It’s been almost exactly one year since Gourmet magazine shut its doors, and left editor-in-chief Ruth Reichl unemployed. So her many fans should be pleased to hear that Reichl has taken a position with Random House as an editor-at-large, and has more books on the horizon. From the LA Times blog Daily Dish:

Apparently, Reichl, already a bestselling author, has contracted for three books, two of which will be nonfiction, including “The Tao of Ruth,” which she says was suggested in an Anthony Bourdain story (wonder what Twitter phenomenon “Ruth Bourdain” will have to say about that?). The other will be the latest installment in her memoirs, covering the years at Gourmet. Food gossip fans are already salivating. In addition, there are plans for her first novel, “Delicious.”

Prior to Gourmet, Reichl was a food critic for the NY Times, and a food editor and critic at the LA Times.

Tony Curtis, the man who dressed up in drag opposite Jack Lemmon and Marylin Monroe in “Some Like it Hot,” died yesterday of cardiopulmonary arrest in Henderson, Nevada. He was 85.

“My father leaves behind a legacy of great performances in movies and in his paintings and assemblages,” actress Jamie Lee Curtis, his daughter, said in a statement. “He leaves behind children and their families who loved him and respected him and a wife and in-laws who were devoted to him. He also leaves behind fans all over the world.”

More from the LA Times’ obit:

Starting out in 1949 as a contract player at Universal, Curtis broke out as a leading Hollywood actor in 1952 with “Son of Ali Baba.” It was, however, a mixed blessing because the film also made Curtis the lifelong butt of a joke about his New York accent when he said: “Yonder lies the castle of my faddah.” Rarely did his delivery of this line not come up during press interviews, but Curtis never saw the humor, saying it was “not just a put-down of New Yorkers but of Jews.” Read more

When local blogger Alissa Walker of GelatoBaby.com discovered a portion of an obituary she had written for John Chase had been plagiarized by AOL-owned website West Hollywood Patch, she contacted the site’s editor. The Informer at LA Weekly has published the email response Walker received from Patch editor Nancy C. Rodriguez:

My calendar editor wrote the obit for me. I’ll have him update the obit … Would you mind sending me some information about John Chase…his significant role to West Hollywood, his character and any contributions to the city? It would be helpful information for our calendar editor.

Wow. The editor actually asked a writer her employee had just stolen from to do more of their work for them. No apology. No promise to correct or remove the stolen material. And apparently, no shame.

The obit was eventually taken down and the author fired. West Hollywood Patch appropriately issued an apology. But in light of new charges of plagiarism over at New Rochelle Patch, it makes us wonder if AOL made good on their promise to hire journalism professionals.

Related: Patch, the WalMart of News? by LA Weekly‘s Tibby Rothman

What do bloggers and maids of indeterminate legal working status have in common? They don’t get paid very well. That is, unless you work for Meg Whitman. Well, as you probably heard, Whitman’s undocumented housekeeper didn’t get paid very well. But her bloggers sure do.

As the Daily Caller’s Jonathan Strong reported last week, Whitman has consistently paid upwards of 1,000 percent the market rate for advertising space on the conservative blog Red Country. She’s been paying $15,000 a month for advertising all year for a site that only gets 125,000 unique viewers per month. That’s a buck for every 8 people. Not bad.

In related news, this Fishie would like to announce the launch of his new investigative blog, “Meg Whitman is a strong, family-oriented patriot who’s good for America and California and may just be the female reincarnation of Jesus Christ himself — and Jerry Brown smells like doo doo.”

H/T The eXiled

Well, maybe not all of us. But surely someone out there is going to want to watch This Ain’t Avatar, Hustler’s XXX parody of the highest grossing film of all time. The L.A.-based adult entertainment company claims to have spent three times the normal budget for a porn film.

Hat tip Perez Hilton

All indications are that talks between Newsweek owner Sidney Harman and The Daily Beast’s Barry Diller are red hot. The Wrap’s Sharon Waxman, citing an “individual close to the talks,” puts the odds of a deal being reached in the next week at 50 percent. Which we guess is another way of saying as hot as talks supposedly are no one still has any idea if this thing is going to happen.

The plan would be to combine the digital operation of both entities while giving editorial control of Newsweek’s print product to Daily Beast editor-in-chief Tina Brown. But neither of the two entities are currently making any money–so who knows how the deal would work financially.

Editorially speaking, however, the deal obviously seems like a good fit. We’d love to see what Brown could do for the chronically conventional-wisdom-spewing Newsweek.

Real Time’s Bill Maher sat in with Bill O’Reilly last night on his Fox News show, and managed to squeeze a few great lines out of an otherwise dry interview.

“At some point in this country the left moved to the center and the right moved to a mental institution.”

Nice. Maher also tore apart the conservative talking point that relatively milquetoast Democratic blogs like Daily Kos represent the “far left” of the ideological spectrum.

Ready to pack your bags and move on to a new gig? Sunset is looking for a new senior travel editor to contribute to planning, assigning and editing the magazine’s travel coverage in print and online.

In addition to conceptualizing features and working with other editors and designers on packaging, you’ll be overseeing and editing several of Sunset‘s regional monthly Weekend Guides, as well as one special quarterly section. Needless to say, you need to be on top of west coast travel trends and have great contacts within the industry.

Five or more years of experience at a magazine or website with a travel focus, plus top-notch editor skills are must-haves for this position. You should also be an efficient project manager and collaborative worker, who can generate compelling stories in the blink of an eye. Interested? Apply here.

This can’t possibly be the real origins of the Letterman/Oprah feud, can it? Letterman pulled the old send-the-check-to-Oprah’s-table trick–and it worked?

You be the judge.