• Apparently Courtney Love said something about being suicidal amid her 60 (!!) blog posts Sunday but she also said her mood was "pirate" (good, right??) and that "ebaz and mj dresses saved my life." Also putting on a dress made her feel pretty. Also: "Dada, circus."
• NBC's Dan Abrams and supermodel Elle Macpherson are an item. [P6]
• After a fan committed suicide in front of her house, Paula Abdul hired "healers" to get rid of ghosts, and still is convinced the place is haunted. [P6]
• Sean Combs: ""I shave and groom my private areas." Good morning to you too, Sean. [R&M - second item]
• No one tell Ricky Gervais the pound is now worth less than $1.50. The city needs all the economic stimulus it can get [R&M - third item]
• Oil heir Brandon Davis is now said to be a degenerate gambler, in addition to a sponge. [P6]
• Madonna is crushing Britney Spears' only-recently-revived hopes and dreams. [Showbiz Spy]
• Miley Cyrus is not dead. [E!]

• No one is buying tickets to go see Katie Holmes' big Broadway play even though she's basically killing herself trying to do the play and jet back to LA to see Tom Cruise and work out and raise her daughter. "She looked pretty groggy."
• Ricky Gervais is to join the "thick-necked... slangy" British expat community in New York after buying a Manhattan apartment with his girlfriend. The cost was about $1.7 million worthless American dollars, which is like 240 British pounds. Cheersmate. [Post]
• The nightclub 1Oak was accused of firing black and Asian waitresses to make the staff more white. The bosses assured everyone that four white waitresses were fired at the same time, for not upholding the very high standards of club waitressing. [P6]
• New York cops reportedly enjoy guarding anti-Scientology pickets. [R&M]
• A joke about Amy Winehouse won a big Scottish joke prize. [Daily Star]

[via OhNoTheyDidn't]

Holding up a copy of The Sun from March 5, [Gervais] says: "I don't know what the readership is, but I imagine most people in Lowell read it." He got that right.

Wisecracking with co-director Matt Robinson in a nondescript office, Gervais seems to relish seeing news of his first movie in print. We hope to keep him tickled for the next three months.

In another video, he attacks assistant Jake with a Nerf gun. These guys must be dying to start shooting. We know we are.

Either the the Sun is threatening a Page Six-style vendetta against Gervais, complete with journalistic sniping, or the paper is just continuing to turn out the same type of writing the movie star had so much fun lampooning in the first place.

Original video that sparked the column:

Among them, according to the conference's inexplicably McSweeneyish website: What Makes Us Laugh, in which humor editor John Hodgeman will interview Ricky Gervais, and What We Eat, in which food editor Amanda Hesser will talk to Sysco president Rick Schnieders, a chef, and a "greenmarket pioneer" (that means foodie!). Then there's How We Innovate, featuring MySpace creator Tom Anderson, and How We Make Movies featuring Luke and Owen Wilson.

Each talk costs $25 — which, admit it, is less than you usually pay for conversation — and the Ricky Gervais one, be advised, is already sold out. The two main events, though, as far as Gawker Weekend is concerned, are both still wide open. They are: How We Obsess (Over Dogs), starring such "dog-human behavior experts" as inveterate giggle-inducer William Wegman, and How We Live Post 9/11, a conversation between Gerry Marzorati and Don DeLillo, whose new novel Falling Man "reflects how we live now: with our doubts, our fears and our new, shifting world." Of course, some readers of his last novel Cosmopolis might object that DeLillo better belongs on that dog panel. Zing!

All in all, the lineup beats last year's — the biggest stars then were Howard Dean and Randy "Moral Relativism" Cohen. (Incidentally, we're assuming that the Times is in fact asking questions with their talk titles, and not just maniacally screaming things like "How We Innovate!" and "How We Live Post 9/11!" Dr. Seuss-style.)

For planning purposes, note that the New Yorker Conference — which is a brand-new vernal celebration not to be confused with the end-of-harvest New Yorker Festival — takes place after Sunday With The Magazine. Well, that's not entirely true, because the "two nights — one day" gathering is actually happening May 6 and 7, a couple of weeks before the Times state fair. But it is mostly true, since this isn't the the 2007 New Yorker Conference we're talking about; no, according to the shiny official website, David Remnick's kickin' slumber party is to be called The New Yorker Conference / 2012: stories from the near future. And, as if to prove time ain't nothing but a number, it's all going down at that new Frank Gehry office building/melting ice cube on the Chelsea riverfront.

So what will 2012 be like? Well, surprisingly, sound-bite sociology will still be around; that is to say, Malcolm Gladwell is slated to attend. Also, the World Beat music sound will be as popular as it is today, as Talking Head David Byrne will testify to next month/five years from now. Newark mayor Cory Booker, SimCity programmer Will Wright, and architect-in-theory Zaha Hadid will also remain luminaries. And still so much science!

Through exclusive interviews, vivid presentations, and in-depth discussions, you will learn what the future holds. It's the ultimate insider's look at the works in progress that will shape our world, from boardrooms to courtrooms, from biology labs to design studios.

Times Magazine or New Yorker; New Yorker or Times Magazine? Oh, who are we kidding — we're going to both; Lynne Hirschberg and Henry Finder are worth a little starvation. Alternative revenue streams for dead-tree Manhattan media: My, how they innovate! —Jon & Leon