Philadelphia, PA

Congrats to NBC 10 meteorologist Glenn “Hurricane” Schwartz who was engaged to Bucks County’s Christie Wood on Christmas morning.

Schwartz, fifty six years old, gave Wood, forty years old, a school guidance counselor, a ring along with her other Christmas presents. The pair met on Match.com earlier this year.

Schwartz has been separated from first wife Wynette since the late summer of 2006. The weatherman says the happy couple has yet to set any wedding plans.

We are currently going away for the holidays and we will be fully back up starting January 1st, 2009. Yes - 2009. Crazy.

We will probably publish something here and there after Christmas, though.

We hope you all have a safe, fun, and stress free holiday season!

The contestants on the fifth season of Fox’s “Hell’s Kitchen,” will compete for a job as a head chef at one of the restaurants at the Borgata in Atlantic City. The show, hosted by chef Gordon Ramsay, premieres at 9 p.m. January 29th, 2009.

It was unclear today whether the winning chef would take over one of the Borgata’s current restaurants, which include Bobby Flay Steak, Wolfgang Puck’s American Grille, SeaBlue, Izakaya, Ombra, and Old Homestead, or would operate a new spot at the hotel/casino. “The winner of this season will win a head chef position at Borgata.

Details regarding specifics of this position will be released in the coming weeks,” a Borgata spokeswoman said this afternoon. This season features an area contestant, Andrea Heinly, a thirty year old line cook from Reading.

(Image via Wire Image. Gordon Ramsay to the right.)

Locally raised actress Blythe Danner and funnyman Fred Willard are special guests at the Academy of Music’s 152 anniversary concert January 24th, 2009. Danner hosts and Willard will perform an ode to the Academy’s newly-restored chandelier. James Taylor will also perform some of his greatest hits with the Philadelphia Orchestra led by Christoph Eschenbach.

The show starts at 7:30 p.m. and is followed by the Academy Ball at the Park Hyatt Philadelphia at the Bellevue. For gala information, call the Academy of Music Restoration Fund Office at 215-893-1940. Concert-only tickets are $183 (of which $148.50 is tax-deductible. For more info, call 215-893-1999 or click here.

Hello guys and gals. We’ve been on break for a couple of days, but we’ll be back tomorrow.

Plus, there’s nothing interesting going on today that you want to hear about, well, at least that has anything to do with the crazed city of Philadelphia…

Starbucks will be harassing Philadelphians with fake coffee cups this holiday season.

Here is a recently released press release:

“This holiday season Starbucks and Zipcar are teaming up to reward good Samaritans in Philadelphia. Zipcar will be driving around the City with life size magnetic versions of Starbucks signature red holiday cups attached to their roofs. When individuals stop to warn the drives about their coffee cup, drivers will then reward that person with a free Starbucks gift card.

If you have any further questions, please let me know.”

Uhh, what the hell?

But none the less, keep a look out.

Armed police finally ended a ninety minute siege at a bank, only to discover that they’d been in a tense stand-off with a cardboard cutout.

The cops raced to the PNC Bank in Montgomery Township, New Jersey, last Thursday when an alarm went off. Upon seeing the silhouette of a person in the window of the bank, with the blinds drawn, they promptly sealed off the area and evacuated nearby buildings.

There then followed a nervous hour and a half confrontation as authorities attempted to make contact with the shadowy figure.

…are you kidding me?! We’re battling war(s), in a recession, and you’re chasing a cardboard cutout?

“I drove in the parking lot and see all these guys with guns,” local resident Ross Stout told the Star-Ledger newspaper.

After ninety minutes of fruitless attempts to negotiate with the figure using bullhorns and telephones, the police sent in a SWAT team – who discovered that the suspected criminal was actually a life-sized cardboard cutout of a person.

(Via the Metro.)

The Penn State senior who plays the Nittany Lion mascot was arrested on a DUI charge and his status for the Rose Bowl is currently in doubt.

James Sheep was pulled over on campus around 3:15 a.m. on November 22nd, hours before Penn State’s 49-18 win over Michigan State.

The officer who made the stop saw that the vehicle was overloaded, with passengers piled onto each other and blocking the driver’s view.

After determining that Sheep had been drinking, the officer administered sobriety tests and took him to the hospital for blood tests. He was later charged with DUI and summary traffic violations.

At the Michigan State game, the final home game of the year, Sheep was honored for serving as the mascot since January 2007.

Stupid college kids…

(Via our partner, CBS 3.)

CBS 3 4 p.m. co-anchor Angela Russell will soon be leaving the station where she started in early 2006. We’re told her contract was not renewed. We will update this post if more information is to come.

Got some things to do this Saturday? Well, guess what? Parking is free on Saturdays after 11 a.m. for the rest of the year. “We have the free meter parking every Saturday,” says PPA spokeswoman Linda Miller.