The New York Observer » George Gurley http://www.observer.com Just another WordPress site Wed, 15 Feb 2012 00:37:48 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Meeting the Met Until recently, I was a ding-dong when it came to the Met's institutional history (opened in the 1870s, big King Tut exhibit a century later, that's it) and knew more about my own: Smoked my first cig around back in seventh grade; drank Michelobs on the steps in eighth; and used to skateboard by the Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2010/culture/meeting-met Socialites Purr at Wildlife Conservation Gala At the Wildlife Conservation Society benefit at the Central Park Zoo last Wednesday, June 10, the main attraction was the Alison Maher Stern snow leopard exhibit, located between the koala bears and the otters. As the black tie event got under way Ms. Stern, who provided the three leopards with their  new habitats, was on Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2009/politics/socialites-purr-wildlife-conservation-gala George and Harry: Our Special Correspondent Gets the Royal Stiff-Arm at Star-Studded Manhattan Polo Classic I’m not a big fan of dressing up like a prepped-out Hamptons dork.

Yet, there I was, sporting the obligatory blue blazer, linen shirt, khakis, and suede moccasins, desperately trying to fit in with the stuffy upper-crust crowd watching British scion Prince Harry take on Argentinean stud Nacho Figueras at the star-studded Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2009/daily-transom/george-and-harry Why a Big Shot Like Me Plays the Lottery When the Mega Millions lottery got over $225 million recently, I went into the deli and bought a New York Post. See, I don’t like the idea of just buying a lottery ticket—feels sketchy, low rent. So as I was paying for the paper, I said, “Oh, and give me a Mega Millions, too, thanks.”

Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2009/style/why-big-shot-me-plays-lottery E-mails I Sent My Pals While Watching the Recession on TV So I got rid of the cell phone. Ten years is enough. It used to be a tool, but then I became the tool. Now I’ve outgrown it, adapted and evolved so I don’t need it anymore and left everyone in the dust. People have to fight to get hold of me now. Side note: Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2009/style/e-mails-i-sent-my-pals-while-watching-recession-tv Mean Streets: Gurley Walks Manhattan, Part Deux Living in exile on Roosevelt Island with my fiancée and kitty for the past two years, I’m feeling awkward, fat as a house, not up for human interaction, but it’s a nice day to walk Manhattan’s East Side, landscape of my bittersweet youth. I’ve been smoking White Widow in effort to wean myself off whiskey. Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2009/style/mean-streets-gurley-walks-manhattan-part-deux The New York World: Gurley Walks Manhattan It’s there every time I look out my bedroom window on Roosevelt Island: Manhattan. Maybe 250 yards away. May as well be in France. The F.D.R. is a stone’s throw away but you have to hold your breath to hear it.

I moved to Manhattan when I was 9. I’ve lived on Spring Street, MacDougal; Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2009/style/new-york-world-gurley-walks-manhattan E-mails I Sent the Day of the ‘Miracle on the Hudson’ 1

The good thing about the new Depression is that I’ve been in one for the past five years, so I’m used to it. Nice to have company.

 

2

Boom times are the worst Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2009/o2/e-mails-i-sent-day-miracle-hudson My Survival Kit for When the Evildoers Strike Next So the evildoers are gonna get us again. I can feel it; they’re getting ready. Leon Panetta for C.I.A. head? Were Warren Christopher and Richard Simmons both unavailable? Not to worry, I’m sure the incoming secretary of state will have the terrorists quaking in their boots, postponing plans to make kaboomies. I’ve been watching the Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2009/o2/my-survival-kit-when-evildoers-strike-next Sex and Food Face Off at Le Cirque Last week, I was at a party at the sophisticated Le Cirque restaurant on East 58th Street street for the HBO documentary Le Cirque: A Table in Heaven. I asked fabled Le Cirque owner Sirio Maccioni, a very elegant man who smelled great, what happens when his beautiful wife of 38 years, Egidiana, sees hot Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2008/o2/sex-and-food-face-le-cirque How to Be Broke and Not Be a Sucker Nothing to do, nowhere to go, imprisoned here on Roosevelt Island. Back in ’99 I bought a $400 bottle of wine at Raoul’s to impress what I thought was my girlfriend. Turned out I was merely one of three dudes she Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2008/o2/how-be-broke-and-not-be-sucker Boss Jim Downey Q: For years now, shows like Meet the Press have been broadcasting clips of an SNL sketch, a spoof of political reality, to have a conversation with their audience about the actual political reality. How are you getting to the core ingredients of what’s going on in a way that people Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2008/arts-culture/boss-jim-downey How a Welsh Vixen Tamed Derek Smalls’ Wild Heart She was on her second coffee and I was running late. My bad!

Had I been meeting, say, Natalie Merchant, Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2008/style/how-welsh-vixen-tamed-derek-smalls-wild-heart Let Me Tell You About My BFF DFW Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2008/style/let-me-tell-you-about-my-bff-dfw Who Needs Wall Street? Socialites Take Cover at Newly Renovated Hideaway Doubles Doubles, the exclusive private club in the basement of the Sherry-Netherland Hotel at Fifth Avenue and 59th Street, reopened all spruced up on the evening of Wednesday, Sept. 17. The carpet was new, as were the wall coverings and the crocodile banquettes. Everything was in a rose salmon color. “You glow,” said Doubles chairwoman Wendy Read More

]]> http://www.observer.com/2008/style/who-needs-wall-street-socialites-take-cover-newly-renovated-hideaway-doubles