• by Kelly Samardak , June 30, 2009

Return From Escape From New York
Last Week-This Week, 2009

Hot in the city! Hot in the city to.. day.  Today!  People, it's hot out there on the grimy (yes grimy, I think I walked by about eight piles of garbage, saw 10 people litter, and watched about four people nodding out in Union Square Park)streets of this fine City of New York.  You can thank me later for bringing the sun back with me from the beach, which is where I was all last week.  And you don't have to ask twice -- I actually did miss you.

I love vacation.  Disconnecting and settling those sizzling bits in your brain is necessary for survival, but I have one of those brains that gets itchy when it's at rest for more than three days.  Being detached from this space for an entire week only gave me a slight touch of agita, but when I returned, I discovered that if nothing else, this city and this industry is consistent.

You're still throwing or attending panels with names like "is your newsroom ready for the future?" "Crisis in your newsroom - do you have enough bananas?" and "Who killed print? Nixon?"

People are still writing books about how to use Twitter.  People are still Tweeting about Twitter.  People are still tweeting about people who tweet about Twitter.  People are still blocking out people who tweet about people blocking people on Twitter who tweet about the death of print.

And now for something completely different: what's with the deluge of people dying -- and then the subsequent revelation of fans?  Michael Jackson dies and suddenly everyone is a fan -- never mind the fact that this was a man beyond eccentric with historically deplorable allegations against him and child-farming strategies.  I guess we all just want to remember him before the dark sensationalism.  I had his photo in a locket that I wore to second grade every day and swore I would marry him.  I also had two boyfriends named David.  And I played Chinese jump rope at the bus stop while dodging Canada Geese fly-by bombings.  What?  Oh right - then Billy Mays dies and suddenly everyone loves OxiClean!   What is the world's (or at least, if we're going to be insular -- America's) obsession with being sympathetically attached to someone posthumously?  The cynic in me feels a lot of tweeting was to grab eyes.  Like a morbid SEO strategy.

Back on track - this week partywise is dead as that flat baby turtle I saw while running on Dewey Beach last week.  Whether that means somewhere along the line I committed social suicide and I'm actually just not invited remains to be seen, but because I'm able to slightly remember last year -- I recall the week before Independence Day (that's the 4^th of July for you worldwide readers...are you out there?) being the time when you all run off to The Hamptons to celebrate the glory of linen pants, severely overpriced drinks, hoity-toity look-at-me parties, and celebrity stalking.  I thought this summer might be different since budgets are not just slashed, they're dismembered, crammed in the trunk of the New York Times delivery van, and left for the mealworms.  Am I right?  Are company beach house parties pared down, or are you all still rocking it out on the beach?  What about this summer in the city?  Will the rooftops be empty or just really tight?  I heard the McCafe at McDonalds is the new Empire Hotel.

Me?  I'll be doing some MediaPost-centric stuff this week AND embarking on my "Healthy Better Living Kelly" journey. Oh that's right -- nothing inspires you to stop turning into a wild rhino than that first bikini experience. I'll let you know how it goes -- maybe we can save the media world and get healthy together.  While focusing on being a healthier me, I'll also be hitting Michael's Restaurant next week to hear Chris Anderson, Editor in Chief of Wired magazine and author of "The Long Tail," speak about his latest book "Free: The Future of a Radical Price."  After that, it's off to a freakin' breakfast hosted by Gotham Media Ventures.  I HATE getting up early.  Yes, arriving somewhere by 8 a.m. is extremely early to me.  But I do these things for you.  Because I know you want to know if there is a way out of this media crisis - the subject of the breakfast panel.  Yarg.

In the meantime, do enjoy some of my beach week photos from Dewey Beach, Delaware, and St. Mary's County, Maryland - locations where NO ONE says Twitter, "stinging nettles" can be confused with jellyfish (they're still jellyfish to me), brutally beating crabs with wooden mallets is a delicacy, and sunsets never get old.

As a total aside, I'm working on my open letter to Greyhound for what was possibly the most gruesome return trip from Baltimore.

Send your summer fun invitations to kelly@mediapost.com!

Bored...errr.. I mean, at lunch? Check out the latest photos!