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Access Atlanta > Blog > Archives > 2007 > February > 16
Friday, February 16, 2007
Have trunk, will travel: Elephant for sale
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Want to get our attention on a frigid Friday afternoon while we’re busy sweeping up those last Godiva wrappers and deflating those heart-shaped Mylar balloons still hovering around at Buzz Central?
Two words: elephant robot.
That’s what the always interesting Atlanta auctioneer Bob Brown has on the block at 2 p.m. today at his Red Baron Antiques on Roswell Road. The 20-foot-tall mechanical elephant was built in 1947 by Englishman Frank Stuart, whose family still owns it. It’s one of only three ever made (the others are in museums in Austria and Chicago), and it was most notably ridden by Dwight D. Eisenhower at the 1952 Republican National Convention in Chicago and later at his inaugural. The gasoline-powered pachyderm is actually registered and licensed as an automobile. “It works good,” Red Baron owner Brown told Buzz on Friday. “We’ve driven it down Roswell Road, and people just freak out. It can get up to 20 miles per hour. It kind of handles like a bulldozer. It’s sort of a mechanical nightmare.” Still, folks are lined up from around the globe to bid on the oddity, including Ripley’s Believe It or Not and a small slew of private collectors. Brown says the opening bid on the (oh, heck, we’ve got to use it one more time) elephant robot will be $100,000, and bidding could go as high as half a million dollars. Only in-person bidders and phone bidders who call 404-252-3770 can get in on the auction action. As for our obvious question, Brown informed Buzz: “She actually gets pretty good gas mileage. The thing’s got a 3 1/2 gallon tank. She’s never run out of gas on us.” For hostessing only
It’s probably a positive thing that the champagne will be flowing today at the closing soiree for the collection of aprons by Atlanta designer Eve Mannes hanging at Uri Vaknin gallery in Midtown. The frilly kitchen staples range from $45 to $400. “The price usually relates to the level of workmanship and fabrics like silk used,” Vaknin gallery’s Pam Moore told us Friday. “And these are more like the hostess aprons your mother wore. You don’t really cook in them.” Well, unless a gravy splotch on a $400 apron doesn’t put a ruffle in your pleats, that is. The reception runs from 2 to 5 p.m. Call: 404-513-0169. An unexpected ‘Ugly’ vote
B98.5 FM Kelly and Alpha morning show producer/human piñata Will Gara got an unexpected endorsement as he competes with 23 other DJs across the country for a trip to Los Angeles to meet the cast of “Ugly Betty” on the set of the comedy. ABC’s “Ugly Betty: A Face for Radio DJ Contest” asks listeners to go to www.pciasp.com/uglybettycontest/selectphoto.aspx and vote on which radio guy is the most hideous in his cross-dressing Betty garb. Listeners can win a vacation to Cancun, Mexico. Gara has risen to the fifth spot in the contest that ends Feb. 28. E-mailed Gara to Buzz Central: “I got a ‘I voted for you’ e-mail from my ex-wife, who I haven’t talked to or seen in 15 years.” Gara theorized that someone e-mailed our previous item on the contest to her in Connecticut. Cracked Gara: “You know how you always hope to look your best before bumping into an ex? Well, so much for that.” Very bad hair day
For scribblers like us, rapper Foxy Brown is a gift that keeps on giving. Brown spent a night in jail after police said she threw hair glue at a Florida beauty shop employee and later swatted an officer, her second legal problem stemming from a salon-related scuffle. The rapper, 27, was expected to leave jail Friday after a $1,500 bond was posted for her, the Broward County Sheriff’s Office said. She was charged with battery and resisting an officer with violence. Brown’s lawyer, John Sampson, didn’t return a phone call seeking comment Friday. It wasn’t immediately clear how the arrest would affect her sentence of three years’ probation and anger management classes for attacking a pair of manicurists in New York City in 2004. According to the Florida arrest report, Brown was applying beauty products in the bathroom when a Queen Beauty Supply employee told her the business was closed and it was time to leave. She refused and threw hair glue at the employee, the report said. Brown then spat on the man as he called 911, staining his shirt. A police officer had to “use a takedown maneuver to gain control” of Brown, according to the report. At press time Friday, Buzz was still preoccupied with visualizing what that particular hot mess looked like.…
UNCOUPLING
Singer Chris Cornell is leaving rock group Audioslave, citing “irresolvable personality conflicts as well as musical differences” in a statement. “I wish the other three members nothing but the best in all of their future endeavors.” Cornell, 42, said he’ll release a solo album May 1 called “Carry On.”
CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS
Saturday: Actor Hal Holbrook is 82. Comedian Larry the Cable Guy (above) is 44. Actor Dominic Purcell (“Prison Break”) is 37.
Sunday: Author Toni Morrison is 76. Vocalist Yoko Ono is 74. Actress Cybill Shepherd is 57. Actor John Travolta is 53. Actor Matt Dillon is 43. Rapper Dr. Dre is 42.
Contributing: News services
If you have a tip, call 404-526-2749. Or fax 404-526-5509. Or e-mail: buzz@ajc.com.
500 tunes over 10 days means help for kids
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Josh Rifkind, manager for local band the Whigs, thinks big.
He has produced the annual Open Mic Madness competition featuring upward of 400 musicians. And now Rifkind wants to gather 500 musicians May 3-12 at Smith’s Olde Bar to each sing a song from Rolling Stone magazine’s top 500 greatest tunes of all time. The money raised will help musicians entertain sick kids at special summer camps in Georgia.
“I’m insane,” Rifkind admitted to Buzz this week. “It’s a logistical monster.” But he said the eclectic list, which features songs from Elvis Presley to Nirvana to Run DMC, “felt like something we could rally people around.” He hopes to get big Georgia musicians involved, especially those who have songs on the list, such as R.E.M. and OutKast. Already, Rifkind and his charity foundation have assigned about 200 selections to local acts including Aslyn, Dead Confederates and Second Shift. More information can be found at www.500songsforkids.org.
Ice cream politics
Everyone knows those Communist sympathizers at Ben & Jerry’s discriminate in favor of leftist flavors, what with their cool desserts named after Jerry Garcia and Wavy Gravy. Now they’ve decided to allow a new voice at the dinner table by naming a new flavor for comedian Stephen Colbert.
“I’m not afraid to say it. Dessert has a well-known liberal agenda,” Colbert said in a statement. “What I hope to do with this ice cream is bring some balance back to the freezer case.”
Stephen Colbert’s Americone Dream is composed of vanilla ice cream with fudge-covered waffle cone pieces and caramel. Ben & Jerry’s describes it as “the sweet taste of liberty in your mouth.” Colbert is donating his proceeds to charity through the new Stephen Colbert Americone Dream Fund.
Love blooms
Love was in the air Wednesday night, and Atlanta restaurants and nightspots were clotted with duos holding hands and pledging troths. The Valentine’s in the Garden event at the Atlanta Botanical Garden drew 500 romancers to the steamy orchid center, where at least five eager fellows had informed garden personnel they planned to pop the question.
Spokeswoman Geri Laufer said the Bulbophyllum orchids, which permeate their surroundings with the smell of rotting meat, had blessedly ceased blooming, and only the more pleasing scents of cinnamon, vanilla and other orchid aromas filled the air.
At Medieval Times, Patrick Donovan of Sandy Springs surprised his sweetie, Rhonda Barnes, with a proposal during the knighting ceremony. He had some help from radio station Q-100, which hosted the “dream proposal” contest, and from Q-100 personality Dylan Sprague, who conspired to lure Barnes to the event with a fabricated free “evening at the castle.”
After Donovan proposed in front of a lustily cheering crowd, Barnes smiled through her tears, said yes, then asked when she was going to get to meet Sprague.
Malibu beach access settled
The commission that regulates California’s coast settled a decades-long dispute with David Geffen over public access to the beach in front of his Malibu estate.
The California Coastal Commission agreed Wednesday to forgive Geffen, 63, for building a deck that intruded into a public easement. In exchange, Geffen agreed to open a stretch of beach in front of his home that had been closed to the public.
Commissioners allowed the entertainment mogul to keep a wooden stairway to the beach. They also gave him a privacy buffer so the public cannot legally intrude on his property.
The decision comes 24 years after Geffen first promised a public walkway to Malibu’s Carbon Beach.
In addition to the new access point, the DreamWorks co-founder agreed to pay $125,000 to a special state public beach access fund to help build a metal ramp so the public can get from the pathway to the sand.
Public access to the state’s shoreline is a major issue for the Coastal Commission, which was meeting this week in San Diego.
Television
An end to California scheming
“The O.C.” will breathe its last next week. Among producers’ favorite “O.C.” lines:
“I love shopping, tanning and celebrity gossip. Always have, always will.” — Summer, getting to the heart of the true Summer
“Well, you know, since my grades went from Bs to As, I was actually wondering if you could change my As to Bs.” — Kaitlin, totally messing with Dr. Roberts about wanting breast augmentation
“Men to me are what chardonnay is to you. One sip and I’m upside down on a chandelier.” — Julie, explaining to Kirsten why she’s swearing off men. And reminding Kirsten that she’s a boozehound.
Celebrity birthdays
Actor William Katt (“Carrie”) is 56. Actor Levar Burton (“Star Trek: The Next Generation”) is 49. Rapper-actor Ice-T (“Law &Order: SVU”) is 48. Tennis legend John McEnroe is 47.
Contributing: Rodney Ho and news services
If you have a tip, call 404-526-2749. Or fax 404-526-5509. Or e-mail: buzz@ajc.com.
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