Mmm-mmm good cause

Larry Thomas, who played the iconic "Seinfeld" character the Soup Nazi, was on his best behavior yesterday as he served up soup in Cambridge. Thomas's appearance was part of "Do Something With Seinfeld," a college-campus food drive that's making stops across the country. In exchange for free soup - and a chance to chat with the dictatorial Thomas - students yesterday donated canned goods to the Greater Boston Food Bank.

Believe it or not, a British-based website says Bobby Brown may be getting married again. Contactmusic.com reports that things are getting serious between the Roxbury R&B singer and his manager, Alicia Etheridge. Brown, who spent 14 tumultuous years with Whitney Houston before divorcing the diva last year, recently talked about Etheridge with Sister 2 Sister magazine: "That [relationship] is gonna work 'cause I'm gonna make it work." Kind of like his music career? The couple certainly looked cozy at the CMT Awards in Nashville last spring.

Author Howard Zinn is getting his props. Suffolk University has organized the first-ever Zinn Fest, a citywide celebration of the left-leaning former BU professor who wrote the influential "A People's History of the United States." Over the next several months, Suffolk, where Zinn's now a visiting prof, will collaborate with Boston Playwrights' Theatre and Central Square Theater to produce several works based on Zinn's plays, activism, and scholarship. Earlier this year, producer Chris Moore shot "The People Speak," a four-part miniseries based on Zinn's best-selling book. Stars who took part included Marisa Tomei, Viggo Mortensen, Benjamin Bratt, Danny Glover, Darryl McDaniels, David Strathairn, Jasmine Guy, John Legend, Josh Brolin, and Kerry Washington.

While John McCain's preaching to the choir tonight at the Republican National Convention, Bill Janovitz will be rocking. The Buffalo Tom frontman is resuming his series of shambolic hootenannies at Toad. Backed by an ace band, Janovitz typically plays two sets peppered with covers. And you never know who might show up. A few years back, BoSox GM Theo Epstein and Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder arrived after midnight and played a few tunes, including Neil Young's "Cortez the Killer." The Thursday series starts tonight and continues Sept. 18 and throughout October.

Olympic gymnast Alicia Sacramone, a Winchester native, had a few words of wisdom for Sox manager Terry Francona during a visit to the Sox dugout. Sacramone, captain of the silver-medal USA women's gymnastics team, was among several Olympians who stopped by the ballpark this week. Sacramone's post-Olympics tour continued yesterday in Chicago, where she joined fellow Team USA medal-winning gymnasts Samantha Peszek and Nastia Liukin for a taping of Oprah Winfrey's show.

Word is security will be tight when New Kids on the Block make their triumphant return to Boston this weekend. The band, whose new CD "The Block" is getting generally good reviews, will be at the opening of the new Newbury Comics at Faneuil Hall Marketplace Saturday. The New Kids are making the rounds as they promote their reunion, hosting an album release party earlier this week in New York. Asked yesterday if he and his bandmates - Jordan and Jonathan Knight, Donnie Wahlberg, and Danny Wood - have any special plans for their Boston appearance, Joey McIntyre was amused. "We're arriving by hot air balloon with our album cover plastered on it," Joey Mac said in a text message. We think he's kidding.

In the 1997 documentary "Hands on a Hard Body," 24 people took part in an endurance contest to win a new Nissan Hard Body truck. The rules were simple: The last person standing with his or her hand on the pickup would drive it home. Yesterday morning, Bank of America and WBCN undertook a similar competition to determine the winner of a pair of Pats season tickets. Ten fans began clutching a giant, inflatable football jersey with the goal of being the last person standing. "I'm doing all right," said Michael Pastorello, a self-employed painter from Salem told us after about four hours on his feet. "I'm not going home tonight." Encouraged by Hall of Famer Andre Tippett and BOA exec Kevin Dolan, the contestants were not allowed to kneel or to sit, but they did get bathroom breaks every five hours, during which they could also eat and drink. "We have lights, security, and an EMT down here," said bank flack Joe Goode. "Some of these guys are in shorts, so they might get a little chilly overnight." If more than two of the fans are still hanging on by the end of the day Friday, there'll be a Pats trivia contest to declare the winner.

Names can be reached at names@globe.com or at 617-929-8253.