I’m used to giving away my storyline and casting ideas for free, so let me make some suggestions for the Sex and the City revival, a ten-episode limited series which will come out on HBO Max at some point. As far as I know, the episodes are still being written and they’re not planning on filming until “late spring.” So, my idea is that they’re going to write out Samantha Jones by killing her, and that’s how Miranda, Charlotte and Carrie come back together, to attend her funeral/memorial, after growing apart in the last decade. Then once they’ve caught up, they start hanging out more and thus, the limited series. Which I think Kim would be fine with – she said years ago that she doesn’t care what they do with the Sam Jones character, they can recast it or kill her off or whatever.

Anyway, I’ve been sort of pleased to see that after the 2017-18 beef between Kim Cattrall and Sarah Jessica Parker, there’s not a ton of gossip around those two this year. Let that beef die and everybody can move on. Which is what Candace Bushnell said too, as one of the few people in the SATC world who is okay with Kim.

Sex and the City author Candace Bushnell is weighing in on Kim Cattrall’s absence from the show’s upcoming HBO Max revival, sharing that she thinks the series will be “fine” without its original Samantha Jones. While many fans and critics shared their qualms that a SATC without Samantha would not be the same, Bushnell said that viewers should not worry about the show’s storyline without Cattrall’s famous character.

“You know what, I think it’s fine,” Bushnell told Page Six just days after the revival’s announcement. “Kim is a grown woman. She is 64 and she’s made a decision that I’m sure she has 10 very good reasons for and I respect her for that.”

Bushnell continued on to say that she thinks the show will be “interesting” without Samantha and that the series can now further explore its other characters. “But I also know there’s a lot of interesting characters like [Nixon’s] Miranda. We are all Mirandas. Miranda is an interesting character — but I don’t know what they’re gonna do,” she said.

“Kim should be happy — and I think she is happy. I think that her character Samantha is always going to be an inspiration to them,” Bushnell added. “So somehow, I imagine she’ll be there in spirit and as an inspiration that gives them a chance of exploring sexuality with different characters [without Samantha hogging the libidinous spotlight].” The author also noted that the reboot’s writers will surely come up with ideas to address Cattrall’s absence.

[From People]

Yeah, I’m happy for Kim too. She doesn’t have to deal with toxic work drama in any form, from a jealous SJP to the storyline they wanted to do for the now-defunct third film, where Sam would have seduced Miranda’s son Brady. Kim is not being degraded, and she’s not allowing the Sam character to be degraded anymore. Honestly, even though so many critics and SATC fans are lamenting the lack of Cattrall, I’m halfway curious to see how they work out the “no Sam” issue and what that dynamic is like on the show.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

You know what I bizarrely enjoyed in the past year? I’ve loved all of the news segments on the history of the Spanish Flu. I’ll always enjoy learning about historical events, but I really didn’t know much about the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918-1920. Seeing all of those old photos and stories about how the world was going through the once-in-a-century deadly pandemic was really fascinating and grotesque – mostly because of how little actually changed 100 years later. And then thinking about how the Roaring Twenties might have been a direct result of not just the end of World War I, but the end of the pandemic. And so… considering how little has actually changed, I am one of those people who thinks that the next decade, after we get mass vaccinations, will be a wild one. We’re going to have so much fun! Olivia Palermo thinks so too. She chatted with fashion editors recently about her pandemic life (it involves cashmere and diamonds) and her plans for the New Roaring Twenties.

Leave it to Olivia Palermo to keep her fashion standards high during a global pandemic. The fashion star, 34, revealed that she hasn’t been slacking style-wise while staying home, sporting “a lot of cashmere and diamonds” over the past few months.

“I have not let coronavirus stop me from getting dressed; I feel that it’s important,” she told editors while promoting a new cocktail she created with Patrón and Muddling Memories based on fashion trends for the new year. “I’m convinced it’s going to be the roaring ’20s with that extra sparkle when we get out [of quarantine]. All of us have probably been looking at our festive wardrobes for a year, waiting to wear things.”

As for what Palermo will be wearing to her virtual holiday parties this year? The former “The City” star says there’s no reason not to “go for it 100 percent. I’m really into skirt overlays that are kind of ’60s, and modernizing it with a fabulous statement necklace,” she said. “[It’s all about] making your most fabulous statements in your wardrobe and emphasizing that, then leaving everything else basic or adding a great accessory.”

After the holidays, Palermo said she plans to return to the ballroom dance lessons she and husband Johannes Huebl started and then abandoned. But generally speaking, the fashionista doesn’t believe in New Year’s resolutions. “I feel that you should work on yourself all year round and not just in January,” she said. “Doing meditation, working out, taking time for yourself, going to the spa, focusing on things that you wouldn’t necessarily have the time [to]. It’s a year of change for everyone, so things that you haven’t done, [you should] take the time for.”

[From Page Six]

I can’t imagine sitting around all year at home, wearing cashmere and diamonds. But that’s not my brand. I do love cashmere, but as I get older, I’m just wary of the cashmere upkeep! But yeah, as I said, I’m also convinced that the Roaring Twenties are coming and I hope they’ll be fun. I’m hoping for fun fashion, fun gossip, fun celebrity hookups, fun drama. Who will be this decade’s Jay Gatsby? Who will be this decade’s F. Scott Fitzgerald?

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

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This story came out a couple of days ago but I wanted to talk about it. Dr. Fauci did an appearance on The Today Show where he talked about the new strains of the coronavirus as well as vaccines and prevention, of course. President Biden recently blocked travel from South Africa due to a virulent new strain which is different from the more transmissible and deadlier UK variant. (The CDC has more on these new strains and here is an article that helped me understand how they emerge.) Given that coronavirus is mutating to be more easily spread, we have to do what we can to prevent it. Dr. Fauci told Savannah Guthrie that double masking “makes common sense” because it provides extra barriers against the virus.

Anthony Fauci, MD, says wearing two masks is better than one when it comes to warding off the coronavirus.

The purpose of a mask is to prevent droplets and the virus from reaching a person’s mouth and nose, he said on the Today show, so increasing the barriers naturally increases protection.

“If you have a physical covering with one layer, you put another layer on, it just makes common sense that it likely would be more effective,” said Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. “And that’s the reason why you see people either double masking or doing a version of an N95.”

N95 masks are expensive, and the CDC recommends they be reserved for health care workers, but health experts say double masking is easy and something of a no-brainer.

“Double layering is adding extra filtration, but a lot of the benefit also comes in making sure you are covering those gaps around the mask, because not every mask you put on fits equally.”

[From WebMD]

I’m writing this story because I want to encourage you to double mask now if you are not doing it. I wear a KN95 mask with a cloth mask over it and a visor whenever I got out. I bring a bottle of alcohol spray with me and when I get to my car I wash my hands. (I have a plastic organizing tub from the Dollar Tree with hand soap, a small towel and a bottle of Gatorade filled with water in it.) I am not messing around with this and lately I’ve been tucking my hair up in a beanie so it doesn’t get contaminated when I’m out. I know this sounds paranoid and it is because I or my son could die or get sick with lasting health issues if I’m not careful enough. Now is the time to hunker down until we get the vaccines. (Even after that I’ll still be wearing a mask.) My local grocery store has KN95 masks near the checkout which are just 10 for $10. You can get them on Amazon too, but they’re more expensive. Check locally first. Wear a cloth mask over it and you can even get a visor, but never wear a visor or face shield alone. They don’t have enough protection for you or others.

There’s also news of new vaccines along with news of how effective the existing vaccines are against the new variants. Dustin at Pajiba has a very good writeup about that. Even though the Johnson and Johnson vaccine is said to be only 85% effective against severe coronavirus, it was 100% effective against hospitalization and death. I will take whatever vaccine I can get!

Here’s that interview with Fauci:

That youtube video has almost as many downvotes as it does upvotes. F-k antimaskers they are crazy and are killing people.

Fauci was double masking since at least November!

Amanda Gorman double masking it.

Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg!

photos credit: Avalon.red

Hollywood icon Cicely Tyson died yesterday at 96 and tributes about her are being shared by so many artists today who benefited from her work and her grace. I was offline when the news broke but when I picked up my phone a couple of hours later last night, most of my texts from people were about how…

The royal reporters and royal commentators are quite obviously still obsessed with Prince Harry and Meghan. We’re past the one-year anniversary of H&M’s Sussexit announcement, and I genuinely believe the theory that most of the royal reporters have seen their Sussex sources dry up as Harry and Meghan clearly have a lockdown on information about what they’re doing and who they’re speaking to. Which has left the British tabloids to find ways to make up stories about their golden geese. Last week, I wondered what was up with the influx of gossip about how the Sussexes are thinking about getting a book deal, because it doesn’t actually seem like they’re trying for that at all. Now the Daily Mail’s Talk of the Town column has a story about a “book deal” which was basically extrapolated from a trademark filing. That’s it.

Actress, campaigner, philanthropist, podcaster, television producer, Royal trailblazer – is there anything Meghan Markle can’t do? Now word reaches me that she appears to be planning to follow in the footsteps of Prince Charles and Sarah Ferguson by trying her hand at fiction writing. Meghan has moved to secure legal protection that will allow her to pen novels via Archewell, the foundation she’s set up with Prince Harry.

Could we see tomes to rival Fergie’s Budgie The Little Helicopter or Charles’s The Old Man Of Lochnagar? Lawyers in the US are poring over the couple’s application to trademark the good cause, which they named after their son, Archie.

One clause they are trying to secure with the US Patent and Trademark Office seeks the right to pen ‘fiction and non-fiction books on a variety of topics’ under the Archewell brand, as well as produce ‘general feature magazines and printed periodicals’.

My source tells me: ‘Meghan has some experience as a writer and used to have a popular blog called The Tig before she met Harry that covered health, travel, food and fashion. Fiction is something she has always wanted to try her hand at, and she could be assured that anything she writes would sell well, regardless of its quality. Fiction, be it children’s books or adult, would be a powerful way of conveying the messages of their woke brand.’

[From The Daily Mail]

A source who really had inside knowledge of the Sussexes would never use the term “woke brand.” The source is a British person talking out of their ass. Now, that being said… I don’t see Meghan and Harry getting some Obama-like book deal, nor do I think Meghan is secretly working on a novel. I could see Meghan doing another cookbook – likely for charity – and I could see her doing a children’s book. But that’s basically it.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid.

I am gaining weight. I hate it. I haven’t been to the gym in two months because I’m scared of being indoors with maskless people as the coronavirus infection rates spike all around the country. So I walk and hike and just leave it at that. But yeah, I’ve gained weight. I can feel it on my body and I hate it. I’m trying to take the long view and I think about how grateful I am that I didn’t have the virus (or at least, I was never symptomatic if I did have it) and how grateful I am that I survived the Trump years. The past four years have been full of so much trauma and if the worst thing that happened to me is that I’ve gained 15-20 pounds, so be it. I also take solace in the fact that I’m not alone, that many people have been gaining weight as their diets go to hell and their workout schedules are destroyed. So it is for Blake Shelton, who wants to lose 10 pounds before he marries Gwen Stefani.

Blake Shelton is ready to get serious about his wedding look! The 44-year-old singer popped the question in October to his longtime love, Gwen Stefani. The “Minimum Wage” singer recently appeared on the Apple Music radio show Party Barn Radio With Luke Bryan where he opened up to his pal about his desire to shed weight ahead of his wedding day to Stefani, 51.

“Scale of 1 to 10, Blake Shelton, [will you] you lose 20 pounds for your wedding?” Bryan asked his pal.

“I feel like if I say 10 I have to do it, so 10,” Shelton replied. “It’s out there now so I can’t let people down.”

About his quarantine weight gain, Shelton admitted that his new look isn’t making him feel great. “I’ve readjusted all the mirrors in the house so they look like when you’re taking a selfie from up above because I can’t even stand to look at myself in the mirror,” he quipped. “So I’ve rearranged them where they’re kind of angled down looking down at me and it’s not so bad.”

And while he’s not so confident about his look, Shelton does seem self-assured that Stefani will make it down the aisle to be his bride. “I’m going with a 10, buddy. I’ve got confidence,” he insisted when asked whether Stefani would go through with the wedding.

Shelton also said that he’d been dodging Bryan’s texts because of Stefani’s adherence to COVID-19 safety procedures. “She’s very strong about this quarantine thing, which is great… She’s the only person I get to see so, that’s it. No buddy hanging out time,” Shelton said. “When you’re a prideful, stubborn guy like myself for me to text you back and say, ‘Man, Gwen won’t let me go.’ That’s tough. It’s embarrassing.”

[From ET]

“I can’t even stand to look at myself in the mirror.” I feel that. I’ve gained weight in my face! That’s where it goes – my face, my ass, my thighs and my stomach. And I hate it all. I bet Blake gains it all in his midsection and face too. Still, it will be easier for him to lose weight because he’s a dude and it’s always easier for dudes to lose weight. As for the other stuff… Blake is kind of douche, blaming Gwen for… adhering to social distancing protocols and sh-t. It’s 2021, why are men still doing the “my old ball and chain said I can’t hang out with my bros, what a witch” thing?

Photos courtesy of social media, Avalon Red.

Amie! Happy Birthday from Natalie who hopes this year that you cook a lot, read a lot, travel a lot, and that you get to see BTS win the Grammy! Here’s your bias, RM, and the bias assassin himself, Suga. Seriously, Yoongi in these boots is pretty destructive:

The trailer for Keeping Up with the Kardashians’ final season has been released. This is their 20th season, after 14 years of filming, and we’re not even counting all of their spinoff shows over the years. The trailer is notable, to me, because of Kim’s Botox Cryface, which is always funny to me. She’s legit emotional though – she loaded up her family on her ass and made them all famous.

One of the other takeaways – beyond Kim’s cryface – is that clip of Khloe Kardashian telling Tristan Thompson that she’s ready to have a second child. Tristan cheated on her with multiple women for years, and they’re not living together at all and he’s moved out of LA to play for the Celtics and Khloe has no plans to move to Boston. But sure, she wants another kid with him:

Khloe Kardashian and Tristan Thompson are ready for a new chapter together! In a new trailer for Keeping Up With the Kardashians, which dropped on Thursday, Jan. 28, the Good American founder tells the Boston Celtics player that she wants to expand their family. That’s right, it appears the duo is hoping to give 2-year-old True Thomspon a sibling.

As she tells Tristan in the sneak peek, “I just feel like it’s now time to have another kid.”

An insider echoes the same sentiments as the 36-year-old star and tells E! News exclusively that the couple, who rekindled their romance just three months ago, “are on the same page and both want another baby.”

“Khloe knows the value of siblings and growing up in a house full of kids and she wants that for True,” the insider shares, adding, “It’s something they have been working on for a while.”

While it’s unclear how soon the pair wants to bring another little one into the world, the source notes just how involved the 29-year-old NBA player has been during this time. “Tristan is very supportive of Khloe and making this happen. He goes with her to doctor’s appointments and listens to her feelings. He’s very involved and invested in the future of their family together.”

[From E! News]

Tristan is “very supportive of Khloe” – is he though? I mean, I guess Tristan just figures, why not? It’s not like he’ll be around. Khloe knows that too. I guess she’s just obsessed with the idea of having babies with the same father, like Kim and Kourtney did, even when their relationships and marriages were never built on solid ground. Anyway, whatever. It’s Khloe’s choice but they’re both so dumb for forcing this weird relationship to exist.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, WENN and Instagram.

This week, we discussed the topic which has been all over the political, financial and online worlds: the Reddit small investors who successfully gamed the system to screw over billionaire hedge-funds. The hedge funds had shorted the stocks of several failing companies like GameStop, only to see small investors organize on Reddit to mass-invest in those stocks, inflating the stock prices and causing hedge funds to lose billions in a matter of days. Many of the Reddit small investors were using the Robinhood platform to invest. But then as soon as the hedge fund billionaires began to weep on their yachts, suddenly all of those stock trading platforms were pulling the plug on trading:

Several retail stockbrokers, including Robinhood, said they would allow trades of GameStop and other volatile companies after restricting customers’ ability to purchase securities earlier in the day.

“Starting tomorrow, we plan to allow limited buys of these securities,” Robinhood, a popular trading app, said. “We’ll continue to monitor the situation and may make adjustments as needed.”

Robinhood, which has attracted millions of millennials to trade on its platform by eliminating trading fees and making stock trading easy, had said Thursday morning that it would limit buying of the kinds of securities that have sparked an enormous rally in shares of GameStop, the video game retailer at the heart of the frenzy, and AMC Entertainment Holdings, the movie theater chain, and a number of other companies. The decision quickly drew fire.

[From The NY Times]

The billionaires are big mad that the “little guy” is gaming the system in the same way the billionaires do regularly. That’s it, at it’s most basic level. And instead of taking the L and writing off some billion-dollar losses, those hedge funds exerted pressure on Robinhood and other trading platforms to change the rules mid-game.

As you can imagine, elected officials like AOC and Elizabeth Warren have been using their platforms to explain what’s happening and why additional regulation is needed, and why there should be hearings and investigations into what’s happened this week. Robinhood’s decision to halt trading on GameStop has turned everyone into a populist – on this somewhat narrow issue, AOC, Ted Cruz and Don Trump Jr find themselves agreeing. But when Ted Cruz agreed with AOC on Twitter, she told him to go f–k himself (atta girl).

Fully agree. ? https://t.co/rW38zfLYGh

— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) January 28, 2021

I am happy to work with Republicans on this issue where there’s common ground, but you almost had me murdered 3 weeks ago so you can sit this one out.

Happy to work w/ almost any other GOP that aren’t trying to get me killed.

In the meantime if you want to help, you can resign. https://t.co/4mVREbaqqm

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 28, 2021

“We need healing + unity, but I will not take any responsibility for my actions, nor will I acknowledge the contributions my lies made to the violence or the harm that it caused, nor do I believe anyone should be held accountable. But if you’re mad at that you’re divisive.” – GOP

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 28, 2021

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

Dear Gossips, You may have noticed a headline this week about Gillian Anderson after she appeared on Late Night with Seth Meyers and they played a behind-the-scenes video from the set of The Crown when, during a break from filming, she and Olivia Colman, along with other cast and crew, did a choreog…