Delivering the “Top 10 Ways The Country Would Be Different If Britney Spears Were President” on The Late Show with David Letterman, Brit-Brit looked astoundingly alert and presentable in a skimpy string bikini. Number 4: “America might have a more coherent fiscal strategy.” Perhaps President Spears could divert some earmark spending towards a more human-like weave, and away from large faux flower headpieces. Only a suggestion. In other recent Spears news, yes, Kevin Federline is fat, and yes, Britney has decided to reward her father for saving her from a life of baldness and straitjackets and future offspring named “Quilt” and “Pillow” with his very own soul food restaurant. Jamie Spears will act as proprietor of the as yet un-monikered L.A. fry-den, which will hopefully be a tad more delicious than Nyla, Brit’s 2002 shot in the dark aimed in the general direction of the New York resto world. And somehow Justin Timberlake’s Southern Hospitality survives. All part of a global conspiracy to separate the former amours from their once-shared place of white trash awesomeness, if you ask me.

The evening of the Academy Awards is one of those arbitrary, easy reasons to have people over, cook a few dishes, let your guests scuff up your floors, and be forced to clean up the mess by yourself at the end of the night -- sans a few dollars and with a dirtier apartment and the inevitable humorless letdown of watching a movie like Crash take Best Picture. Luckily, New Yorkers live in a city rife with far better places to be and far less irritating things to do. It helps that this year more than ever, it's easy to have a decent time on the cheap, and watch the show on a screen (or twelve) ten times the size of your boob-tube at home. We've dug up the best parties going down Sunday night; all we ask is that you don't forget your ballot, and your Nate Silver-endorsed cheat sheet with it.

1. Southern Hospitality (Upper East Side) - The 14 HD TVs and a large HD projection screen aren't the real excess here -- that's the $80 premium VIP package. All you can drink, all you can eat appetizers (the fried pickles are absurd), and guaranteed seating to make sure once the fat is on, it stays on. Free Jim Beam from 4 to 6 only sweetens the deal. The place to be.
2. 40/40 (Flatiron) - Like stepping into a hip-hop video, minus the fisheye. All-white, super sleek. Oh, and Kobe Bryant is holding a party for his Laker friends and all the video hos this side of the Bronx.
3. Village Pourhouse (Greenwich Village) - 50 bottles, around 24 drafts at any given moment. But with the $30 all you can drink Bud Light draft from kickoff until end of the game, we both know what you'll be drinking.

On Sunday, the New York Giants will play the Philadelphia Eagles for a chance to play for a chance to play in the Superbowl, and you can be damn sure every restaurant and bar in the city with a screen and a business sense will be looking to fatten you up with irresistible gameday specials. Here's a rundown of prime places in New York to watch Eli Manning and the Giants clip the Eagles' wings, or the Eagles ... peck out the Giants' ... eyes? Whatever:

● Southern Hospitality (Upper East Side) - Justin Timberlake's Memphis mock-up makes no qualms about who it's rooting for. Their menu includes a smoked eagle (turkey), clipped eagle wings, and the Big Blue Bird Crusher (blue frozen margarita), as well as Plaxico shots ($2 whenever the Giants score).

BlackBook's Holiday Gift Guide presents two gift picks per day through December 19. One comes from our very own YOOX.com store; the other from the world at large. Suggestions? Let us know.

For a gift that most any cash-strapped, bar-hopping friend would appreciate, go to Buy Your Friend a Belvedere and purchase cocktails or bottles that recipients can then redeem at a nationwide network of bars and clubs, including Randy Gerber’s Stone Rose and Justin Timberlake’s Southern Hospitality.

Scott Weiland’s Snitch is now Citrine, Tim Robbins is no longer behind the Back Room, De Niro’s Ago was critically panned, cholesterol problems await at Justin Timberlake’s Southern Hospitality, and Arnold Schwarzenegger & co.’s Planet Hollywood is a tourist trap, all’s not lost -- here’s a list of celeb-owned spots worth looking into.