Caroline Miller and Andrew Essex left the masthead of Absolute long ago – she to Newser.com, he to Droga5 – when it folded last February. Then New York Home publisher Hour Media breathed new life into it, and all was going swimmingly, or at least going, until last week.

Then, on Thursday, the whole staff was let go.

Stop what you're doing right now and listen up. There is some major, breaking, important, life-altering news from the New York Observer today. Greg Lindsay got paid. He did it! He got his check, he went to the bank, he cashed it, and the money showed up in his bank account. Mindblowing, we know. But try to relax.

We guess the reason this is such a big deal that it deserves an entire page in the media column is because Lindsay got paid by Absolute. You know, the magazine for rich people that never actually pays its writers. The one that folded and will be now for distribution by subscription only? Andrew Essex's baby that never made it to kindergarten? Yeah, they were majorly holding out on their contribs. Until this week.

“Getting money out of Absolute, at any point during its incandescent rise, was always problematic,” said contributor Gil Schwartz, a CBS executive who writes under the pseudonym Stanley Bing. “I think all of us, to get anything at all, is pretty awesome, and relatively rare.”

The rare check which landed in Lindsay's mailbox just happened to come out to $954.70. Which, though it may not be quite enough to cover our average night at Per Se, can get you a hell of a lot of airport bagels.

Off The Record [Michael Calderone, New York Observer]

The EIC of the defunct (though in the works to reboot) magazine Absolute, Andrew Essex, is leaving the world of glossy, luxury mags and joining the stuff shirt world of advertising. On July 10, he'll join his old buddy David Droga at his new "boutique ad agency" Droga5.

Droga5 takes its name from the laundry tags that Droga's mother used to sew into his clothes as a kid, where he was the fifth child among seven siblings.

Aww, that's so cute. Maybe in a few years, Essex will be able to start his own agency called little Andy after the labels his mom wrote in his underwear before sending him to sleep away camp.

SI FLASHES EDGE-Y SIDE [Keith Kelly, New York Post] (2nd Item)

When word hit last week that ultra-luxe magalogue Absolute had found a new financier, we were overjoyed with images of Caroline Miller once again able to bathe in Tahitian pearls. Absolute has been through the rough and tumble: folding Feb. 24 when Domingo Cuadra lost interest in burning through cash; then real estate mogul William May was said to be dropping seven figures on a resurrection and then .. nothing.

But now who's giving this Spanish-origin title a new chance? We've just received rumored word that Absolute's new breaths will be funded by New York Home, owned by Hour Media, a Michigan-based publishing outfit. Paging Andrew Essex. Essex. Essex?

Wow, people really are fond of Andrew Essex. Despite "burning through" $10 million in its first year, Absolute's EIC has found a hero to salvage his mag from the still glowing ashed.

Real estate mogul William B. May will not only fund the mailing of Absolute's already printed March issue, but he's totally "prepared to make a substantial seven-figure investment."

The "upscale lifestyle" mag folded on Feb. 24, when the money behind the project, Domingo Cuadra, pulled funding of the mag. New moneybags May would like to meet with some "key people" and re-scrape the mag back up with about eight staffers. (Making for a total staff cut of about 22.)

At least one ex-staffer was skeptical of the venture. "I think it shows the caliber of the people involved - they think they can compete in New York for $2 an issue, but they may be in for a rude awakening."

Just a shot in the dark, but, we're guessing that former employee wasn't one of the elite eight chosen for project Absolute re-birth.

Mag back [Keith J. Kelly, New York Post]

Earlier: Absolute Dunzo

When news broke last week that Caroline Miller's Absolute magazine was folding after less than a year, we were hardly shocked. A glossy magazine about all things glitzy from Details wingman Andrew Essex? We had more faith in Gear.

Now we've got Keith Kelly suspecting the magazine's shuttering may have something to do with that vodka label you should never be caught ordering.

Quietly and behind the scenes for the past year, V&S Vin & Spirit, the Swedish government-owned company that owns Absolut Vodka, has waged a knock-down drag-out battle against the Absolute Publishing Company, which has been publishing Absolute Magazine, aimed at high end, luxury-minded consumers.

Nice conspiracy theory, but we're still more inclined to believe the magazine folded because high-style and high-art just don't mix. Even old money want their $200,000 jewelry presented with Jason Binn's party photo pages.

IT'S LAST CALL FOR ABSOLUTE [Keith Kelly, NYP]
Related: Absolute Dunzo

We love it when these things come up in our random blog scouring. One minute nothing's going on, and the next, it's like, "oh yeah, this magazine folded." Fresh from the Media Mob blog of the New York Observer: Absolute magazine is closed for business.

Andrew Essex, former editor at both New York Magazine and Details started the upscale lifestyle mag just under a year ago, and the glossy gained notice for its focus on all thing fabulous.

Beauty is ever fleeting: The stunningly lush Absolute magazine was shut down today by owner Domingo Cuadra, just shy of its first birthday. Its eighth issue had already been printed, but whether it will be distributed is unclear. The Media Mob–which had harsh words recently with a sticky-fingered colleague about the "borrowing" of issues No. 1, 3, 4, 5, and 7 from the Media Mob Library–is saddened by the news.

"I'm extremely disappointed," editor in chief Andrew Essex said. "We just produced our biggest issue yet, and it's a surprise, to put it mildly. We were under the impression that we had more support."

With a target readership of New Yorkers who earned over $500,000 a year, the mag was rumored to be marketed and distributed based on potential readers' zip codes (how very New York Sun) but it sounds like 10003 never really caught on.

There was always more hype over Essex than there ever was over the mag anways — and we think the EIC spots at the Village Voice, New York Press, and Out are still absolutely open.

Absolute Folds [Media Mob]
Earlier: Caroline Miller steals Andrew Essex from 'Details'