Philly Chit Chat

Everything is about timing, and I had the wrong list with the wrong times for the the Saturday celebrity visit to the Youth Study Center to help get the word out for the anti-violence rally. I was hoping to get a photograph of Queen Latifah, but got there just in time to hear the Queen’s voice as she spoke to the kids behind bars. Unfortunately the only queen I kinda saw was indirectly, it was Queena Bass’ father handing out more wacky literature. This time she’s complaining that there was too much noise at her apartment building, The Drake, as they were renovating and she felt terrorized. Then she goes on to spew about Thomas Jefferson University and her view on why she was fired, even though I recall they outsourced the whole group (I remember hearing they offered her another job at a lab, but she told me or I read it on the flyer back then that she was allergic to blood,” things that make you go Hmmm!), then finally she accusses this year’s Mayoral Primary as a fraud and she should have been the winner. (wait a minute she can afford to live at The Drake?) As I saw her father at the rally, all I could think of is that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Then Comm. Sylvester Johnson arrive. He is as disgusting to me as John Street. Thankfully Queen’s father was able to harass him before he entered the gates to visit the few peeps he may have gotten off the street…A few hours later I went to the PECO building to catch the celebs arriving for a Press Luncheon. Again timing off, but I did catch model/actress/MAXIM pin-up girl Melyssa Ford strolling in, late.Then I caught Mo’niqe leaving. As I caught up to her I asked her for a shot, her body guards actually tried to prevent me, I was like this is Philly, I am the only one here, c’mon it’s Mo’nque I love her, but what the fuck (ok all that really just did a live stream through my head). Mo’nique being the sweet thang that she is, said “sure sweetheart”. I got off about 7 shots, and thanked her. (not picture, big scary bodyguard standing next to me)

Tisha Campbell on the right, who is on the left?Raheem Brock #79 Colts, who is on the right?

The gays weren’t lining up for Harry Potter on Friday, no they were in line to see the cool gay surfer pix “Shelter”. Hoda and Laura selling Philadelphia Lesbian and Gay Film Festival TicketsFriday night before the screening of “Shelter”, Jonah Markowitz received the first ever Scion Award presented by Official sponsor Scion Automotive for his directorial debut Shelter. After graciously accepting the award in front of a sold out crowd, Markowitz invited all of the festival-goers at the theater to join him at Sotto Varalli for his very own post-screening celebration, “The Helter Shelter Soiree!” Here I risk my life for this shot of Thom Cardwell, PIGLFF Devlopment Director, Director and recipient, Jonah Markowitz and Sean Williamson of SCION. As we were walking to this spot to shoot this picture, a very surprised Markowitz told us that this was his first award ever and the PIGLFF will also have a special place in his heart, the first one is always the sweetest. “The Helter Shelter Soiree” hosted by BUCKmonkey and sponsered by Toyota SCION. Thanks to Joseph Varalli for his generous hospitality.
Thom Cardwell and and the cast/producers of “Nightwood” Ethan Weiner and Chris Maher; Wednesday at 9:30PM the Wilma

Robert Drake, Where’s Laura Burkhardt
Vince Austin-Cole ACSNJ/RAY OF HOPE, Jim Austin-Cole from NJ Real Estate Sales and a friend at the SOTTO Shelter party.
Debra Brady, Ellen COntrevo of Lion’s Heart Productions and Marla Gold

Man about town, Philly’s own walking cliche, a walking talking, black republican Donald Carter. Our celebrity of the day as he was once on Politically Incorrect with Bill Mahr

I lied, here’s my boyfriend with Rex Lee. I was fortunate to get a little interview out of him which I will write about shortly.Gift Bag contents

This year’s festival has been made possible by the generosity and support of the Members of the Philadelphia Film Society and our Presenting Sponsors: Avis, City of Philadelphia Department of Commerce, Pennsylvania Film Office, Hyatt Regency Philadelphia at Penn’s Landing, here! Networks and TLA Entertainment Group; Official Sponsors: Anheuser-Busch, Tylenol-PM, Sundance Channel, Eventions Productions, Scion, Triumph Brewing Company, Twenty21, Penn’s Landing Corporation, Parrot Bay, Park Hyatt Philadelphia at the Bellevue, Cashman & Associates and University of the Arts; Partner Sponsors: Plumer & Associates, Inc., Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corporation, Modern Eye, Fest In Philly, Crowne Plaza, Sofitel Hotel, B-Side, Mixto, Hoffman Design Group, Haru, Hangar 1, PA Festivals and Premier Tours; Patron Sponsors:Jennifer Angelo Design, Marathon Grill, Sisters, Campus Philly, PhillyCarShare, Lucky Strike Lanes, P.I.N.K., The Restaurant Collection, Caviar Assouline, Vitamin Water, Philadelphia Trolley Works, Neff Associates Inc., Philly Fringe Festival, Vesuvio, Drexel University Antoinette Westphal College of Media Arts & Design, McCormick & Schmick’s, Allied Advertising, The National Condominium Residences, 12th Street Gym, Whole Foods, FuntasticFotos, Prince Music Theater, Bluecoat, American Apparel and Philly Aids Thrift; and Media Sponsors: Gaydar Magazine, Where Philadelphia, Metro, Philadelphia City Paper, Philly Gay Calendar, HX Philadelphia and Queer Times.

If you were at the event, your photos can be found here: http://buckmonkey.smugmug.com/

I didn’t think I needed to mention this before, but I am a blogger, it’s true I can admit it now. Actually I am an overachiever or over obsessive blogger logging in with about six as we speak, my number 1 site Confessions of a Paparazzi, How We Met, One More Shot, What I Ate on My Nutrisytem Diet Today (I thought the shame would keep me honest, damn it didn’t work, but I have a trainer now), How We Met Stories and finally my newest one – PHILLY CHIT CHAT. I really hope I can do for this what Confessions has done nationally. Philly Needs a Paparazzi to get the news in the one shot that tells a thousand words, although I do think after attending todays convention in Philly, Blogging is more than just photos it’s words. It’s about 2:30AM as I write this, as I covered the opening night of the Philadelphia GLBT Film Festival http://www.phillyfests.com/piglff/home.cfm, I did get in about 2AM, but seriously struggled with which event was I going to write about first, so I did the only thing that was write and did it chronologically. I will be stealing my work tonight from one of my favorite blogs Phillyist.com I read what he wrote and there was no way it was going to be any better. (This entry should be called Confessions of a Blogger because there is so much behind the scenes information, I do hope what I learned will entertained my readers.) All content below this line is stolen from http://phillyist.com// 9:35AM: Panel: “The State of Social Media and Thoughts on the Future,” moderated by Joey Sweeney (Philebrity), and featuring Caroline Marks (Ziddio.com), Vincent Veneziani (CrunchGear.com), AJ Daulerio (Philly Mag and Deadspin.com), Neal Stewart (Flying Dog Brewery and Open Source Beer Project), and Emily King (Intelligent Travel, a National Geographic blog). Takeaways and observations:

Apparently, all bloggers live in their parents’ basements and blog in their underwear.
Print media outlets have finally figured out that blogs matter (yeah, blogs!), and have begun to look to blogs to figure out where to take their publication content.
Bloggers like beer. So beers have started having blogs.
We can thank Gawker for legitimizing online publications (read: blogs). Thanks, Gawker!
Snark: an essential, if not necessary or constant, component of the blogosphere.
How refreshing: National Geographic’s blog is fact-checked. (But then doesn’t it remove the immediacy of blogging?)
Key to repeat readers on your blog: a good sense of humor. Check!
File under no shit, Sherlock: bloggers don’t usually have much of a budget.
Good question, posed by Sweeney: “What is up with the internet and cats?”
Ziddo, a subsidy of Comcast, invests in other sites. They should invest in us! We’ll make videos if they give us cash. Or feed us. Food is good.
Denver has the largest beer convention in North America. Who knew?
World of Warcraft > SecondLife because you can kill the people you’re “networking” with. Awesome.
Scary: a lot of medical students have started using SecondLife to practice techniques.
Someone asked: “Can you hear me now?” and the whole room erupted into laughter. We are such nerds.
Holy crap! Intelligent Travel has a one-week turnaround time on their posts. That doesn’t really sound like a blog to us. (The girl in the glasses happens to work for Phillyist.com)Then the various topical groups began. I decided to go to the business and blogging group as I just started a business blog called http://www.buckmonkey.net/ which does PR work and event planning. It was interesting, but really for corporation gigs. I then walked over to the How to seperate your social blogging from your work blogging or something of that nature11:25AM: Breakout session: “The NEW Work/Life Balance: Keeping Your Blogs and Social Media Life Separate, with Alicia Dorset (MS&L, Digital/GM Fastlane, http://www.handmadedetroit.com/ and FYI Blogs ). Phillyist’s Takeaways and observations:
It’s probably a good idea not to link to your MySpace and other social networking sites, not just when you’re applying for jobs, but also if you’ve got a widely-read blog. People will make fun of you. (Thank god I’ve got my social networking pages restricted.)
Hmmm… Maybe I shouldn’t be writing for Phillyist under my real name. Props to you, Pencopal!
People will Google you. They may even print up everything they find about you. Terrifying.
There may be ways to hide from Google. But what’s the point?
Note to self: If I’m going to do anything stupid on the web, I should be sure to do it under an alias.
MySpace is your “travelling resume.” That’s scary, considering that my MySpace page talks about movies and music – I hope I didn’t just get my job because I listen to Modest Mouse!
Apparently, “mommy bloggers” are celebrities. I don’t think I’d ever even heard that expression until twenty minutes ago.
People will spam your online wedding guestbook. Spammers are relentless.
Oooh… those mommy bloggers get lots of free stuff. Think it would work if I pretended to have a kid?
Consenus: bloggers like when people comment. So comment, people!
Somebody at BlogPhiladelphia just asked what a blog is. Three people did a Scooby Do-double take.
I think that this discussion has moved pretty far from its topic. But that’s okay. It looks like we’re having more fun than the group on the other side of the room.
Live blogging occured at the event
bloggers were never far from their computers

1PM: Lunch break. Back in an hour, folks. Thanks! (Hmm Hmm Good, I was going to say something about Ziddio’s choice of horror clips they were playing during lunch, like its not too appetizing to see a women stangled with a towel during lunch, but hey the food was excellent – Philly Cheesesteaks, Hoagies (Subs for the rest of youse), peanut chews, and caesar salad (?).
2:15PM: Breakout session: (This was fascinating) “Paid Blogging and Commenting,” with Chris O’Donnell (TechDirt). I will admit that I am attending this session purely in the hope that someday, I can get paid to sit on my ass all day and blog. Also, because a part of me, though I know better, hoped that the Chris O’Donnell hosting the panel would actually be this Chris O’Donnell. Takeaways and observations:
Two ways to think about paid blogging: ads (obviously!) or getting paid for what you’re writing about – what you know and love. This sounds good to me. Anyone want to give me a job?
“Ghostblogging” – per the bullet above, does anyone want to pay me to write their blog?
Hmmm… People could pay you to link to their products/businesses in your blog. Maybe I need to start name-dropping more. But it may be a little unethical.
We’re twenty minutes in, and it feels like this group has been highjacked.
How is it that I’ve never heard of spider food, but everyone else seems to know exactly what it is?
There’s a blogger code of ethics? Seriously?
Snack time, Pretzels, peanut chews (Pa made), M&M’s (Hershey Pa made), peanuts and sweedish meatballs.

Then the godfather of blogs, Joey Sweeney of Philebrity.com gets up and tells us that boilerplate bloggings is the worst thing a blogger can do to their site. It should all be orginal content. Bummer tonight, eh I promise to do better in the future. But a bit later someone mentioned that Philly needs a Perez Hilton site, something that highlights our local celebrities. I was like JOEY, JOEY, I just told you five minutes ago about my new philly celebrity site http://www.phillychitchat.com/ I am going to do my best to stay on top of things for you here in Philly.

I did see a celebrity here in Philly tonight and will write about them later today. Until then – Peace, Love and Hair jell because tomorrow night RuPaul blows into town.

(Former Philadelphia Eagles and now a) DALLAS Cowboy showboat Terrell Owens isn’t much of a team player off the field, either. While attending a wedding last weekend at Marquis Los Cabos in Cabo San Lucas, the swollen-headed wide receiver ignored the all-in-white dress code and was the only guest in black attire. “He managed to draw further attention to himself by arriving late to the ceremony,” said our source. Earlier in the day, when T.O. froze going into the hotel’s unheated pool and complained it was too cold, onlookers taunted him with stadium-style chants. Kinda reminds me of this popular Seinfeld episode: George: Well I just got back from swimming in the pool. And the water was cold… Jerry: Oh… You mean… shrinkage. George: Yes. Significant shrinkage!
T.O. with Payton Manning at the Espy Awards rehearsals airing on Saturday 7/14/07 (NY Post)
P.S. in my morning rounds I found this great site which has a few ESPY Awards Photos, is funny and informative. http://www.threebrothersandasister.blogspot.com/

I received this in my email from the informative Yahoo group, center city information exchange, this morning:

Hey folks — who just doesn’t happen to have 5.2 million dollars laying around for this cute, little (well, actually not so little) downtown mansion that has just come on the market? Come on, you can just let loose and raid that over-stuffed mattress or that overgrown money-tree!
Well, at least they’re going to serve free refreshments and hors d’oeuvres (and I *just* don’t know how they can afford it).

This property is eligible for the Ten Year Tax Abatement too!http://www.acornphila.com/properties/2032_delancey/grand_parlor.html

Greta the City Hall Tour Director was at my house for the Fourth. She admired my William Penn statue, I asked about hers and she said “I thought they were gonna give it back, but they really are going to keep it up there and try and break the curse!” She has a another one, its chipped though. Hmm should I give her mine?