Welcome to the Big Apple Blog Festival (BABF), a representative roundup of this week’s posts by NYC bloggers.
Next week’s BABF will be hosted by Englishman in New York … if you have a NYC blog or you blog about NYC and would like to host an upcoming BABF, let us know …
Lots of questions this week … scroll down …

• Miscellaneous Objections … “There’s nothing like riding the subway with the Stroller of Damocles hanging over your head.” … or bumping into your leg … Stroller of Damocles … Heh.
• The Dawn Patrol is “going into hibernation until I finish my book, which will likely be just when it’s due, in the middle of January.” … Happy hibernation and good luck with the book!
• cityrag.com has pics and a reminder that “so many animals still need help in the areas devastated by Katrina” …
• Harleys, Cars, Girls & Guitars says “Hudson Corner [Diner], on Hudson and West 11th Street, produces a great hamburger and fries.” … also likes the spaghetti marinara … 570 Hudson Street, between 11th and Perry Streets, 212-229-2727 [MenuPages | Citysearch]
• Mister Snitch! links to “Greatest ‘404 page not found’ ever” …
• forgotten NY added a new page … “5 ALIVE. Brooklyn’s Fifth Avenue” … a “comparison of Fifth then [1970s] and Fifth now.” … with a pic of “The House of Tuition” … and Brooklyn Superhero Supply, “a spiffed-up tutoring center for neighborhood kids” … 5th Avenue between Flatbush and Greenwood Cemetery, Brooklyn …
• Salli Vates is “excited to learn that The Chocolate Room is once again offering its beloved bittersweet hot chocolate.” … it’s located at 86 5th Avenue, Brooklyn, 718-783-2900 [Citysearch]
• Alarming News has an interesting guest post by Candace … “Party Foul” …
• this fish needs a bicycle tells how she has thus far avoided … the Gym Weirdo at her gym …
• Asymmetrical Information has an interesting post …”Lawsuit culture” … “Is it the result of our lax regulatory system, or the decline of unionisation?” …
• Slashfood says … “Pomegranate juice may fight prostate cancer” …
• eat drink one woman also has a post about pomegranates … and has one of her regular “You Are What You Eat” posts … with one of her 150-plus cousins … Saigon Grill sounds good to us … [MenuPages | Citysearch]
• A Full Belly reports that Shake Shack will be open until December 23rd … southeast corner of Madison Square Park, near Madison Avenue and East 23rd Street [A Hamburger Today | MenuPages | Citysearch]
• New York’s Sixth says “your cab driver still insists he can’t cross the Hudson River without an introduction to Ben Franklin.” … 50 cents extra? … or $100? …
• The Kitchen Review reports on Pickle Day … “In honor of the immigrants who started their American life in the Lower East Side, I ate pickles and challah for dinner. Very New York.” …
• Hotel Chelsea Blog quotes a story from The Toronto Star … “Chelsea owner Stanley Bard, 71, fondly remembers the years Bob Dylan lived here in the 1960s. … ‘He stayed to himself and he was a gentleman’” …
• Stand Clear of the Closing Doors, Please … “There are days when the subway is so packed, like yesterday morning at the time I wanted to get on, that however tiny one is, there is just NO room in the subway car.” …
• Express Train has a pic of a full car … “5 Train ~ Grand Central Station ~ 6:10pm: Packed rush hour. No more room on this car.” …
• greg.org found a “great vintage Jewish cowboy belt buckle on ebay” …
• Kevin McCullough is “working with ‘Food For The Poor’ in the ghettos of Kingston Jamaica” …
• slice has a link roundup, featuring … Canadian Pizza Scandal …
• stereogum got married this weekend … Congratulations and Best Wishes! … and The Corsair says: “I think it’s a safe bet that this wedding will have the best music of any wedding in history.” …
• Amy’s New York Notebook has the perfect gift for “reporters out there who have been wanting to thank your anonymous sources but didn’t know how” …
• A Socialite’s Life is taking a vacation with the largest martini glass we’ve seen … but before she left, she linked to the story about a 13 foot-long Python eating a 6 foot-long alligator … Hey You! Yeah, you! The one trying to flush your pet alligator down the toilet! DONT! … Oh. Never mind …
• gothamist reports “Cat Show Comes, Goes” … and “the City Council is about to make Gothamist very non-plussed. On Tuesday the Council is expected to override Bloomberg’s veto of a bill that would kill metered parking on Sundays” …
• Right Moon? got a call from the hospital billing department … and “although it’s illogical and not quite true, I feel that I saved $30,000 today.” …
• A Guy In New York had his weekly roundup of restaurant reviews in “This Week in Reviews (TWIR)” …
• Third Avenue reviews “Ariadne auf Naxos at the Metropolitan Opera” … “Were I to be stranded with just one opera recording on that mystical desert island, I would be torn between either Parsifal or Tristan und Isolde, with my preference probably going to the former. But iTunes does not lie – and the opera that, by some margin, I listen to most often is Richard Strauss’ 1916 gem, Ariadne auf Naxos.” … “the Met’s production by Elijah Moshinsky does not disappoint. Neither does it offer any original insight, but it is for the most part inoffensive and, joy of joys, totally devoid of animals.” … (An Unamplified Voice reviewed Ariadne last week (BABF, October 3, 2005)) … Metropolitan Opera …
• modern fabulousity comments on the Screen Actors Guild report “showing a 10% plunge in episodic television roles last year to 34,431 — a loss of 3,523 roles from 2003 — as primetime reality programming increased from 15 to 22 hours per week. … however, if you’re dedicated enough to eat bugs, date a bimbo or a himbo, work for a tyrant, or go stircrazy, you can still follow your dreams of acting on TV!” …
• The Tin Man is “beginning to think that I’m a social liberal but a judicial conservative, or at least not a judicial liberal.” …
• The New SteveSilver.net has the best headline we’ve seen about the AOL purchase of Weblogs, Inc. for $25 million … “Let’s Hope It Works Out Better Than That Whole ‘Buying Time Warner’ Thing” … and asks: “Could Yahoo!Gawker be far behind?” …
• snack brought back food in a tube from Europe …
• untitlednamedotcom has comments and pics … “ round 7 pm on October 5, 2005 the NYPD removed bicycles locked to the entrance of the Bedford Avenue L station in Williamsburg. Locks were cut, bicycles were tagged and driven away in vans without prior warning” …
• jewschool reposts “The Laws of the Sukkah according to Dr. Seuss” … “Forget about the Green Eggs and Ham” …
• Englishman in New York reports “A New York institution passed into history last week. The banking hall in the Williamsburgh Savings Bank Building on Atlantic Avenue, in Brooklyn, closed its doors for the last time on Friday.” … with pics and lots of great links …
• cityrag has a story and a pic of an “attack cat” …
• the bronx announces “BLOGS: An exhibition of photoblogs — NYC Exposition, Puerto Rico Sun, and East Harlem” … October 14-November 26, 2005 … at MediaNoche … 161 East 106th Street, first floor (between Lexington and Third Avenues), 212-828-0401
• NewYorkology has a … “Autumn roundup: where to see the leaves peak” … with lots of links …
• Ace of Spades has a clip and a pic of an Alaskan Airlines 737 painted to look like a salmon … read the comments … you paid for the paint job … “If You Like Puns …. this should tickle you. Presenting the Salmon Thirty Salmon.” … also has a “Stupid Product Alert” …

  Q and A

• writersbloc wants to know “Why do people proudly announce maxing out their credit cards? Is credit card debt that chic? Am I missing something? Furthermore, why would you proudly announced that you’ve maxed out your Saks Fifth Avenue card?” … guess we can’t brag – we pay our credit cards in full every month …
• Slant Point answers the question … “What does 7-11 stand for?” … we’re old enough to remember when they did close …
• Dave Friedman’s Soul of Wit asks … “why does the lore of the Ivy League persist, despite ample evidence that it remains a relic of outdated thinking?” …
• Yet another weird SF fan asks, “If there are driverless robots that can cross 130 miles of desert, how long will it be until we can buy driverless cars?” …
• Jolie in NYC answers the question … “do you know what the advantage is to using one of those ionic hair dryers?” … at $160 plus, it better make coffee, too …
• gothamist asks “What do you think is the smelliest subway station?” … read the comments and add your nomination … and reminds us … “Both the Hudson and East Rivers have extremely strong currents, and can look deceptively calm from the outside. Never, ever, ever go in, for any reason– even your life’s work isn’t worth dying for.“

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The Big Apple Blog Festival is listed on the ÜberCarnival page and in Carnival News.
To nominate your favorite blog post about NYC, or if you have a NYC blog and want to see something in the next BABF … or you have a NYC blog and would like to host an upcoming BABF … send us a short write up and a permalink to aguyinnewyork [at] gmail.com … or use the Carnival Submit Form … see you next week …
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