[Photo Credit: X17]

[Leighton Meester on location in New York City today; image via INF]

[That's socialite and occasional Page 6 contributor Lydia Hearst (great-granddaughter of the villainous William Randolph) with Ed Westwick, in a scene from an upcoming episode of "Gossip Girl." She'll apparently play some sort of bitch. Image from LA Times]

We're so confused. An extra day's digestion of the Miley Cyrus/Vanity Fair photo "scandal" hasn't cleared much up for us in the way of morals, betrayals, exploitations and career management of the young Hannah Montana star, but the public meltdown has alerted us to a more basic truth that is helping guide us through the fog of outrage. This isn't about Miley Cyrus without a shirt on or if she's been seen somewhere in her lingerie, or if her father dropped the ball.

Um, has anyone ever studied that much for the SATs? When I took that odious exam (back when it was out of 1600 points! I don't understand this new math! what's a computer?!) I just showed up the damn day of and suffered through it. And I did OK. Not great, but good enough. Even friends who took the prep classes weren't drinking cup after cup of fancy coffee and getting massages and looking at notecards and whatnot. So, all in all, the whole conceit of last night's episode of Gossip Girl was... well, wrong. That aside, though, things happened!

Rick Haskins, a marketing exec for The CW was on CNN recently, talking about Gossip Girl's controversial "OMFG" sexy time marketing campaign. He claimed that it wasn't that racy because, while yes the images were a bit steamy, the initials could simply stand for "Oh My Freaking Goodness!" This is true! It could also, possibly, stand for "On Meth, Feeling Good," or "One More Fart Gun." Not quite satisfied with Haskins' answer, Brooke Anderson hit the streets, asking bemused people what they thought it meant. Only two ladies "in their sixties" didn't know that it stood for OH MY FUCKING GOD. Curse words and tepid teen dramas continue to threaten our youth. Whee! It's funny when both the outraged and the outrageous seem like idiots. Video of the important news story is here. [Videogum]

As the days and months stumble on, it's hard to remember that long ago and faraway time when Gossip Girl, a television show about feelings, wasn't a part of our lives. Luckily for us, Us Weekly, a magazine about the daily sadnesses of not being rich and famous, has provided a photo album retrospective of our favorite bitchy, unfortunately acting Manhattan teens. So go look, and try to remember the kind of September, in 2003, when you didn't know who Chace Crawford was. Album is here, and the absolute best photo of the bunch is after the jump.

Bucking all the Hollywood dieting trends and fads, Gossip Girl guest star Michelle Trachtenberg enjoyed an ice cream sundae while on set yesterday. Trachtenberg explained that it was a hot day and, quite frankly, frozen yogurt doesn't quite hit the spot on a hot day. However, Trachtenberg did say that she called her personal trainer and notified him that she was going to have some ice cream and that her workout the following day would reflect her decision to have ice cream.

As readers have reminded us, Chace Crawford likes to work out at the Chelsea Equinox, and the gays and girls all swoon. A tipster has sent the additional details that the Gossip Girl star also shows up "almost every early evening during prime cruising hours" and often hangs out in the steam room. Proof of nothing, of course, and certainly very far from confirmation of the rumors that Crawford is gay. But someone made an "m4m" Craigslist "missed connections" post that sounds a lot like it's from Chace, but probably only because it's supposed to sound like it's from Chace.

Ever wonder what the inspiration is behind the fashions on Gossip Girl (other than "money" and "bright enough colors to attract fourteen year olds and macaws")?? Well Vanity Fair recently interviewed the show's costumers, Eric Daman and assistant costume designer Meredith Markworth-Pollack, and they divulged their interests and inspirations. Kate Moss, she of the cocaine-aura, is the inspiration for messy-chic Serena, while Anna Wintour and Audrey Hepburn inform Blair's buttoned-up old New York styling. Put them together and who do Daman and Markworth-Pollack envision? New York's favorite stream of consciousness-talking socialite, Tinsley Mortimer! [VF] A choice quote from the interview after the jump.

[Blake Lively, who is on some sort of television show called "Gossiping Girls," arriving at the New York City, NY set yesterday; image comes to us by way of photo agency WENN]

The media manipulators at Gossip Girl have successfully ginned up some conservative outrage over their OMFG ad campaign. WorldNetDaily and Parents Television Council are upset about the poster at left (apparently real!) not because it shows Nate and Serena hooking up but because it uses "cleavage kissing... to hype [a] kids' show... 'The Parents Television Council deplores the CW's deliberate use of profanity and sexual imagery to exploit and further corrupt young viewers," drugs are bad, strip clubs are bad, drinking is bad for teens, etc. etc. I just like repeating "cleavage kissing." Bigger picture of the scandal poster after the jump.

Nobody watches The Hills. But even more nobody watches Gossip Girl. While not in the same time slot, both shows air on Monday nights, meaning they are inevitably pitted against each other by television writers, in some sort of useless garbage battle royal. Because fake truth is more interesting than strange fiction, The Hills' 3.75 million viewers easily outnumbered Gossip Girl's 2.5 this week.

[New "Gossip Girl" cast member Michelle Trachtenberg on the set yesterday; image via INF]

Haha! So, um, I got a little jump-the-gun self-righteous there and didn't quite read the fine print! This wasn't really a Gossip Girl experience day for admitted Yale students. It is clearly a fake, but a hilarious and (for like two seconds or two minutes if you're an idiot like me) slightly believable one. Anyway, please enjoy without any of my ridiculous social theorizing. Click through for larger.

OMFG, I take it all back. The Gossip Girl phenomenon isn't the worst thing ever. I mean, how could it be when last night's triumphant return episode was just so good? I mean, well, it wasn't that good. It was no Brandon and Kelly hook up in Washington D.C. or Angela rides her bicycle down a Pittsburgh hill, arms outstretched. But, you know, it was good for this show. Starting with the lovely Breakfast at Tiffany's homage and ending with the mysterious revelation of the drug-sending "G" (who we know to be Georgina, played by Michelle Trachtenberg), it was as full of humor and intrigue as this show gets. Oh, and The HIlls was on. Recaps and video after the jump.

You're likely familiar with the work of Sam Rubin—KTLA entertainment reporter, World's Biggest Chace Crawford fan (sorry, JC), and, on paper at least, a grown man—whose motor-mouthed showbiz punditry becomes even more red-faced and spittle-flecked when the subject turns to anything Gossip Girl. (The greatest show ever! Just ask the writers of this New York cover story we won't be caught dead reading!) With the show's second-season premiere airing tonight, Rubin unveiled his own Sweded take on the middling teen soap's overtly sexual OMFG marketing campaign.

Funny thing from Radar: Pope visit OMFG posters, in the style of Gossip Girl's silly yet effective marketing campaign. Click thumb for larger image at Radar.

In honor of Gossip Girl's historic return to television, EW.com has compiled a list of the best (Rydell, West Beverly, Degrassi) and worst (Sunnydale, Liberty, McKinley) high schools from TV and movies. Conspicuously absent from their list: Clone High, Bayside High, (don't know if it counts, but) Riverdale High, and, duh, East High from High School Musical. What other schools did they miss?

OK, so let me make this clear: I like Gossip Girl. When it was on in the fall, I enjoyed bellowing at the TV, sloshing grape juice around, pleading with Nate and Chuck to kiss (just once!). And I'm looking forward to tonight's return, what with the promise of someone coming out and a Nate/Vanessa 'ship. But! That New York magazine cover story (that our own Ryan Tate took as gentle encouragement to watch an episode) about it? Complete bunk. This is not the "Best. Show. Ever.", however ironically or unironically or ironically unironic the piece's authors', Jessica Pressler and Chris Rovzar, meant it to read. I mean, look. Does this show have the trashy bite of The Hills? No. Does it have the warm, toothless smarts of a show like Greek? No. It exists in some awkward no man's land in the middle, and Pressler and Rovzar's attempts to make smart junk pop out of the oddly sedate show just reeks of effort and so-bad-it's-good winking gone embarrassingly awry. After the jump, in the style of the NYM piece, find three reasons why Gossip Girl, and the faux-hype surrounding it, kinda sucks.