This press release showed up sometime in the last, confusing day or two:

Friday:
• Brazilians celebrate their independence today with various parties throughout New York City. Hopefully things remain a little less stabby than PR Day. [flavorpill]
• Jamie Stewart's lyrics as Xiu Xiu singer have got it all goin' on for the summer: A bit of depression here, some child abuse there, homosexual angst, and suicidal tendencies to boot. Hop on the party train at Bowery Ballroom tonight. [Paper]
Saturday:
• If you can't be drunk on a beach, here's the second best option: Ian Williams, author of Rum: A Social and Sociable History of the Real Spirit of 1776, discusses his book on Governors Island today. Bring a flask of Bacardi and it'll be just like the Vineyard. [flavorpill]
• Didn't go to Queens for the last P.S. 1 of the summer? Don't want to hop on the 7 to check out the U.S. Open in Flushing? Luckily, the kind souls at American Express are willing to accomodate your laziness: They roll out big screen TVs at the World Financial Center and Madison Square Park to broadcast live tennis coverage.
Sunday:
• Party like you're at Star Room with 100% less beach but 50% more self-loathing at GBH's Holiday Party bash at Marquee. If not, make a last ditch effort to get the hell out of town. [Upcoming]

• Time Out notes that Nicolas Roeg's Don't Look Now contains one of the most "erotic sex scenes ever filmed." Whatever you need to take your mind off of hurricanes and whatnot. 6:15pm, Walter Reade Theater. [TONY]
• Dance, mime, anime, cartoon, video, Japanimation — "X Kills Y and Vice Versa" is a veritable medicine cabinet of artistic media. But BYO Vicodin, because the medicine cabinet is just a bad metaphor we thought of. 8:00pm, The Chocolate Factory Theater. [flavorpill]
• Louis XIV lets Ike Reilley eat cake at Irving Plaza; let us make terrible, historical puns at the expense of our own self-respect. [Paper]

For those cutting-edge Hollywood scenesters who find that the Tropicana Bar isn't exclusive and/or sufficiently A-lister-fellating enough for their tastes, local nightlife despot Amanda Scheer Demme will soon offer a solution at the Roosevelt Hotel. Our friends at LA.com explain:

• William Eggleston, Flavorpill says, is often called the "father of color photography" — famous for his ability to "capture the photogenically tragic moments of the American South." We assume the documentary William Eggleston in the Real World isn't his paean to idiot whore Trishelle, but we can always hope. [flavorpill]
• In tonight's installment of How to Kick People, titled "Missed Connections," two Jons (Friedman and Ames), a Jesse (Hartman) and an Ophira (Eisenberg) ruminate on, well, we're not quite sure. But it's sure to be funny and witty and clever and other assorted glowing adjectives. [HtKP]
• The 1954 film Salt of the Earth is the only blacklisted film ever in American film history. It's tale of mine workers on strike is sure to warm the cockles of your pinko heart. [Paper]

If Merlin Bronques of Last Night's Party wants fabulousness to reign, then reign it shall. A little catastrophic death and destruction ain't going to stop the pulchritudinous orgy, you know?

Times restaurant critic Frank Bruni makes his way to downtown pseudo-speakeasy La Esquina, where entry is acheived via all sorts of exotic hoop-jumping:

• Our favorite overtly perverted, certifiably batshit insane rapper Kool Keith performs at SOBs tonight. Bring your raincoat. [flavorpill]
• Alec Ounswirth, lead singer of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah (insert Talking Heads reference...here) performs at Mercury Lounge tonight sans bandmates. At least theoretically: rumor has it the remaining members of CYHSY may just show up. [Paper ]
• Oh, those crazy Jews are at it again: Makor hosts a "Spelling Bee for Non-Children," with categories ranging from disease names to band names. Don't forget there's more than one correct way to spell "Hanukkah." [92Y]

After dropping a handful of c-notes on their room at the Roosevelt and dining at the hotel's Dakota restaurant, city-hopping brother blog Gridskipper's L.A. correspondent and a friend still found themselves unable to penetrate celebrity-worshipping proprietress Amanda Scheer Demme's perimeter defenses at the Tropicana Bar, prompting this scribbled "comment card" (at left) and yet another chapter in the rapidly expanding canon of anti-Roosevelt/Trop literature:

• Precocious literary talent (or at least precocious offspring of literary talent) Nick McDonell reads from his new book at the Half King tonight. Oh, to have parents in high places. [Half King]
• Punky biopic We Jam Econo: The Story of the Minutemen opened on Friday, but Flavorpill has dubbed today Minuteman Monday. Whatever — utter disregard for dates is totes punk. [flavorpill]
• For all eleven sports fans out there, the U.S. Open starts today. New blue courts, same names we can't pronounce, more short skirts than you can shake your meat stick at. [USO]

Oddly enough, not the guy who does the scary spoken word at the end of "Thriller." We kid! Say hello to Jason, owner of the Dark Room.

• What would happen if an epidemic of organ failures resulted in the frentic harvesting of human organs, collected by brutal genetic repo men? Check out REPO! The Genetic Opera tonight at Wings Theatre to find out. Marijuana pretty much seems to be a requisite. [flavorpill]
• Postmodern venue selection reaches its zenith (or nadir, depending on your perspective), when Sam Lipsyte reads from his new novel, Homeland, at a laundromat on Avenue C as part of the Howl! Festival. [Paper]
• Tickets for September 23-25's New Yorker Festival go on sale today. Jhumpa Lahiri or Michael Chabon on Friday night? Malcolm Gladwell's meditation on America's obesession with precociousness, or John Updike's interview with David Remnick, on Saturday? Oh, the choices of a culture snob! [NYer]

• Bellis Stalkerfest2k5, Round IV: The man that just won't quit appears at lit bar Half King tonight to read from some book he wrote. Dude hasn't published a book in seven years, but he sure knows how to make up for lost time. [Half King]
• The irrascible buggers at Billionaires for Bush throw another fund-raising fete at Frying Pan tonight. Wear your sharpest, most ironic three-piece suit or string of faux pearls. [flavorpill]
• Duude, did you hear that Dazed and Confused is, like, playing for free at the Hudson River Park tonight? Nooo way! Party at the Moontower to follow. [Hudson River Park]

Courtesy, per usual, of Animal magazine's Bucky Turco.

It's not strange to see Nicky Hilton and Kevin Connolly at Chelsea megaplex Marquee at 3 AM. It is, however, rather strange to see them partying at said hour with Nicky's parents. Seriously: What were Kathy and Rick Hilton doing at Marquee at 3 AM on a recent school night? (Not that they'd be any less out of place on a weekend.) Does this strike anyone else as strange? The Hiltons are hardly parental types, but the thought of Kathy dancing on a banquette at such a late hour still gives us chills. Call us conservative, but we like our parents asleep by 10 PM, passed out on the couch in front of the History Channel, right where they belong.

• Bret Easton Ellis continues his "Lunar Park" press junket at Coliseum Books tonight, which, given the subject matter, is also a press junket for himself. We're sure some of you have gone to every damn Bellis reading we've listed, so keep up the stalking. [Coliseum]
• The legendary Kurtis Blow plays a free show at Queensbridge Partk tonight. Finally, a rap show you can leave the Kevlar vest at home for. [Upcoming]
• The Howl! Festival continues its dominance of every venue in Lower Manhattan with the Big Jewish Quiz Thing tonight at the 14th Street Y, in which a bunch of Jews (including a certain Gawkeleh) compete in a test of knowledge on all things Semitic. In keeping with non-Gentile trend, the show costs a mere $5. [Howl]

• Gothamist's Moveable Hype 4.0 at Knitting Factory: In which Doveman, Raising the Fawn, Bravo Silva, and Langhorne Slim perform (with special, Gawky guests DJ Tanner and DJ Edgar Hoover between sets) for the indie blogging set, who promptly return to their apartments and write up the night's events upon show's completion. [flavorpill]
• Jaws — the movie that scared millions of beachgoers out of the ocean 25 years before Time — plays at Bryant Park tonight, 5:00pm. [Bryant Park]
• Celebrate the birthday of Dorothy Parker in all her sardonic glory at (obviously) the Algonquin Hotel, over drinks and reduced admission to "The Talk of the Town." [DPNYC]

These guys are on a road trip to funkytown. They were detained at the border.

Friday:
• New York expats and current "Sixth Borough" residents Enon make the seventy-five minute trek back to New York to play Mercury Lounge tonight. Hope it's worth it just for the "cheaper" rent. [flavorpill]
• Sufjan Stevens brings his pretty little self to Bowery Ballroom tonight to play some of his pretty little music. [Upcoming]
Saturday:
• Six years ago, says Flavorpill, Minnesota's Hocky Night were rap-punk. Now they sound like Pavement. Check out the transformation yourself tonight at Mercury Lounge, where they play with the Jim Yoshii Pile-Up and Hopewell. [flavorpill]
• Sometimes, the exact words of a press release are more effective than our editorializing. This is one of those times: "In a world full of apathy and low expectations, two northeast artists — MCA and Magmo — descend upon New York through billowy clouds of fire to tear the city apart. ...There will be enough granite to crush the skulls of 20 men, an army of trash-filled dolls, ear-bleeding noise beats, and rays upon rays of eye-dazzling projections." There's only one plausible explanation for this: the rouge batch of fucked-up heroin has reached a far-wider audience than previously believed. 7:00pm, Orchard Street Art Gallery (139 Orchard Street).
Sunday:
• We just like the picture. [Upcoming]

• Ah, booze on a cruise: as time-honored a summer tradition as hotdogs at a baseball game and fabricating news stories in the absence of real news. Throw Brooklyn-based afrobeat crew Antibalas into the mix, and you got yourselves a party. [flavorpill]
• Sex with Jake Gyllenhaal? Do we even have to ask? Unfortunately, you probably won't get the real deal at this New York International Fringe Festival performance (not for $15 at least), but one can always hope. [Paper]
• The Death Cab for Cutie/Decemberists double-billing at Summerstage tonight is sold out, but we have little doubt in your ability to beat up any one of the numerous Seth Cohen lookalikes in your vicinity and steal his tickets. [Summerstage]