SNL alum Jimmy Fallon almost makes sense...but not quite:

The New York Post takes a step towards respectability today with a real live correction—just like the ones you'd find in a boring "serious" newspapers!

"Only a few years after my birth in 1961, the city began to rot away from the inside..."-John Podhoretz
What Gotham Lost [NYP]

Everyone thinks we're miserable, cynical misanthropes, but we have a confession to make: We have a raging case of wedding fever! And if there's a cure, we don't want it.

Some people are so sensitive! You accuse them of a brutal murder with ritualistic overtones on the cover of your tabloid and they get all bent out of shape! Sheesh!

From "The Company You Keep" file comes this bit of 'Page Six' parent company pluggery:

From today's New York Post "On the Newsstand" column:

Sara Nelson's column in today's Post alerts us to a book we might actually read: baseball cap-bedecked Boston hottie and Times mag contributor Benoit Denizet-Lewis' upcoming tome about the state of addiction in America. The book is still untitled (Nelson writes that the book has been titled America Anonymous, but Denizet-Lewis doth protest) and, while we weren't interviewed for his book (for shame!), the sporty Frenchman tells us:

Today marks the beginning of, perhaps, a new era: the NY Daily News has set up Rush and Molloy's bitchy Australian gossip-boy Ben Widdicombe with his own weekend column. And just a few weeks ago, the NY Post launched their own weekend gossip column, hostessed by the even-younger-than-Ben Elisa Lipsky-Karasz.

LES evangelist and blogger Lockhart Steele was right. The Lower East Side is the coolest neighborhood in Manhattan. Or so says the NY Post. (I'm not sure anyone reads the Post to find out what's cool, but we'll just go with it.)
Sweet 'n' Ludlow [Post]

James Scott, a reporter for the Charleston Post and Courier, was recently in Augusta covering The Master's tournament protests. He quoted a protester who said his name was "Heywood Jablowme" and the quote made it into the article. Scott was immediately scolded, publically and nationally, for having missed "the oldest joke in the fifth grade." He writes about it: "According to the 99X Web site, the stunt was mentioned in over 100 newspapers and numerous TV stations. That makes me feel a little better at night when I curl up in the fetal position and whine myself to sleep." [Update: a reader notes that the NY Post fell for "Heywood Jablowme" once as well, a year and a half ago.]
Embarrassing lesson: duped reporter learns the hard way [Charleston Post and Courier via Romenesko]

A reader writes, in response to Jared Paul Stern's Post column ("Tips for flacks") yesterday:
1. Never, ever, fuck with Alec Baldwin or Tim Robbins, they are really big guys and won't hesitate to punch your lights out or throw a drink on you.
2. Just because you wear a fedora and eat dinner at Elaine's, it doesn t make you a journalist and I ll answer your stupid questions about my clients drug habits however I damn please.
3. Being friends with Mickey Rourke doesn't make you cool. [Ed. notePage Six columnist Richard Johnson and Mickey Roarke have a history of very publicly threatening to kick each other's asses. They're not friends. But you're right; being friends with Mickey Roarke doesn't make anyone cool. UPDATE: Nevermind. I'm told that A.J. Benza is friends with Roarke.]
4. If you are or were gay, just admit it and don't write a book about it.
5. I've seen your kid doing crank at a party in the East Village, you shouldn t talk about other people's kids.
6. Relax, Graydon gave you that money as a pay-off, he doesn't actually expect you to contribute a story to the magazine.

The Post's Keith Kelly gets a preview of Talk veteran Maer Roshan's soon-to-be-launched magazine, Radar, and notes that it's already taking swipes at other magazines. Media targets include Jann Wenner, Bonnie Fuller, and particularly Details editor Dan Peres. "Let's Get One Thing Straight," says one article, "Dan Peres, editor-in-chief of Details, is not gay. But his magazine sure seems to be."
Radar's attitude: more SPY than Vanity Fair [Keith Kelly - Post]

The NY Post's Jared Paul Stern offers a few words of advice for publicists: He warns against overhyping parties and obscure restaurants, lying to journalists about facts that have already been substantiated, and spending exhorbitant amounts of money on badly-produced events. Conspicuously missing from the list: running over innocent bystanders with your Mercedes SUV, demanding that your client's GQ photos be airbrushed, and sending a gossip website editor a press release about a total non-event with the expectation that the hypothetical editor wouldn't possibly make fun of it on said website.
Eight-step program for PR biz makeover [Post via 601am]

Page Six columnist Richard Johnson, in LA stumping for the Post, recently did a morning radio show with Danny Bonaduce in which Bonaduce "started right in talking about his drinking days back in New York and how one morning he arrived at his DJ job barely sober, bruised and covered in puke and wondering what the hell happened, only to open up the Post to read Johnson going on about how he was drunk as hell running around in clubs the night before." Bonaduce fired back: "The first target was Johnson's style. He showed up wearing a black Izod golf shirt with a pair of Ray-Ban-style glasses hanging from his neck. 'Hey, Richard,' Bonaduce said, 'the '80s called, and they want their wardrobe back.'...Bonaduce stands 5-foot-skinny to Johnson's more-than-6-foot frame, but that wasn't stopping him from questioning Johnson's sexuality. That didn't go over so well, considering Johnson's both mildly conservative and recently separated. But, then again, Bonaduce's got that silly goatee and is wearing snakeskin bootsso go figure."
NY gossip: The Post's man always rings twice [LA Weekly]

Attorney General Eliot Spitzer is now negotiating immunity agreements for people associated with Credit Suisse First Boston's former superstar tech banker, Frank Quattrone, many of whom received potentially illegal IPO allocations. A list of 63 "Friends of Frank" who received the allocations in question has served as the centerpiece of the investigations, and I, for the record, would very much like to get my hands on that list. (Anyone? Anyone?)
Frank on ropes [NY Post]

Choire from East/West issues an "appreciation" to the "Cab Driver Who Gave Me the New York Post and Totally Encouraged Me To Smoke": You might be the only reason I haven't grifted an arson fraud and moved to L.A. with the insurance money. I will always love you. Even though you're really really old and don't drive so good and I think you were muttering something about the Mayor's space ship while pulling hairs from your terrifying and probably fundamentalist-induced beard, I think you rock. I hope you didn't spend your five dollar tip on underage porn or Night Train or Hezbolla, and I hope I see you again real soon!
Two apologies and an appreciation [East/West]

Celene, a 20-year-old economics major at NYU who funds her Jimmy Choo habit by turning tricks: "It's a hell of a lot less demeaning than working as a waitress or something. And I always reward myself by getting a manicure and pedicure and going on a shopping spree at Bergdorf or Barneys every Saturday afternoon."
Hooked on fashion [Post]

The NY Post reports that the tendency to sit frozen in front of the TV watching news broadcasts for hours at a time is an actual addiction problem. "People who abuse drugs or alcohol do so because the substance serves some purpose, like escape from some type of personal pain, [program manager of a hospital-based substance abuse program, Eric] D'Entrone explains. "In this case watching non-stop news may help soothe viewer's anxieties or give them a sense of control in an increasingly chaotic world." (Frighteningly, this article was categorized by the Post as "entertainment.")
Help! I can't stop watching the war! [NY Post]

The NY Post reports that frumpy is fashionable. I suppose this is just a continuation of the if-it-looks-awful wear it trend that includes fauxhawks, mesh truck-driver hats (my favorite), and any piece of clothing that would have been unironically cool in 1981. But if you must, get your Aerosoles before Barneys sells out.
Over the frump [NY Post]