Philly Chit Chat

Mike and I – You’re probably so tired of this shirt. I will now put it away for a year.

Earlier this year I met former Senator Vince Fumo and Carolyn Zinni at an event at Eastern State Penitentiary. We were introduced by the former president of the board Cindy Wanerman, who told me how the senator saved ESP from the wrecking ball. Over the past few months I ran into the couple at various charity events, and got to know them a little. I was really honored that they invited Mike and I to their holiday party. It wasn’t to photograph it, but of course I want to capture as much of Philadelphia life as I can.

I was only there for about 45 minutes as I had so many parties to attend. So Ann Catania from Ten Pennies was nice enough to send me a few photos. Here’s Anthony Sembello, Councilman Mark Squilla, Anne Cantania, Brigid Squilla and Lauren Beloff.

Ann sent this photo with the girls and Senator Christine Tartaglione

Former Councilman Frank DiCicco, former Senator Vince Fumo and Senator Larry Farnese

Diane Johnson DiCicco and Christian DiCicco. He has the best attorney website which describes his work.
My Bankruptcy Attorney

Lt Mike Stack (r) , his wife Tonya (l), Sen Fumo and Mike Stack’s mom.

OMG he turns 18 and blew up the social circuit this year. Garrett Getlin Snider. He’s a college student, on the scene and a seriously philanthropic. He runs his own foundation and consults on his grandfather’s Ed Snider foundation. Next up  Garrett Snider will be hosting a very special evening benefiting the
Vetri Foundation for Children:

 

Ann Catania and Sen Fumo

Peter Nero, later in the evening he tickled the ivories. He’s with Sheila from NYC.

The spread was impressive.

Happy New Year indeed Vince Fumo and Carolyn Zinni.
Here are the photos to Mark Segal’s party which I attended after leaving the Fumo Party.

 Cool, Trendy Bar The Bridge Philadelphia Opens in Northern Liberties at 100 Spring Garden Street, in the same strip mall as Enterprise, Zee Bar and strip club Delilah’s Gentleman’s Club.

 Formerly called Rebel, which was a cute, trendy bar too, The Bridge is more like a cute trendy bar with sofa’s, tables and a great juke box. 

The Bridge is for hanging out with friends and catching up, where Rebel was about hanging out with friends, catching up, eating and listening to a band. The stage now has a a large communal table on it.

 The menu is limited, and very affordable. 

Open 7 days a week/4:00 pm – 2:00 am

“Celebrity Apprentice” returned to the airwaves Sunday night with 16 new celebs including  Ian Ziering , Kevin Jonas talk show hosts Geraldo Rivera and Leeza Gibbons, “Real Housewives of
Beverly Hills” star Brandi Glanville, Olympians Jamie Anderson and Shawn
Johnson, “The Deadliest Catch” star Sig Hansen, comedian Gilbert Gottfried, actor Lorenzo Lamas, former Miss USA Kenya
Moore, former NFL wide receiver Terrell Owens, Major League Baseball
outfielder Johnny Damon, and Keshia Knight Pulliam, Rudy Huxtable on
“The Cosby Show.”

 Rafi Spero, a co-founder of Neat, Vivica A. Fox,  Jeff Dickerson, CEO and Chairman at The Neat Company, Kate Gosselin, and Evan S. Kramer, Chief Marketing Officer at The Neat Company

Both ladies were terrific when it came to posing with folks and fans. Here’s Kate with Jenn Choi, Vice President of Marketing at The Neat Company

I ran into old friends: Lucia Davis and Joanna Dissin.

Alison Tutelman, Rafi Spero and Brad Denenberg.

Anne Gove, Jeff Gove and Tracey Jones

David L. Cohen, Executive Vice President of Comcast Corporation VP Comcast is showing reality star Kate Gosselin how to search for her name
using the Comcast Voice Recognition Remote X1 by Xfinity.

  John Demming, Executive Director Corporate and Financial Communications of Comcast explains more about the X1 by Xfinity.

I love this photo, I’m a big selfie fan, meaning I love taking photos of people taking selfies. I’ve been collecting them for a year now. Soon I’ll be doing a post just on people taking selfies.

This is Danielle Cohn, Kate Gosselin, Vivica A Fox and John Demming.

Right before the screening several people greeted the guests as well as Mayor Michael Nutter. There was also a raffle for some great Neat Company products. What’s Neat Company: The Neat Company: desktop and wireless
scanners to help you transform your receipts, documents and business
cards into information that works for you. Plus you can store them on their cloud, or even your own. I need this, my life is a mess. My 2015 paper mess can’t be like what 2014 has been.

Then the show started. I tweeted how awkward Kate Gosselin is sitting about 10 feet from me. (you can see her leg on the right.)

The show started out messy, with everyone trying to find their way and
it looked like it wouldn’t end the way you hoped it would end as the
stars of the show are in the same room as you.

Even though Kate and Vivica knew who won, they were still thrilled when the winner was announced.

Neat donated $20,000 to Kate’s charity “Camp Barnabas,” during the show because
she was the project manager and won the Neat Challenge. At the viewing party, it was announced that Neat will be donating an additional $2,000 each to Camp Barnabas and Vivica A. Fox’s charity “Best Buddies International.” Neat Board member Ron Kaiser also
donated $5,000 apiece to each charity.

 Many of the Kate Gosselin fans on twitter yesterday were tweeting that Kate’s new beau was in the crowd. I didn’t see him, nor did I see the bodyguard. I told the twitter peeps I would put up random crowd shots to see if they saw him.

Comcast/Freelance Photographer Joe Kaczmarek got some great shots from this hard to shoot from angle.

 

Vivica is rocking HerveLedger with Laboutin pumps she tweeted. Kate
looks fabulous, I wish I had asked her what she was wearing. I had no idea she had a Winnie the Pooh tattoo on her
ankle. The girls are obviously good friends and very respectful of each
other, so whatever might have transpired during the filming has waned.
Vivica is one feisty ie direct women, I imagine she’ll have a run in
with nearly everyone. I think after this filming she will be the
“breakout” star as was Joan Rivers was. Joan always said it was the
Celebrity Apprentice that revived her career. Kate she’s going to get
swept up and married after this show, she’s so smokin hot, and you
#KateGosselin people know I had a very public twitter fight with Kate in
2012, but that’s old news. Time does change people, the other night I watched her close, she genuinely seems to be very happy, and pleasant.
IF she’s reading this she is no doubt saying that’s where I know you
from. When we were first introduced her eyes got big and I think she was
thinking, how do I know this guy. Anyway Katers I know you’re going to
have a field day with me, as you did yesterday on Twitter. But I really
feel this way.

The renovation is long over due, and no doubt in anticipation of the new Comcast Tower being built a block away.

Philly Native Casey Reed to Host Afternoon
Drive on Q102

LISTEN LIVE

(Curb Philly)

We’re the leading social diarist in the City, we break stories (We were
the first to tell you about Walgreen’s in Borders, the Pearl Property
grab, the Gallery Upgrade, and The Four Seasons and NBC moving into the
new Comcast building), we tweet leads (We tweeted in August 2013 that
Comcast was going to build a new building, then in Jan 2014 the Inky
confirmed it, oh and so many other stories, celeb sightings and
speculation.) we place stories and photos in nearly every top media
outlet in the City (as you’ll see below.) 

We partnered with several people to have PhillyChitChat pop up parties, thanks to Square 1682 (James Zeleniak, Punch Media, GM Matt Rafferty, Michelle Miller,  The Nouveau Image) and the Christmas Village (Tiamo and Kory Aversa) for fun, spectacular parties. We had contests, ticket giveaways and meet and greets. Thanks to my intern and mentee Ian Michael Crum, business consultant Christie Honigman, The Honigman Group and my admins Janine DeFeo and Crista Bateman (also known as my sisters.) Thanks to all the PR companies that hire me, the business, and for the invitations to cover your events. Below are some of the placements I’ve gotten in 2014.

I regularly contribute to 4 media outlets with four distinct audiences. I have a column at Philly Mag called the Scene. It’s my baby and I love it. I’ve been contributing to Philly Mag for 3.5 years.

In August I celebrated 3 years as a contributor to Fox 29’s Good Day.
Now I am a semi-regular on the #Fox29Weekend show too. Usually on Sunday
mornings.

I’ve been with Philly.com for 2 years.

Liberty City Press is an independent weekly newspaper distributed by the
Philadelphia Multi-Cultural News Network whose members include
Philadelphia Sunday Sun, The Philadelphia Gay News, Al Dia, The Jewish
Exponent, The Metro Chinese Weekly and The Metro Viet News. I’ve been with them for 3 years. My advice to people starting out is to start with these smaller papers to get the experience and your foot in the door.

Philly Daily News Molly Eichel regularly publishes my photos. 

 

This is country singer Brett Eldredge feeding a giraffe at the Philly Zoo.

Also this year I began contributing my photos to NBC 10 Phila website

In November I started to contributing to A.D. Amorosi’s column in the Metro Newspaper.

Then various news organizations carry my photos if they’re going to run a story. Often they write me because they know I have the photo as it was published somewhere or I did a story on a party where that person was.

Sometimes a PR person places my photo. I heard they were putting up the Palladino sign, I got a photo mentioned it to my buddy Kory and he said oh wait The Insider is looking for that photo. I feed stories to all the various outlets, usually when it’s bigger than I can handle.

And the Philadelphia Business Journal

I consult with PR, and clients on how to get their stories placed in the various media outlets.

Celebrities, it’s always fun to shoot them. I wear many reporter hats in Philly. I don’t just cover one subject or contribute to one publication.

I saw this story a Florida paper and tweeted about it. Many outlets cited me on breaking it here.

Definitely my favorite story ever in Philly.

Katy Perry will now be known as the nicest celebrity I ever met.

I mean photographed, LOL

I contribute photos to Philly Mag’s various sections

Thanks to Danya Henninger and Zagat for highlighting some of my favorite dishes from local restaurants. I sense the excitement people must have to be in my column (as I had to be in this column), and hold that in the highest regard when I chose which photos to run. It’s a difficult process because I know I’m going to disappoint someone. (Also Danya really sums up my career in this paragraph.)

I like meeting my readers and viewers.

This year a lot of the TV news outlets have come to me to get quotes on celebrity doings, and misdoings. That’s fun.

Author Thom Nickels wrote a book on Center City Legends – people who are overlooked or were underlooked in history, and he put me in his book. I didn’t really talk about me being in the book before because it’s kinda mind blowing, even more than The Palm restaurant putting my face on their wall. Here’s Thom with someone I admire, Carol Saline, author of the Sister’s books, and once an editor for Philly Mag, also once contributor to Inside Edition on 6ABC. She was my celebrity when I was growing up so it’s so excited to call her my friend now.

Oh and the highlight of my year. Thanks so much for your support, and trust that allows me to bring the stories to you, covering the who, what, when and where of Philadelphia.

Check out last weeks PhillyChitChat columns for the best events, and fashion.

 I am so privileged to live in the City I always dreamed to live in when I grew up in Cherry Hill. Sure it’s just over the bridge, but it was a lifetime away.

 I’m so glad to have gotten to know Atlantic City. It’s sad to see so many people lose their jobs. This is from Harrah’s looking towards Brigantine.

 I love this shot, it really tells the whole story about the newly restored chaplain’s murals at Eastern State Penitentiary. Here’s the restoration artist describing the process to one of the supporters.

 I instagramed this photo of a wedding at Rittenhouse Sq last January.

Ryan Gagnon and Katie English look fabulous.

 Friends Leah Kauffman and Lexie Norcross looking steller at the Academy Ball last January. I love their power red glam look, exuding confidence to take on the world. Leah is wearing the cutest gold bracelets, and Lexie is wearing the cutest gold shoes.

 Speaking of uniquely, this brother and sister duo Jim Magnatta and Marisa Magnatta at the Best of Philly Mag party held at the equally unique venue Citizen Bank Park in the concourse.

  “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” Gala at the National Museum of American Jewish History

to benefit the KIPP Philadelphia Schools (I think they were in character and that’s why they’re not smiling.)

 Sidney and Caroline Kimmel – glamorous, philanthropic and the nicest people. 

 A photo I took of Jill Scott appeared full page in Philly Style Magazine. She was the headliner at the Academy Ball last February.

 Wendy stopped by Fox 29

Jeremy Maclin invited me to his birthday party.

Thom Nickels included me in his Center City Philadelphia Legends book. Here he is with Carol Saline, author of the very popular book series on Sisters, plus long time editor of Philadelphia Magazine in the 1970s.

One of my favorite photos of the year, when Jon Bon Jovi greets Paul Anka at a private meet and greet at the Marian Anderson Gala in November. Looking on Caroline and Sidney Kimmel.

Country singer Brett Eldridge feeding a giraffe at the Philadelphia Zoo

Flyers practice for their turn on the Harlem Globetrotters game at Wells Fargo

I’ll miss Jimmy and Johari Rollins, here they are at the best event of 2014 –
The Rollins Foundation Bollywood Nights held at the Union League last May. It was here that Jen Utley said to me, HughE I’m not fat, I’m pregnant. I broke that story on twitter, and my blog and it made news all the way to the Daily Mail in the UK.

Viola Davis on the hugely popular hit “How To Get Away With Murder.” They filmed the pilot here in Philly, but she had it written in her contract that if the show was picked up they’d move the filming to LA. Blah girl.

Nicki Minaj leaving the Ritz Carlton and waving to the waiting fans. (If you do this right you can time just when the celebs will leave their hotel. I was there for 15 minutes before she left for rehearsal at 3PM at the Four Season’s (the July 4th rehearsal is always held the day before at that time for the past 5 years.) Now that that hotel is closing, it’s going to through off my timing.

 Daisy Day Luncheon for CHOP with Zac Posen. It was a fashionable event for the ladies that lunch.

 Fifth Annual JAM Party for Cancer Research – Nicole Rubin and Jennifer Brown.

adorable outfits

 Opera on the Square. What a great event. It happens annually and you should go. It’s free.

 Connor Barwin delivers Geno’s Cheesesteaks to Uber Philly Contest Winners.

 Project Runway Dom Streater and Cory Wade at InLiquid at Crane Arts. It’s happening again this year on February 7.
Dom’s outfit would be perfect for the Lemon Ball on 1/10/15

Terry Buckman and Amy Buckman at the Eighth Annual Lemon Ball. Every year I look forward to seeing them, and seeing what they would wear. It was always fashionable and classy.

 Terrell Owens continues his comeback. First he gets roasted in Philly, then he gives an amazing behind the scenes chat at the Thuzio Dinner and now you can watch him on Celebrity Apprentice beginning on Monday.

Gloria Casarez

 The Hair of The Dog, is a decadent prom, new year’s eve that keeps the party going in the slow month of January. It’s always a lot over the top. 1/17/15 at the Crystal Tea Room – Party Like It’s 2015

 Katie Perry wears peperoni – She told the sold out crowd at the Wells Fargo Center she’d be running down the Rocky Steps, and she did. At the bottom she was greeted by hundreds of fans.

 Seriously the best dish, dessert in the City. Ice cream sushi at Sampan.

Mary Dougherty’s (2nd from right) Nicole Miller (L) stores celebrate 20 years in Philadelphia. She had a grand party and Philadelphia gave her the highest honor, The Philadelphia Bowl. First Lady Lisa Nutter and Melanie Johnson (r).

Thanks to you, my readers for your support. You’ve allowed me to chronicle Philadelphia for the past 4 years as my full time job. This year was the best year. I celebrated 3 years with Philadelphia Magazine, Fox 29 and 2 years with Philly.com; Nearly every media outlet has carried my photos or used story ideas either via the blog or that I’ve tweeted or instagramed, and they gave me credit linking the Social Media. All the major networks come to me for my expert opinion on celebrities and society and that’s been fun to participate in. This job is a dream come true. 

Thanks to my admins – Janine DeFeo and Crista Bateman, but most of all to my partner, husband Mike Toub who gives me unconditional love and support on this crazy ride. (Thanks to Kory Aversa for this photograph, and for his friendship.)

 A photo I took of kids sledding on the Art Museum Steps went viral all over the world. For awhile I was the top trending name on Twitter. I woke up to it on Good Morning America.

 I tweeted that Jimmy Fallon was this generations Rosie O’Donnell on twitter and she began to follow me.

 That’s Steve Wynn 2nd from right. Nick Hisson graduated from U of P. While he was here I would get all these “Nick Hisson” sightings, they would just say budding singer yada yada was at , or seen blah blah. He never tried to trade on the Wynn name.

Cograts former City Paper’s Mary Patel.

Yeah for all of us.

One of the nicest gifts to wake up to

These guys always do a great job, check out their fashion week in February.

If you park there, this will happen.

Michael Schulson and Nina Tinari got engaged this year; Plus Independence Beer Garden is one of the best pop up’s ever, with Spruce Street close behind.

He broke the internet with his football #TBT, I broke it when I instagramed a photo of he and his new boyfriend. The story was picked up by at least 4 outlets.

seriously

Mike will want a dog after seeing this photo.

You can wear sneakers at Hop Sing on New Year’s Eve from 10PM to 2AM

Adam Joseph is a real daddy now. He’s going to have to make sure his yard is free of a lot of dangerous obstacles for his and Karl’s new baby. I love how he came out as gay and with a baby the same day.

He’ll drive you crazy, and make you think intelligently at the same time.

Bryan Boy had brunch at Parc.

We had our first PhillyChitChat pop up at Square 1682. I curated a list of tastemakers and tweeters, and we enjoyed the Spring menu with fun interactions with the chef and lead bartender. It was a great success.

Or these where I protect the names even though they were public tweets:

“disagreeing is not the same as saying you’re a fucking scumbag”

Why you shouldn’t have your mom on your FB page?

Is that my son in his underwear?

I took a photo of Katy Perry taking a selfie know it would pop up on Social Media.

It turned out that it was my buddy Ian (the biggest fan slayer in the world, he meets so many celebs)

The Queen will be walking in the Mummers Parade on Thursday and I look forward to seeing her.

Happy New Year on Social Media.