OK, let’s start with this story from KYW: Groups Tell Mayor: Tap Water Is Good Enough by KYW’s Karin Phillips A coalition of advocates, students, and faith organizations is sending a letter to Mayor Street asking him to terminate city contracts with bottled water companies. The letter to Mayor Street is part of the “Think Outside the Bottle” campaign by Corporate Accountability International, which is leading a charge against what it calls the marketing muscle of bottled water corporations. Michael Gagne is Philadelphia coordinator: “It calls on him to lead a public education campaign on the quality of our public […]
TODAY I SAW…
BY JEFF DEENEY “Today I saw…” is a series of nonfiction shorts based on my experiences as a caseworker serving formerly homeless families now living in North and West Philadelphia. I decided not long after starting the job that I was seeing so many fascinating and disturbing things in the city’s poorest neighborhoods that I needed to start cataloging them. I hope this bi-weekly column serves as a record of a side of the city that many Philadelphians don’t come in contact with on a daily basis. I want to capture moments not frequently covered by the local media, […]
KYW UNLEASHES TASTE-KILLER COMPOUND AT READING TERMINAL; ‘This Is Horrible, This Is Great’
Sugarest(TM) is a minty tablet which dissolves in your mouth and temporarily blocks and neutralizes the sweet-taste receptors of your taste buds. Simply place a tablet in your mouth for 2 minutes, and sugary foods and sweets lose their taste and appeal, giving a dieter the “instant willpower” they need to keep to their diet. The effect lasts for 20-30 minutes, long enough for a dieter to defeat their sugar cravings and lose their desire for sweet but fattening foods. Additional information may be found on the Sugarest(TM) website. The KYW reporter held a live taste test for Sugarest(TM) at […]
FILM FEST PICKS & PANS: See Edith Piaf’s Biopic, Hear ‘Whispering Of The Gods,’ Endure ‘Princess’
BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC From Dr. Shock to Gary Heidnik to Exhumed Films, Philadelphia has always been Horror City. And one of the elements that makes the Philadelphia Film Festival unique is the generous selection of horror films they present, under the heading “Danger After Dark.” Business-wise, it’s a smart move, and the screenings tend to draw a younger crowd. Artistically, they’ve managed to ride on the upside of a growing international wave of interest in horror. Last night, I saw the Danish animated revenge saga Princess, which is a good example of how the “Danger After Dark” category […]
POPPED! FEST BAND LIBS: Golden Ball
Golden Ball 1. We are called Golden Ball because i read still life with woodpecker. 2. No, that is not a stupid name for a band and it is predictably self-absorbed of you to say that. 3. We are a band because it is fun being a band. 4. If we were not a band, we would be two or three bands. 5. People say we sound like all these bands they never heard. 6. But really we sound like pine. 7. If the cops searched our van, they would find other cops searching our van. 8. One band that […]
GAYBO: It’s Safe To Dance
BY TOMMY ZANE February made me shiver and April was just as shrinkage-inducing, if you know what I mean. During the recent warm weather, though, I hit the clubs and shook it up as all gay folk should at some point. Seriously, it’s in the Queer Handbook, Rule #297. Anyway, aside from Ben Gay, here’s what’s currently warming cockles: HOUSE MUSIC I don’t mean the crap that passes for it today. I’m talking about the shit gay folks popularized in the mid-80s and perfected around ’92. Everything from George Kranz’s 1985 “Din Daa Daa,” thru to Philly’s own Josh Wink, […]
Vallas Cries Uncle, Tells Street To ‘Pogue Mahone’
BY SUSAN SNYDER INQUIRER STAFF WRITER Philadelphia School District chief executive officer Paul Vallas, who brought hope and a whirlwind of change to the 174,000-student system, says he will leave soon and take his family home to Chicago.”I’m done,” Vallas said in a telephone interview last night. “I made a commitment to stay here five years. I think five years is enough.” He said he would at least finish the school year but would not be specific about a departure date. The news came as no surprise to district insiders, who have heard the rumors for weeks that Vallas would […]
KURT VONNEGUT RIP: ‘Everything Was Beautiful, And Nothing Hurt’ — Epitaph From Slaughterhouse Five
NEW YORK — Kurt Vonnegut, the satirical novelist who captured the absurdity of war and questioned the advances of science in darkly humorous works such as “Slaughterhouse-Five” and “Cat’s Cradle,” died Wednesday. He was 84. Vonnegut, who often marveled that he had lived so long despite his lifelong smoking habit, had suffered brain injuries after a fall at his Manhattan home weeks ago, said his wife, photographer Jill Krementz. The author of at least 19 novels, many of them best-sellers, as well as dozens of short stories, essays and plays, Vonnegut relished the role of a social critic. He lectured […]
HIZZONER ’07: A PHAWKER TV NEWS BULLETIN
SPECIAL REPORT: Meet the men who would be mayor. See what they see, smell what they smell, eat what they eat.
BREAKING: $teven $tarr On The $elling Block?
[Via DownByTheHipster] It seems Starwood Capital CEO and hospitality visionary Barry Sternlicht’s buying spree may not end with B.R. Guest. A little birdy let us know that Philly’s most famous (and pompous) restaurateur may be the next target for Sternlicht’s firm, saying “Starwood Capital may be looking to buy the Starr Restaurant Organization and then make a play to take back control of Starwood Hotels.” Hmm, Starr just made a successful move into Atlantic City (Continental, Buddakan) and NYC (Buddakan and Morimoto), and with Continental NYC coming soon, why sell now? DEVELOPING….
POPPED! PICKS: THE NOTEKILLERS & THE LOW BUDGETS & NORTHERN LIBERTIES (The Band)
NOTE: All this week we will be running our Popped! Fest Band Libs. Northern Liberties 1. We are called Northern Liberties because we are a noospheric oratory rite, transmitting holographic emblems, resonating neural linguistic imprinting, brazenly eulogizing radiant terrestrial imagined entities, stridently. 2. No, that is not a stupid name for a band and it is unenlightened of you to say that. 3. We are a band because we received the command, and it is a way for us to partially reveal our plan. 4. If we were not a band, we would be a pigeon, a beehive, or a […]
BREAKING: House Of Cash Burns Down
NASHVILLE, Tennessee (Reuters) – The Tennessee home of late country icon Johnny Cash burned down on Tuesday as renovations were under way for its new owner, Barry Gibb of the Bee Gees, a local newspaper reported. Cash and his wife, June Carter Cash, lived together in the three-story, wooden lakeside house in Hendersonville, Tennessee, about 20 miles north of Nashville, from 1968 until they died within months of each other in 2003. The Hendersonville Star News quoted a fire official as saying the blaze probably started when fumes from a wood preservative used in the renovations were ignited by a […]