• New York EIC and Elvis Costello imposter Adam Moss joins Time ME Richard Stengel to remind you that the media can be slightly inaccurate. Hold on to your seats for this one. [NYSEC]
• The Gimme Shelter fundraiser has it all: 80s musicians in the process of making a comeback (Debbie Harry), New York icons (the Beastie Boys), a good cause (saving cute, fuzzy animals), and a reason for you to keep living (an open bar). [Rational-Animal]
• Lord Whimsy, one of New York's top dandies (certainly there must be a ranking of these things somewhere), shows other dandies how to refine their lives. Your brows should always be perfectly arched, even in hell. [flavorpill]

While they've always been the most faithful chronicler of the goings on outside of Hyde, the local establishment which currently plays host to Hollywood's peripatetic high school cafeteria, today TMZ.com seems particularly obsessed with documenting the action unfolding in the vicinity of the venue's front door, having already put up four Hyde-related posts by noon. A round-up of things
that the site's omnipresent camera picked up last night:

• Remember the first time you had sex? At Fresh Meat, comedians share their first jokes, which are almost as bad as the night you lost it. [Comix]
• Dragons of Zynth, Harlem Shakes, White Rabbits, and the Subjects team up to bring you more psychedelic, new-age, doo-wop, post-garage pop than your Chucks can handle. [flavorpill]
• Tired of being elbowed by the douchebag who attempts to unfold a Times on a crowded train? Sick of that stupid kid and his candy bars? Had enough of heavy breathing perverts who flash you? Listen to those who share your pain at a reading of The Subway Chronicles. [NYM]

• Curumin, the Brazilian singer/producer, plays the guitar and drums to hip-hop and jazz beats. The more influences, the better. [flavorpill]
• The Film Forum shows Brazil, Terry Gilliam's 141-minute vision of the fucked-up dystopia of the future. We'd advise against smoking anything before seeing this one. [Paper]
• It's no secret that the other coast has been hogging the teen drama scene with Laguna Beach and The O.C. Now we've got The NYC, which comes complete with a puppy-obsessed overachieving virgin and a bitchy omni-dater who believes Keds are for losers. [The Pit]

If you find yourself whimpering with withdrawal at the knowledge that you have to wait a full week for another Blue States Lose, consider this the hipster-photo equivalent of scraping out the tar from inside the pipe, just to get you to the next fix. Epicenter of naughtiness Fleshbot has exclusive preview boobie pics from Merlin Bronques's Last Night's Party book. Absolutely NSFW — expect prodigious udders and fondling of same — but then, you knew all that already.

When considering all the assorted tragedies that have set up shop in the Meatpacking District, it's nearly impossible to assemble them in a rank and file from bad to abhorrent. They're all bad, they're all filled with overly slick playas and faux-empowered hobags. So rather than enumerate all the things worth hating, we're instead focusing on what comes to mind as the four most offensive, neighborhood-iconic, and ridiculous venues: One, Level V, PM, and G-Spa — the four horsemen's stables, if you will.

Friday:
• Volver earns the prestigious title of "centerpiece" in the prestigious 19-day New York Film Festival. People, presumably those of prestige, flock to buy moderately-priced $40 admission tickets. [flavorpill]
• Slightly less prestigious but no less talented, the NYC Photobloggers Conglomerate or somesuch gathers tonight in Soho at the Apple Store. Rock geek out with your cock out. [NYCPhotobloggers]

It's Friday, your brain is dead, and you can hardly muster the energy to move your mouse — but it's time for your pick-me-up: Blue States Lose, wherein we look at the ridiculous pictures on The Cobrasnake, Last Night’s Party, Misshapes, and Ambrel so you don't have to. After the jump, Alex Blagg shows you his Joy Division collection.

There are few more thankless job than door control in the Meatpacking District, but among them is attempting to interview bouncers and doormen in the Meatpacking District. Some are actually quite friendly, while others are friendly in the "I will break your shit" way. Observe the reactionary gamut from cheerful chatting to hunter-killer mode when nightlife enforcers are confronted with the camera.

• Clap Your Hands Say Yeah hit Central Park with Takka Takka, where they'll play for those rare bloggers who have enough money to buy the $32-plus-fees ticket. [Paper]
• Jewtopia authors Bryan Fogel and Sam Wolfson explain why the chosen folk rule the world. [NYM]
• Wired hosts a weekend-long festival of geek-friendly events. See how far they can take that Conde party budget. [flavorpill]

• Forest Whitaker and Gillian Anderson star in The Last King of Scotland, based on the regime of a former Ugandan dictator. Expect a lot of history buffs who happen to own all nine box sets of The X Files. [flavorpill]
• Some Rolling Stones and Kanye West fans trek to the depths of New Jersey for a once-in-a-lifetime concert. Others send hate mail asking why it wasn't at the Garden. [NYM]
• Veteran journalist Edward Kosner talks shit about Newsweek and reads from his memoir. [B&N]

• Last week Jim McGreevey hawked his memoir to desperate housewives on Oprah. This week he hawks his memoir to desperate college students at The New School. [Paper]
• Bloomingdales, Kenneth Cole and InStyle host a party for Model Student, Robin Hazelwood's account of her days as a Yale undergrad/couture model. A few lucky shoppers will receive a free, autographed copy of the book — just try to wait a couple weeks before selling it on eBay. [WUNYC]
• Once again, we defer to the descriptive insanity of flavorpill: "Kiahkeya Productions transforms Hiro Ballroom into a reverie of frenetic tribal dance." Seriously, what more do you need to know? BYO peyote. [flavorpill]

Now that we've given you an overview and a history as part of our weeklong tirade versus New York's Meatpacking District, we'll spend a little time focusing on a few of the worst local offenders. Let's begin with a trio of establishments that have each contributed substantially to the Meatpacking's rise, for good or ill. And by good, of course we mean more ill. The venues in question are French diner-bistro Florent (established 1985), Romper Room dive bar Hogs & Heifers (1992), and infinitely repeatable/exportable brasserie prototype Pastis (2002). After the jump, comparison, contrast, and condemnation.

After overhearing some suspiciously chatty, sniffling patron exiting Hyde talking excitedly about how he felt "like Strawberry Shortcake just peed down the back of my throat," TMZ.com's curiosity was aroused enough to try and find the source of this new buzz, confident that even the most cutting-edge club does not yet offer deviant, childhood-cartoon-character-based water sports. Today, they present the findings from their journey through the fruit-flavored underbelly of the local narcotics trade:

• While you were rocking the Aquanet or, if you're a bit younger, the snap bracelets, acclaimed Mexican director Alfonso Cuar n was busy directing his first film, S lo con Tu Pareja. Fifteen years later, the film, about a "yuppie and womanizer falsely diagnosed with AIDS," finally makes its American debut. [flavorpill]
• Continuing with the AIDS beat, Jennifer Love Hewitt and Parker Posey dance for charity at AmfAR Rocks, an AIDS research benefit. All in a day's work for the rich and semi-fabulous. [Paper]
• Republican Playbook author Andy Borowitz kicks of the third season of his eponymous show with fellow comedians Jimmy Carr, Dean Obedidallah and the Daily Show's John Oliver. Nothing about AIDS, at least to our knowledge. [NYM]

No one in New York needs to be told to stay away from the Meatpacking District, that little slice o' damnation by the Hudson just below 14th Street. Why, then, does the place continue to pulse like Sodom, Gomorrah, and the Las Vegas Strip all rolled into a giant distasteful enchilada? The obvious answer — especially if you spend time there — is that the Meatpacking District is increasingly populated by tourists hailing not just from outside Manhattan, but outside New York, or even outside New Jersey. Of course, there's still plenty of local lookie-loos and eager guidos who call the Meatpacking District their second home most every weekend night. They don't even realize that most of their brethren have already moved eastward to befoul what's left of Rivington Street. Therefore, as a public service, we're passing along the only message worth hearing about the Meatpacking District: Stay away. Get out. Don't go. It's that simple. All this week, we'll beat this drum till it carries beyond Manhattan, to the ears that most need to hear the warning.

And here's the full-court-press Good experience at last. The philanthropically minded mag venture celebrated its birth last night at Chelsea's Emergency Arts, and Gawker was there, and there. But wherever there is an open bar and tragically vulnerable boldface names, you can surely find Intern in Perpetuity Neel Shah. After the jump, enjoy one of Neel's trademark productions of fearless investigatory reportage, coupled with the cheerfully impolitic photography of Jennifer Snow. You got more Al Gore, more Matthew Modine, and even a few cupsful of Amanda Congdon, plus a gaggle of other well-meaning New York media mandarins.

TMZ.com's tireless dedication to the video documentation of the comings and goings of various celebrities from our city's many fine drinking establishments has once again yielded one of those priceless, only-in-front-of-an-exclusive-hotspot moments, as the webarazzi's all-seeing cameras captured a brief mix-up in which Jeremy Piven accidentally climbed inside another patron's vehicle at Hyde's valet stand. We know! In the clip, Piven quickly realizes that he's seated in the wrong Range Rover (Hollywood tip: merely telling a parking attendant "to bring around the Range Rover" is a tragically vague instruction likely to result in such an embarassing snafu), barely avoids a half-hearted hug-it-out from the car's rightful, too-handsy owner, and is eventually placed in his own SUV, which even the most addled valet should have been able to identify in the first place by its telltale, hood-mounted Emmy statuette and vanity PIVWEELZ plates. We're sure the proprieters of Hyde will take the necessary steps to ensure that such a mortifying error never happens again.

Friday:
• Michel Gondry finally puts you in a darkened room with Gael Garcia Bernal. Try not touch yourself while watching The Science of Sleep, which opens tonight. [flavorpill]
• Fake priests, Jews for Jesus and a man who claims to be Christ remind you of your sinful ways in The Gods of Times Square, Richard Sandler's 1999 documentary about your not-so-friendly neighborhood street preachers. [Paper]

The seasons may be changing and the leaves are about to turn, but fucktard hipsters are evergreen. Join us, then, in appreciating these marvels of nature with Blue State Lose, wherein we sift through the photos on The Cobrasnake, Last Night’s Party, Misshapes, and Ambrel so you don't have to. After the jump, Alex Blagg talks about how the new My Chemical Romance album "really is good."