Since I was born and raised in the Great Northeast, I find myself inexorably drawn, like a hair-sprayed lemming in Z. Cavariccis, to the shores of Wildwood.

Iraq hawks are starting to sound like Bill Giles right before former Phillies GM Ed Wade got canned.

You can't get a bath like this in Philadelphia. Not anymore.

I find it extremely sad that we live in a world where no one has to take responsibility for his or her actions. | He's instead picked up the tired old shell game of pretending that justice in America is colorblind. | Candace Karch has been stylin' like this since 1984. | One goal which it simply doesn't have is changing the power relationship between working people and their bosses in the interest of justice and dignity for the former. | I am glad I don't live in Philadelphia. ... It is a nasty place.

The boss of an Albanian drug cartel, Daut Kadriovski, is said to be hiding out in the Philadelphia area and maintaining his contacts with shady business partners in the U.S. and abroad.

The Sixers and Flyers both blew this year, and the Phillies are already donning their plaid skirts and knee-highs to play their annual role of Tempting 'Lil Tease.

Fresh off his trip to New York City to visit with Mayor Michael Bloomberg , Democratic mayoral nominee Michael Nutter cruised into a fundraiser held in his honor last Thursday night.

I have been sporadically wading through Russian Thinkers by Isaiah Berlin | As an amateur embroiderer, I'm so impressed with the work of Marie Elcin. | Bitters are my new best friend. | I'm nostalgic for the simpler days of the Cold War.

For the past 60 years, the Newark, N.J.-born painter and poet has been manipulating fonts, line length and word arrangement to mold his picture-poems (or technopaegnia, as his inspirational Greek predecessors would have called them) into shapes that mirror or complement his subject matter.

Picks from week two of the Live Arts/Fringe festival.

Is there any one person who would purchase work from both Nancy Middlebrook's and Daniel Cutrone's concurrent shows at Snyderman Gallery? Each artist is accomplished in a traditional discipline and each charts an original and visually sumptuous course through what could easily become familiar territory. Nevertheless, their work is separated by chasms of difference in organization and concept.

"What on earth are you talking about? You're pretty incoherent for a City Paper writer, if you don't mind my saying so,"

One can only imagine how it must read: Dear Diary, had an idea today ... two men, both dressed in pith helmets and safari outfits, face each other. The smaller begins slapping the larger with two tiny fish until, eventually, the larger grows bored of the exchange, reveals his halibut, and shellacs the bothersome explorer.

Opening reception Fri., Sept. 7, 5-7 p.m., exhibit runs through Sept. 29, AxD Gallery, 265 S. 10th St.

Opening receptions Thu., Sept. 6, 6:30 p.m., Mugshots Coffeehouse, 21st Street and Fairmount Avenue; Fri., Sept. 7, 7 p.m., MilkBoy Coffee, 824 Lancaster Ave., Bryn Mawr.

Just as appalling children's author Madonna's performance in Evita was infinitely inferior to adult film actress Jeanne Fine's one-woman (OK, two women in some scenes) tour de force in I Eata, so is jazz inferior to all other musical genres including air guitar and placing one's left palm under one's right armpit and "farting out" Mozart melodies.

rock/cabaret (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION) I've got this gray Jeff cap I wear all the time. It's elicited comparisons to cabbies, newsies and Irish

jazz Naming your ensemble after a supernova may seem like tempting fate — courting accusations of flaming out if it doesn't hold together, or of

dance/jazz (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION) That Steven Bernstein and Herb Alpert are the two guest trumpeters on Mocean Worker's fifth CD, Cinco de Mowo!,

rock/pop There's no purist politics behind Hrishikesh Hirway's decisions to return to his boyhood drum kit and learn to play cello, just as there's no

jazz After several years of experimenting with electronics, pianist Shipp's Piano Vortex is an almost disarmingly traditional acoustic date in spontaneous conversation with bassist Joe

Jenkintown Jazz and Brewfest | Who Let the Dogs Out? | Brooklyn Brewery & Garrett Oliver | Teen Cuisine: Bake Shop | Back-to-School Tasting for Kids

1 Fogo de Chao | 2 Cereality | 3 Pita Pit | 4 City Tavern | 5 Trader Joe's

Though born of Manhattan's psychedelic scene of 1967, Silver Apples (aka Danny Taylor and Simeon Coxe III) managed to rock in their own bizarre, discordant fashion.

Sat., Sept. 8, 2-4 p.m., free, University City Arts League, 4226 Spruce St.

Sun., Sept. 9, 8 a.m., $45-$50, Art Museum steps, 26th Street and the Parkway.

Kids on 12th | Brady Rymer and the Little Band That Could | Count's Halloween Spooktacular | Grandparents Day | Gram Adele

Zachary Pryor's oversize earrings may be splattered across the pages of your US Weekly (the Olsens, Avril and Nicky Hilton have all been spotted in pairs), but that doesn't mean your ears can't have them.

So Re FaSun., Sept. 9, noon-3 p.m., free, South Street, between Ninth and 10th streets.