, then inviting him to burrow inside right there at the table and partake of his victory snack.

• First an Adrien Brody/Diet Coke commercial, now the Hudson River: watch Lyrics Born rocket its way to stardom tonight at RiverRocks. Rjd2 and Alice Smith are along for the ride. [flavorpill]
• On the other side of our fair isle, the Brooklyn Bridge Park screens Bonnie & Clyde. Head on over for some "seminal counter-culture" and a glimpse at Faye Dunaway before gravity got to her. [WUNYC]
• Lincoln Center hosts an all-girl break dancing extravaganza. And you thought it couldn't get any worse after David Blaine. [Paper]

Africa's recent run as the hottest continent for Hollywood's charity-minded tastemakers to embrace finally comes to an end with this Gwyneth Paltrow ad, in which the Sliding Doors and Bounce star one-ups good works icon Angelina Jolie by symbolically adopting all of Africa, not just a single, too-trendy nation willing to host a publicity-attracting celebrity birth. However, the trendsetting Jolie knows that public awareness campaigns consist of more than just having one's stylist dig up some beads and smear some eyeshadow on one's face, and will prove that she'll always be ahead of the fashionable do-gooder curve by leaving Africa to move her family into an abandoned well in rural Bangladesh, then turning down all movie projects that refuse to shoot on location in her new homeland.

Reality show producer and former agent Jamie Gold is currently the chip leader at the World Series of Poker No Limit Hold 'Em Championship in Vegas, but he's terrified of winning—not because he's afraid of the millions of dollars he'd take home, as an agent's moneylust never truly fades, but rather because he fears the fame that a victory will bring. In an interview with ESPN.com, Gold explains why the idea of instant celebrity is so frightening that he openly muses about taking a dive into second place:

• For some inexplicable reason, Candi Staton chooses Bowery Ballroom as the venue for her first NYC show in 20 years. Frankly, the Lower East Side could use some Southern soul and gospel. [flavorpill]
• Cheap and charitable: shop for a good cause tonight at the AccesSoiree Sale and Benefit. Proceeds go the Children's Action Network (and your closet). [WUNYC]
• BAM screens a sneak preview of Ryan Gosling's new movie, Half Nelson. Finally — our Notebook DVD was getting all worn out. [Paper]

We at Defamer will not rest until Victoria Redstall, the charmingly kooky, if incredibly naive, serial killer groupie/struggling actress who's befriended an imprisoned psychopath, gets an acting gig that will give her something better to do with her time than wait around for her new BFF to turn her glowing skin into a fetching kimono. So, compassionate producers and casting directors of Hollywood, we beseech you to watch some of the finest work from Redstall's reel, in which the actress ably submerges her British accent and delivers each line with the sensual nuance of a housewife who's about to be bent over the couch by her shirtless "cleaning hunk"—a performance made all the more impressive when you consider that Redstall curbed her desire to ad-lib some dialogue asking the pine-scented furniture-polisher if he has any products strong enough to dissolve dismembered limbs in a bathtub. Surely one of you can find a use for a talent like this and rescue her before it's too late.