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If you want to pick a New York neighborhood to stand for snobby elitism it's easy to turn to the Upper East Side. And though that's a broad stereotype, a new controversy is helping to reinforce it. The Times brings us the story of the residents of East 69th Street near Lexington Avenue, who are joining together to resist what they perceive to be an impending threat...subway station entrances. Um. Aren't subway entrances a fact of life in New York? As the Times explains, "a major thrust of their argument is that their blocks are simply too pretty" for what the MTA says are necessary installments for access to the station when elevators are built at the 68th Street 6 line stop.

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"(Another documentary with a Big Media focus is 'Page One: A Year Inside The New York Times,' directed by Andrew Rossi.)" - Brooks Barnes writing for the New York Times Carpetbagger blog about what will very easily be one of the more amusing (or: a-snoozing?) documentaries at the Sundance Film Festival this year. For the record, Rossi -- a Yale graduate -- has now directed documentaries about Al Jazeera and about the New York Times. Surely, that'll help with any East Coast Liberal Elite perception problems the paper may have. [FK]

Hey, Flyover Country! Do you think us Godless New York Liberals want too much of your guns taken off of the street, your unborn babies to become science experiments, and worst of all, your money for our grubby little (often Jewish) hands? Well, guess what! We just score the motherfucking Powerball on your asses.

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Lavo: If this looks good to you, please go there.

The new Manhattan hotspot, according to the New York Post, is Midtown, and specifically Lavo, a 500-person nightclub on 58th Street where Geoge Clooney's onetime girlfriend works (and she could work anywhere -- right? Right?), as well as Covet and the Andaz Fifth Avenue Hotel. Persons of a certain age may remember the location of Lavo as the former location of Au Bar. We'll speak no further about that. In an article done the way only the Post can (for better or worse), they tout the many unsung delights of this new promised party land: a little bit Vegas, a little bit...well, we'll let you decide.

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via Brownstoner

Though new guidelines give the New York City Sanitation Department the authority to remove abandoned bicycles from poles and parking meters, ghost bikes -- usually painted white and adorned with flowers to commemorate killed bikers -- are exempted from the rule, the Daily News reported yesterday. According to the official announcement, "ghost bikes will never be deemed to be derelict." The News counts at least 67 ghost bikes city-wide. It's a small, but not insignificant victory for urban riders, a growing, but still embattled group, who are being recognized by local government and given new lanes, yet have their share of enemies who continue to break their locks, run them over or write mean things about them on the Internet! There's a war brewing; whose side are you on?

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via Detroit News

Assuming the identity of "Prince Josef von Habsburg-Lothringen of Austria," a name that sounds as fake as the color of his gelled, frosted-tipped hair, a Michigan con artist pulled off an elaborate scam for years with a Soho apartment grand enough to match his bogus name. What's worse is that the FBI supported his extravagant guise -- he worked as an informant for many years.

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The other headline was "Subset of NYC Long in Need of Being Told to 'STFU' Finally Mandated by City to 'STFU,' " but there're precious Google results to be had, here.

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President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle have shown pretty decent taste whenever they visit our fair city. So why the hell'd they do this, of everything else there is to see in town?

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