Part Two is here.
Toby Young, on the ruckus at his book party, and as reported in Lowdown:
It sure wasn’t Norman Mailer bouncing his Scotch glass off Gore Vidal‘s head. But writers Ian Spiegelman and Doug Dechert brawling at Soho House — pushing, shoving and flinging insults — was more than enough to make Toby Young‘s book party a rousing success. Young is the mischievous Brit whose new memoir, “The Sound of No Hands Clapping,” follows his 2002 chronicle of life at Vanity Fair, “How to Lose Friends and Alienate People.”
Spiegelman is the former Page Six staffer who was fired by the New York Post two years ago after his bosses learned — from this column — of his threatening, obscene E-mail to Dechert in a dispute over a young lady.
Apparently, they hadn’t spoken since — not until their fateful encounter at Soho House the other night.
According to witnesses, Spiegelman fortified himself with a few stiff drinks before confronting Dechert, demanding satisfaction.
He called his nemesis something unprintable. Dechert responded in kind. Then, according to the definitive account by Gawker.com correspondent Neel Shah, “Spiegelman proceeded to lightly bump Dechert, initiating some sort of violent lambada, but Dechert refused to shove back. … Not one to back down from a challenge, Marty McFly Spiegelman proceeded to shove Dechert with both hands.”
(Afterward, Spiegelman claimed to a Lowdown spy: “I smashed him three times in the head. He kept saying ‘Not here, man, not here.'” Spiegelman paused here to swig his drink. “I hit him eight times!”)
Young’s wife, Caroline, the mother of their two young children, bravely intervened to break it up. “Either stop fighting or leave,” she scolded.
At which her husband cried: “Are you insane? This is great publicity!”
As decided by the AFL-CIO, who have some degree of experience with bad bosses.
Did I say that?
Here’s a snippet of the winning story. Read on, revenge is sweet.
The final straw came shortly after my father died unexpectedly. The owner didn’t believe in bereavement, and we were not allowed to use sick time without a doctor’s note. I used what little vacation time we were given (5 days a year) to bury my father and put his affairs in order. The company was nice enough to send flowers. Of course, they included a generic, unsigned card. The next month, my commission check was suspiciously light. $200 light, to be exact. When the billing sheets arrived the next day, my suspicions were confirmed. They billed me for the flowers they sent.
via Kitsilano, James’s Up in Ontario blog, to be specific. Seems that old church/state separation idea doesn’t go over big with the bigwigs at the Times Colonist. Visit the site to read James’s take on it, along with the original article, plus the breaking news from Sean Holman.
A snippet from Up in Ontario:
Smith wrote a column raising questions about the value of visiting some well-established Victoria tourist destinations and suggested some alternate, free attractions. Tourism industry representatives sought and got a meeting with the Times Columnist publisher, Bob McKenzie, and a day later Smith was sacked.
Now, a commenter on Up in Ontario has objected, saying the story had no place being published at all, as it was an opinion piece. It may or may not have been slanted, but the Times Colonist is no stranger to slants and, as I pointed out, if the tourist attractions are overpriced, that in itself is news. If free attractions that are interesting are available, that, too, is news. And the decision about whether or not a story belongs in the paper rests with the editors, not the local business capos.
As was put very well by a journalism prof on Public Eye Online:
In an interview with Public Eye, associate professor Klaus Pohle, a specialist in media ethics and newspaper management at Carleton University‘s school of journalism, said it wasn’t surprising publisher Bob McKenzie declined to comment on the situation, explaining “I would be totally embarassed to admit” to cancelling such a contract just after meeting with “the vested interests in Victoria…It’s a terrible conflict. A terrible conflict. And it sends a terrible message – not only to the journalists at the paper but to the other media and the readers and the advertisers. It sends a message (to the advertisers) that I can interfere anytime. And that’s a very, very dangerous situation to be in.”
Sure Victoria is a small town, but it’s got at least two horses, and so is too big to be indulging in these Pottersville-type shenanigans, particularly in a CanWest Global publication. Or are they planning to take this strategy national?
Stupido here is possibly the world’s dumbest crook. Along with a gang of pals, he posed as a member of a Portugese camera crew, and helped out a team filming in Hong Kong. They worked steadily, and apparently professionally, as a camera crew for two full days before pulling a disappearing act with all the gear that belonged to the independent television company they’d been assisting.
From BoingBoing:
“We’re a small, independent television production company in Hong Kong… last week, a group of con men ripped off a load of very expensive professional tv gear from us… cameras, tripods, a recording deck, wireless microphones… lots of stuff. They were posing as a Portuguese production company… very professional-seeming. They even shot footage of Hong Kong with our crew for two days before they did a runner with the gear! At any rate, we got a photograph of one of them, who for some reason thought it would be okay to pose for a tourist snapshot CARRYING THE CAMERA HE WAS ABOUT TO STEAL.”
UPDATE: they seem to be Brazilian rather than Portugese, and there is VIDEO of them here.
raincoaster 