Link-o-rama: What I Did on My Summer Vacation

I know. It’s been quite a while since I posted anything to the blog. But the move has been made, the kinks in the new internet connection have (mostly) been worked out, and I’m falling into end of summer procrastination mode on all other work that should be done. Here’s a quick run down of some of the celebrity-related things that have been occupying my mind of late.

Kanye (and Erin) Joins Twitter
I’m honestly amazed that it took so long for Mr. West to join Twitter. His blog is already a thing of celebrity overshare legend. And Twitter’s stream of consciousness format seems tailor made for Kanye. But he has certainly made up for lost time, most notably starting a public love fest with Justin Beiber. I told you Bieber Fever knows no bounds. Inoculate yourself now, people! His tweets are just what you would expect…grandiose, egotistic, and (unintentionally?) hilarious.

Speaking of late arrivals to Twitter, I also recently joined. You can see my feed (which is nowhere near as exciting as Kanye’s, let’s be honest) on the right or you can follow me @erin_meyers. I’ll admit, I kind of like it. There’s something about the 140 character limit and the fact that following in no way implies any reciprocal commitment (unlike *coughcoughFacebookcoughcough*) that I’m getting into. Mostly just following celebrities at this point for something I’m working on, and it’s a pretty interesting window into how celeb’s attempt to control their images. More on that to come.

Celebrity Weddings
Celebrity weddings have dominated the gossip landscape this summer. Hilary Duff and Mike Comrie, John Krasinski and Emily Blunt, Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz, Carrie Underwood and Mike Fisher, to name just a few. The coverage of these, of course, paled in comparison to the big one, Chelsea Clinton and Marc Mezvinsky’s wedding in Rhinebeck, NY on July 31.

Celebrity Wedding of the Season

Chelsea’s wedding was fascinating to me for the massive amount of coverage it received from gossip media (natch) as well as the mainstream press. She never courted the spotlight and it is really her parents’ (political) star power that was the draw for the media. So suddenly all these media outlets who eschew celebrity-oriented stories as not news are falling all over themselves to find out how much she spent on port-a-potties for her guests and interviewing every resident of Rhinebeck twice to find out some tiny detail. Look, I know that celebrity content constantly bleeds into “real” news, but there is really no difference between covering Carrie Underwood’s wedding and covering Chelsea Clinton’s. It seems in this case that the fact they are political celebrities is just a gloss that somehow makes it more acceptable for mainstream media to cover it without sneering. Nevertheless, she looked amazing and did a relatively good job of keeping the celebration private. Mazel Tov!

Real Housewives of New Jersey
I really need to dedicate a post just to this show and my addiction to it. Chuck Klosterman has already written an excellent piece debunking the term “guilty pleasure,” rejecting the idea that we need to be embarrassed about any media consumption. But I think guilt is a major part of my personal pleasure in this show, because there is really so much wrong with it, and that is crucial to my weird love for it. I know it’s wrong, and that’s part of why I like it. It’s complicated. Stop judging me.

Real Housewives of New Jersey

In an interesting twist on the reality of reality TV, it seems resident villain, Danielle Staub, has been fired the show and will not appear in season three. One rumor has it the reason she will not return to the show is because she failed to bring the reality to her BravoTV.com blog about the show. Instead of addressing all the drama going down on the show that ostensibly documents her real life (and, if you don’t watch, there has been plenty this season) and giving viewers more insight, her blog posts mostly just thank people for standing by her and gloss over any of insanity. The key to this show is the gossipy nature, the idea that you get different parts of the story from the various housewives and, yay new media, get even more insight if you read their blogs. By not keeping up her end of the bargain by delivering more “reality,” she was, allegedly, canned.

I kind of want that to be the reason. More likely, however, the firing was the result of her sex tape scandals or her too-volatile-for-reality-tv relationship with the other housewives. (quite a feat in itself!) But the actual reason seems to be that she’s getting a Bethany Frankel style spin off. Which simultaneously horrifies and delights me.