Break out the Cristal. Mr. Sean Combs turns 40 today. Perhaps he'll get together later to celebrate with Bethenny Frankel of the Real Housewives of New York: She's turning 39. Others blowing out candles today: Matthew McConaughey is turning 40. Kathy Griffin is turning 49. Laura Bush is 63. Survivor host Jeff Probst turns 47. Author Charles Frazier is turning 59. Playwright Jon Robin Baitz is 48. Literary agent Andrew Wylie is turning 62. Publishing industry honcho Jonathan Galassi is 60. Anne Sweeney, the president of Disney/ABC president, is turning 51. Ralph Macchio of Karate Kid fame is 48. And Trishelle from The Real World is 30.

So bookstores are struggling, editors aren't allowed to acquire new projects or even eat a decent lunch, and it's never been a worse time for aspiring authors with dreams of literary stardom. (Unless they're Jewish comedians or former child-star drug addicts, that is.) But wait! Is it possible that Barack Obama will singlehandedly turn the tide and redeem literary culture? The President-elect was recently photographed with a copy of Nobel Laureate Derek Walcott's Collected Poems, much to the delight of Farrar, Straus and Giroux president Jonathan Galassi, who, after picking up his own poetry prize at the Mercantile Library Center for Fiction Awards last night, said: "Obama is a big reader, and he's an author, so people are paying attention to what he reads. He could have a lot of influence on books and what's read." Indeed. Now, if Michelle could just be seen reading, say, a Joan Didion novel, another angel will get its wings and a few more editorial assistants will still have their jobs come Christmas.

Not only does Diddy get to vote or die today, he gets to celebrate his birthday, too. He's 39. There probably won't be much to celebrate in the White House today, but Laura Bush will have one reason to. She's turning 62. Also celebrating: Literary agent Andrew Wylie is 61. Playwright Jon Robin Baitz is turning 47. Book publisher Jonathan Galassi is 59. Matthew McConaughey is celebrating his 39th. Kathy Griffin is 48. Disney/ABC president Anne Sweeney is celebrating the big 5-0. Walter Cronkite is 92. Survivor host Jeff Probst is turning 46. Author Charles Frazier is 58. And the Karate Kid, Ralph Macchio, is 47.

The bespectacled, soft-spoken Galassi is the head of ultra-literary publisher Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

In this day and age, who still files business cards in a Rolodex? Old people, it turns out, and people who want to employ a device that "displays the size of one's business network for the world to see." These include Farrar, Straus & Giroux president Jonathan Galassi, who flipped through his for a Wall Street Journal reporter. Two of the three cards he plucked randomly from his five Rolodexes turned out to contain contact information for people who are currently not alive. [WSJ]

• Britney Spears got into a fender-bender, then announced to the assembled paparazzi that "I'm a brainiac!" [Page Six]
  

FSG just bought a memoir—actually, a "self-portrait"!—by John Waters. That is great, we cannot wait to read it. The purchasing editor was Jonathan Galassi. The selling agent was Bill Clegg from William Morris Agency. You know what else is funny? A while back, we floated this crazy rumor that Clegg and Galassi had become lovers, after Clegg returned from falling off the face of the earth, and after Jonathan had, we presume, done something with his wife! After we ran that item, we had a couple reactions. One: an email saying we were "ruining people's lives"! Aren't we. And then we ran into a literary pal, who told us that, uh, that was no rumor, it was totally true. And that we should have seen the FSG offices after that item went up, you could have heard a pin drop. Mmm, awkward office moments! But what do we know? At the very least, their business relationship is working out nicely. [PW]

Oddly enough, the rumor flying all around this week's Book Expo has almost nothing to do with books, which means that it's actually kind of interesting! It concerns longtime Farrar, Straus & Giroux editor Jonathan Galassi and William Morris agent Bill Clegg. The rumor goes that Jonathan is leaving his wife of several decades for Bill. This is nuts. Bill Clegg, of course, is best known for repping Nicole Krauss and Haven Kimmel and Cintra Wilson and for, a while back, having made an "abrupt disappearance" to spend some quality time on his "personal problems." Crazy! But is it, uh, true?