Hasta Lavista, Brickell

A big Allo to all my new Australian readers; I would love to visit your part of the world sometime soon.
Yesterday I gave my 30-day's notice to my landlord that I would be vacating the premises by midnight, Oct. 31. I'm coming home to collect Wally and moving to South Beach, where the young, Jewish and stylish roam free. My landlord has not responded to my phone calls, so I've gotten a real estate lawyer involved and consequently, am going to nail his old, decrepit, German ass to the poorly shod walls.

On another note, you simply must read what my "fan" Leandro has written about me. Particularly hilarious are the parts where she advises me to get a makeover so I can go from "pretty to beautiful" and the part where she tells me to get a subscriptiton to NetFlix. I wonder what kind of meds she is on? Freaking priceless. I love it. I am heading to Chicago on Friday and have a busy week of apartment hunting, so I don't know how much I will post. If you have any apartment leads on West Ave or Bay Dr., send them my way...
LeandroToro Juicy Gossip and Fun!
In her defense, I'm pretty sure she's Canadian. And in my defense, drugs are FUN.


Page 623 -- Bonnie Fuller, Stephanie Green, Dishing from Dishalicious
Filed Under: Bonnie Fuller

(source: www.cbc.ca)

PHENOMENALLY FOCUSED AND HARD-WORKING BONNIE FULLER, EDITORIAL DIRECTOR OF AMERICAN MEDIA, INC.

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(source: www.dishalicious.blogspot.com)

STEPHANIE GREEN, FORMER RESEARCH ASSISTANT AT AMI, AUTHOR OF A FICTION NOVEL, DISHALICIOUS


Stephanie Green has replied to our posting about her on her website as follows:



Thursday, August 24, 2006

Wow, It's weird being written about by retards

Keep in mind that the book is fiction and I only stumbled upon this link through a function of my site tracker. This is pretty unbelievable dreck, but worth some shits and giggles. BTW, this "writer" takes offense at the fact that I use expletives in my writing. Um, OK, what can I say? I have the manners of a Miss Porter's graduate and the mouth of a sailor.




Our comments on her comments:

* * * * *

We stand by our position:

PROFESSIONALISM

We found Stephanic Green a compelling author based on the excerpt she published from her novel Dishalicious on her site. Wonderful!

Nonetheless, we still maintain that it is (temporary) career suicide for someone with two degrees in journalism to (a) attempt to publish a fictional book about a top editor; (b) publish material which has many four-letter words (perhaps it gives flavor to the story, what do we know); (c) publish what appears to be semi-autobiographical material that describes (mild but regular) illegal drug use by the author.

Is that professional? Is that the way to act to gain respect of peers? All the bloggers may love it, it's part of the "rough and tumble" of blogging (to paraphrase President Clinton talking about politics).

Ms. Green gives the impression she feels she is above glossy gossip tabloids. Nothing wrong with that.

But where is Ms. Green planning to work? If one were, say, seeking a position at Vogue, is this what one would present to Anna Wintour as part of a resume?

We take no offense with Ms. Green's comments -- we enjoyed her writing.

Moving on from that, as Ms. Green put her work (about a fictional life) on her site for viewing -- we are just commenting.

Do we work in the book/magazine/publishing industry? No. We're just guessing that this isn't the way to gain respect in the industry. (But again, what do we know,)

Do we ourselves have "bad manners" in commenting in this way? Perhaps.

Though Ms. Green emphasizes this is a work of fiction, the attraction of her work is that others simultaneously suggest it is thinly-veiled biographical material.

So we feel sad to see such an obviously intelligent and talented person commit (temporary) career suicide. (She's presently studying for a position in real estate.)

SELF-DEFEATING

What's the point of working to get a front-page-story by-line in Star magazine (OK it's all fiction) on a scoop re Brad and Angelina if one then does the above three things?

OUR ADVICE TO STEPHANIE:

Now we attempt to "make-up" for our possible bad manners, by giving possibly unwelcomed advice.

1. You are semi-famous. Look at the magazines and find the name of make-up artists. Throw yourself at the mercy of someone and beg him/her/them to re-do your look. You could go from pretty to beautiful (just as do many "stars" with the correct make-up person).

Then get a few photographers to take many photos of you and put the best ones on your website under "press kit" to provide potential interviewers and writers with access to good photographs of you.


2. Decide whether or not you really want to be famous, and how famous you want to be. You might want to do the following.

(a) Read Deborah Schoeneman's excellent book, "4% Famous." Do you want to get "so" famous your life will be investigated and you will be attacked? Or do you want to stay below the radar at 4% or less?

(b) Join Netflix (can't get a better bargain -- you can end up renting top movies for about $1 each) (and yes, we have its ads on our site). Then rent the movie "Spanglish" with Adam Sandler. Sandler plays a chef who wants to get a rating -- he doesn't want 4 stars -- that's the equivalent of "too famous." He wants, say, 3.4, so he's high, but not too high.

(c) Invest in Bonnie Fuller's "The Joys of Much Too Much" so you can keep going when getting famous is stressful.

(d) Read Paris Hilton interviews. See what how a super-famous individual handles the inevitable insults that come with being famous.

3. Think over your opinion of "super" agents, particularly, the idea that you need such.

The "right" agent could have gotten you a big "advance." What's that? An "advance"? Isn't that a loan against your future royalties? It would be great to get all that money up-front, but then how many years would you have to wait to sell enough books to cover that advance so you can start making more money?

And what about super-agent's percentage? What percentage of that advance and those future royalties would belong to super-agent?

And what percentage of the cover price is yours and what percentage of the cover price goes to the publisher?

4. Self-Publish

Dishalicious (in our opinion) is a great title -- ignore what everyone says -- keep it.

Bonnie Fuller is one of the hottest editors in the country. She's super-mom, super-achiever, super-advisor. She gets into what she's doing and gives it her best. That type of person is rare. People have gotten into game-playing power-struggles with her and left the scene in a rage. Everyone wants to read about Bonnie Fuller.

You have a gold mine in that book!

You are $30,000 in debt. Why? You fought a court case and WON.

You took those (temporary) career suicide risks. Now comes the time to reap the financial benefits, and keep doing so for a long, long time. You could write a second, a third, a fourth novel. Advice on how to succeed at Star magazine, etc., etc., etc.

Self-publish on Amazon. You'll begin making money immediately and keep making money. The percentage taken by Amazon can't come close to super-agent's percentage plua publisher's percentage..

We guess you'll be assigned a self-publishing specialist from www.Amazon.com who will advise you on the best price to choose, etc. and people who wish to read your book can simply go to Amazon.com, pay the price, and download and read it. You likely will not be required to invest any money "up-front" (our guess).

5. Publicize, publicize, publicize.

You've already shown you have a talent for getting publicity.

Supplement that with even more expertise. Look up on the Internet material on how to publicize your book, and keep working at publicizing it. Appear at bookstores. Go to book signings. Never mind if only a few people show up. Keep doing it. We do read from time to time of a best seller that was made by an author who believed in his/her book, that many best sellers have become best-sellers simply because the authors just kept working to publicize them. And your constant self-publicizing may also produce good job offers.

* * * * *

Click here to go to the Dishalicious web site.

* * * * *


(source: www.gawker.com)

BONNIE FULLER SPEAKING AT COLUMBIA'S GRADUATE SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM

The publication of the "fictitious" "tell-all" actually might help Star's sales.

What could be hurting the gossip glossies' sales is that people think it is "all "made-up."

Here is part of what was reported on Gawker.com when Bonnie Fuller spoke at Columbia's Graduate School of Journalism:


[Bonnie Fuller] claimed that her stories are legitimate and multi-sourced, and some of the "scoops" she gets, like the next day's Angelina cover, are obtained by sending out stringers to stalk celebrities, taking copious notes about their activities, and drawing conclusions from there.

For instance, when they reported on Jen and Brad's estrangement ("We were the first!"), it was a "scoop" because they were the only ones to stake out the two of them and write about how they were never together.

So they drew a conclusion from there. Brilliant.

So when the rest of the world was reporting their break-up, Star had already moved on to the Brad and Angelina affair.

...

...Bonnie told us what she does with famous people's assistants and friends and the like when they call and give them a big scoop. She polygraphs them.


Dishalicious' fictionalized portrayal of the fictional gossip glossy describes exactly that.

This can only make Star more believable and buyable (in our opinion)

Publicizing Dishalicious likely could increase interest in and therefore sales of Star magazine.

Click here to read the full Gawker article.

Click here to go the Star magazine website.

* * * * *

Ah ... giving advice... isn't it fun?

* * * * *

P.S. Fact-checking detail: Re Dishalicious' heroine's "hideous working-class Canadian accent" -- there's no such thing as a "working-class Canadian accent."


MY COMMENTS TO HER: (The girl just can't help herself)
OK, Leandro, I just stumbled across this post about me again. A few corrections: 1) I am not $30,000 "in debt" that was merely the cost of my legal counsel. 2.) It is my understanding that people who grow up in Canada of a certain lower income class, are branded with a particularly annoying accent like Ms. Fuller's. 3.) I have ABSOLUTELY no desire to be famous and I am not 'semi-famous.' 4. People who shop exclusively at Bergdorf Goodman, Barneys, Neiman Marcus and on Madison and Fifth Avenues are not the ones in need of makeovers. The ones in need of makeovers are the ones who've never heard of these locales. But thanks for reading. You certainly have some interesting opinions!