From the mailbag:

• Droll Gawker alum Elizabeth Spiers ditches her EIC gig at Mediabistro, sends requisite farewell memo, sells her first novel, and yet everyone speaks in hushed tones about the advance.
• But more importantly: Which poor fool will be Spiers's replacement at the 'Bistro?
• We spend some time on the Panel of the Damned.
• You can't just say no to free drugs!
• The Times found its inner inner fratboy.
• And the city's "elite" who received the advance warning about this month's credible non-credible terror threat are revealed to be little more than crunchy art lovers.
• Forthcoming 7-Eleven marks UES apocalypse.
• The 40 best magazine covers remind us of the piss-poor state of our glossies' art departments.

In the name of service journalism, a reader writes:

• Actress Rose McGowan got into a Tuesday-night tussle after exchanging words with a security guard. Funny, this version of events has nothing to do with the key-bombing tragicomedy we heard about. [Page Six]
• America's Favorite Maligned Sweetheart Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn are, according to the celebrity weeklies, officially a couple. Vinifer? Jence? It just doesn't seem right to us. [R&M]
• Madonna dips her fantastic fingers into the UN, giving us hope that Angelina Jolie will be knocked off her pedestal and go back to making Brad Pitt's babies. [Scoop]
• Overpaid Yankee Alex Rodriguez mourns the death of an uncle by playing poorly and getting loaded at Cain. [Lowdown]
• Bombaster Donald Trump bombastically puts his Palm Beach estate for sale, priced at a record-setting, bombastic $125 million. [Page Six]

Having abruptly booted Kate Moss from their fall campaign after the supermodel was photographed hoovering cocaine, cheapie clothier H&M is currently looking for her replacement (models Erin O'Connor and Mariacarla Boscono are on the short list).

It's not, sadly, as cool as you think.

While we've been nothing but supportive of supermodel Kate Moss's highly publicized cocaine habit, we might have to step back for a moment and deliver some heavy-handed criticism to our girl. Yesterday, it was reported that Moss's on-and-off junky boyfriend Pete Doherty was planning to visit Moss at the Meadows rehab center in Arizona — and while we thought it wasn't perhaps the best idea for a heroin addict to go visit Moss during this delicate time, we certainly had to admire homeboy's dedication.

• Since the world was visually introduced to the coke-fuelled antics of supermodel Kate Moss, she's lost contracts with Burberry, H&M, and Chanel. Now, as it's been roughly a month since the initial story broke, it's time for her comeback: First the cover of W, then love from Yves St. Laurent. Alas, we doubt Vogue will ever forgive her. Those bitches know how to hold a grudge. [Page Six]
• The lobbyists at the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America hired writers to create a thriller-style novel designed to scare the crap out of anyone looking to score their prescriptions from Canada. When the deal fell through, the lobbyists attempted to buy the silence of involved writers and publishers for a pithy $100,000. If Lloyd Grove got the story, clearly the money wasn't good enough. [Lowdown]
• America's first completely cracked-out supermodel Janice Dickinson will fuck you — yes, you!! — for a Xanax. [Page Six]
• If you don't receive the self-promoting mass emails from Cory Bernstein (AKA "Cory the Model"), consider yourself a better person. Otherwise, you'd likely give a shit about the leaked tapes of his marathon masturbation. [R&M (2nd item)]
• Matt Lauer's recent vacation from the Today show was reportedly a Eurotrash getaway with his wife, Annette Roque. No better way to celebrate your reconciliation than at Paris's Sexodrome or on the streets of Amsterdam. [Gatecrasher (2nd to last)]

We fail to see how this possibly could be a good idea. Unless, of course, he intends to stay.

• More on the Boy George cocaine bust: He apparently called the cops after a male prostitute tried to rob him, at which point the cops found the coke. Because where there's a hooker, there's blow of one sort of another. [Page Six]
• Angelina Jolie stops humping Brad Pitt just long enough to speak out against mining the Iraq border, then threatened to adopt all Iraqi orphans if her requests were not met. [R&M]
• While Kate Moss twiddles her thumbs in rehab, the father of her child, Jefferson Hack, has possession of the little girl and a brand new modeling contract on Savile Row. [Page Six]
• Why we'll always love MTV: In an episode of Date My Mom, a mother told a contestant, in Russian, that her daughter had a very big heart. The MTV subtitles, however, read, "There is no better piece of a- than my princess Anastasia." Six in one hand, half-dozen in the other. [Lowdown]

New York Times New York/Region Section, October 11, 2003:

First we won the Snark War, now we're winning the Drug War — do Tuesdays get any better for dyspeptic addicts?

• Proving that her own offensiveness has no limits, Paris Hilton allegedly broke up with fiancé Paris Latsis while her new fuckbuddy, Stavros Niarchos was listening on the phone. Meanwhile, Latsis reduces Hilton to a common street whore, which isn't really fair to street whores. They have feelings, too. [Page Six]
• At the youthful age of 79, Playboy kingpin Hugh Hefner is looking to have another child, this one with Holly Madison, who has managed to put up with being in his harem for over four years now. [Lowdown]
• A NYT spokesbot denies that Judith Miller has speaking engagements lined up through 2007, seeing as she's too busy working on her 17-book deal. [Page Six]
• When paparazzi followed Tom Cruise to the Scientology center in LA, the center's security took a pic of the photogs. Later, those photogs beat the crap out of the security guard. So now we finally get the Scientology thing: They get their asses kicked for you. [Scoop]
• Even if Boy George, who was recently arrested for posession, were doing drugs, he certainly wouldn't tell YOU about it. [R&M]

• The latest in celebrity drug abuse: Boy George was arrested this weekend for cocaine posession. The face-painting 80's icon called the NYPD to investigate a break-in at his downtown apartment, wherein they fould a nice bag of the marching powder. Naturally, George claims the drugs weren't his (he has a lot of company, you know, quite the hostess!), but he'll still be in court on December 19 to deal with the matter. [Reuters]
• For a mere $2 million, you can be the proud owner of SeanPrestonFederline.com. Worth every penny, we think. [eBay]
• Freedom of speech does not extend to t-shirts worn on Southwest Airlines flights. [Southwest]
• Times opera boy Anthony Tommasini insists on describing his male subjects as "strapping," which is only slightly less obvious than "glistening" or "potent." [Parterre]
• The NYC celebrity assistants posse learns how to sell their bosses on pink feather Christmas trees, adult bibs, and the fine art of re-gifting. 'Tis the season to be a cheap bastard! [NYM]

You can now officially stop going about your daily business with steely determination in the face of terror, and return to going about it with quiet desperation:

• Dennis Rodman reveals that his ex-wife Carmen Electra has a tendency to insert penne pasta in her lovers' asses. Happy Columbus Day! [Lowdown]
• Long Island's favorite alcoholic, singer Billy Joel, was once so depressed that he drank furniture polish. Sadly, he didn't drink quite enough and instead went on to destroy several innocent trees with his car. [Page Six]
• Having sacked supermodel Kate Moss after she graced the cover of the Daily Mirror with a rolled 5-note shoved up her nose, Burberry considers actress Rachel Weisz as the face of their next campaign. [R&M (3rd item)]
• Brad Pitt has bought some sort of batcave in the wilds of Canada, where he's instructed bodyguards to stalk any paparazzi following around the actor. [Page Six]
• Former gossipista Deborah Schoeneman's forthcoming roman chef features a character called Tim, "An already jaded, near-alcoholic gossip writer with no boundaries." Wonder who that could be based on. No, really, we do wonder: Find us a gossip boy who doesn't fit that description. [Gatecrasher]

The image at right is not the cast of Misshapes: The Musical! These are actually fresh faces behind the East Village's beloved crusties, a group of street kids who regularly sleep on beds of needles in Tomkins Square park. An ambiguous family of homeless punk anarchists (or young bums, as one might say), the crusties have recently come under scrutiny in light of the EDGY spate of heroin overdoses to plague the East Village and Lower East Side as of late, most recently the death of a young man in the bathroom at the Odessa diner. The Villager hits the street for some reportage:

If Kate Moss knows what's good for her, she might stay at Arizona's Meadows rehab center indefinitely. The UK's Sun reports today that upon her return to Britain, the once-super model will be arrested under suspicion of supplying cocaine.

At this point, we're plum out of original commentary on supermodel Kate Moss's "alleged" cocaine use, except for the fact that we find media reports of the incident utterly absurd in that they still referring to the whole thing as "alleged." There's really nothing alleged about it: The Daily Mirror published photographs of her bumping lines, Kate Moss has apologized for her indiscretions, and now a video of the incident has made its way to European television outlets and, in turn, the internet. If you've never seen a Brian DePalma movie, you'll find the footage (from an Italian newscast) highly educational. Otherwise, it's nothing you haven't already seen on a Saturday night.

A moment of silence, please, in honor of Leo Sternbach, who died yesterday at the age of 97. Through his cutting-edge work with tranquilizers, Sternback saved countless nuclear families from violence and mommy-rage. May his memory will live on with his eventual beatification.