Jamie Peck's NY Press cover story — about the decline and fall of after-hours party space, The Shank — tells the usual story of ephemeral exclusivity and the programmatic obsolescence of bohemian fun. Everything dies, baby. (She does a particularly good job, too, of getting people to go on record kind of dissing each other, which is always fun.) The money quotes, however, are from Bushwick resident Julie Vick, who is scared of local teens:

“I’m surrounded by teenagers. People are tagging and ruining things; things were getting a little Altamont-y, and the fun was ending.” Then, according to Vick, a teenage girl grabbed her beer, poured it on her and punched her in the head until she broke free and ran. “I was like, this is humiliating. I’m 30 years old, getting beaten up by 16-year-olds. I’m too old to be somewhere that teenagers are going to beat me up.”

This is true.

Isn't it nice when you can have fun and help someone at the same time? You know, helping others? Ok, stay with me here: The Williamsburg Charter Collegiate School is having a benefit party tonight at Southside, from 8pm to 11pm, to help send their kids on various field trips to fun and interesting places like Costa Rica, Virginia, New Orleans and (boring!) Upstate New York. If I'd had opportunities like this, I wouldn't be stuck blogging for you, dear reader.

(N.B. No actual children will be getting drunk with you at the bar. Despite what the image at left cannot help but imply.)

My wife visited Haiti a couple of years ago to do some work at a rural hospital. When we finally got back to Brooklyn (I'd met her at the airport), and got out of the car, she just started crying right there on our stoop, much to the concern of the neighbor's cat. Now, the tears of a white liberal New Yorker are what every TV/radio pundit lives to ridicule, but these particular tears weren't for guilt or shame, but were mere gratitude for the kind of opulent lives we're able to live here in New York, a reality too infrequently contextualized by the way the other two thirds of the planet lives each day.

I could get into details about how difficult life is in Haiti, especially for children, but that would defeat the purpose of the party I'm trying to get you to go to tonight: Haiti Optimiste II, a shindig at the Bubble Lounge which aims to celebrate the great things about Haiti through photography and music (by Michou and Emily King). Your $10 donation will get you a rum drink and go towards fixing some of those bad things I didn't mention. IF YOU DON'T GO TO THIS YOU ARE A BAD PERSON.

Tonight, 8pm, 228 W. Broadway.

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Here. Follow the instructions for walk-in or (express at this point) mail-in registration here. If you know anybody who is not registered to vote, send them this link, and walk them down to the registration place before end-of-day Friday.

Or, sayeth the L's Nightlife Editor Zachary Palmer, take them to Le Royale tonight, where the nice people running a "Barack the Vote" party will be registering new voters, and collecting suggested donations (on top of the cover at the door) for to benefit the Obama campaign. There'll be a silent auction, also to benefit the campaign; there'll and DJs and dancing to benefit you, and an open bar for an hour starting at 8pm, to benefit the whole debate-watching process when 9pm rolls around.

Oh, right, the debate tonight. Enjoy that, everyone. This is the Town Hall debate featuring undecided voters, right? God, I hate average Americans, especially ones who don't know who they're going to vote for. Who's excited to watch Obama spout platitudinous talking points as his way of holding ground while questioners hammer McCain on the economy? Good times, good times.

Register to vote if you haven't.

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Well, kids, it's time to slather yourselves in body glitter and fill your heart with love for fabulous people you wouldn't recognize in the deli under natural light: it's The L Magazine's second annual Nightlife Awards party, at Touch, for which the winners and judges and voters of the eponymous recognition of Nightlife Excellence will celebrate their, um, Nightlife Excellence, by having excellent nightlife together. (That means like music and performances and dancing and all that stuff. And who knows what else.)

Oh, right, the L Magazine's actual Nightlife Awards will be the focus of the issue of the L out tomorrow, after being announced tonight. (I lost the nose-game and will have to type out the blank part of all 105,000 copies of the new issue tonight, as they're announced and then sent to me here, at the office, from Mike Conklin's iPhone. So, I won't see you there tonight, sorry.)

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It's time, once again, for the L Magazine's annual Nightlife Awards. For the second time, Zachary Palmer, our man-about-downtown, has gotten party promoters, DJs, photographers, venue managers and more to hold forth on the best the city has to offer in terms of dancing, live music, art, scenes, people, amenities, things, ideas, et cetera et cetera. It's sort of like a Zagat's for people covered in body glitter.

The issue comes out next Wednesday, the 17th; we're also celebrating the release of the issue with our second annual Nightlife Awards Party, a week from today (so, Tuesday 9/16) at Touch, on the West Side. It should be an... interesting party, if last year's is anything to go on.

Tomorrow, July 31st, Rififi, the grungy and lovable East Village party-and-comedy mainstay, closes its doors forever. Bye!

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Still in town? Me too. And if you're still around tonight, and not going to your magazine's holiday party, there's another party you should consider. It's called The Long Weekend, and it benefits City Harvest, a great organization that takes excess food from grocery stores/restaurants and delivers it to people who are hungry. It's a crazy danceparty with Professor Rockwell and DJ Knomad, and although there's no open bar, the drinks are cheaply: $5 well drinks, $4 all beer, $4 well shots. You're encouraged to bring non-perishable food to donate. I would, but I ONLY buy organic, local food from the Greenmarket that I carry home in a hemp bag embroidered with strings of manure that has dissolved into my body by the time I get home. It's at Uncle Ming's, its all night, from 9pm until they close, and there's no cover. If I recall correctly, this is the place with very attractive bartenders.