​A "Dogs Against Romney" protest brought out more reporters sniffing for a story than pups this afternoon.

The animal advocacy group aims to call attention to an infamous incident in which Mitt Romney strapped the family dog in a crate to the roof of the car for a 12-hour drive in the late 1980s. Protester Paul Gestos, a longtime dog owner and Occupy Wall Streeter, said Mutt Romney's story reflects poorly on his owner's character. "It shows he has no empathy," Gestos said of the presidential hopeful. "He made a bad decision and now he won't even own up to it."

More »

C.S. Muncy

The Coney Island Polar Bear Club, the "oldest winter bathing organization in the United States," was at it again with aplomb over the weekend for their annual New Year's Day swim. Photographer C.S. Muncy was there to get some shots. While it was warmer than usual as far as outside temperatures run this time of year, the water was a reported 45 degrees and "one heck of an ice bath," per one participant. If semi-nude bathers willingly plunging into frigid waters in January are a thermometer of the times, styles for 2012 are skimpy, but hats are definitely in, as are (still) homemade Occupy signs.

More »

Bowery Boogie

From our friends at Bowery Boogie comes this photo of a guy casually going about his business, sans shoes, on the sidewalks of New York City. He's got those five-fingered running shoes attached to his belt, so it's clearly a matter of choice. But...why? Bowery Boogie has seen him not once but twice in recent days.

More »

Steven Thrasher

Yesterday, we wrote about how from the middle of Sixth Avenue in the West Village, you can get a view that is eerily reminiscent of what the Twin Towers looked like from the same spot a decade ago.

The optical illusion is created by the pairing of the Trump SoHo Tower and the still-under-construction One World Trade. From this unique point in the city, the two buildings appear to be next to each other and to be the same size.

But how close are they? And how alike are they, really?

More »

Steven Thrasher

Crossing Sixth Avenue at 11th Street this afternoon, it was impossible not to notice. At its current stage of construction, One World Trade appears to be the same height and size as the Trump SoHo Tower. Together, the two create a view that looks eerily like the pre-9/11 World Trade Center from this intersection.

More »

via EV Grieve

From our East Village blog pal EV Grieve comes this photo of a very dapper-looking Joe Franklin, New York City celebrity, the man credited with having hosted the very first television talk show, a man who got to appear as himself in Ghostbusters. Also, a Village Voice reader!

It looks like Joe got this copy of the Voice at 14th Street and 2nd Avenue. We spoke to him today by phone and he clarified that this was not this week's issue, though, he says, "I love that paper, I quote from it on my radio show...I read it every week!"

More »

This is something of a still life, but with people! Yesterday, our inscrutable Mayor Bloomberg was down at the World Trade Center, where a really fancy (and big!) motorcycle designed by Paul Teutul Jr. of American Chopper fame was unveiled as a tribute to the reconstruction of the World Trade Center. In January another bike, presumably similar and valued at $50,000, will be raffled off at $50 a ticket to benefit the museum. But also, this photo is kind of great. Composition-wise and such. (Click here for the full-size version.)

via @NYCMayorsOffice

More »

via John de Guzman

Everyone was freaking out about this photo, tweeted by the New York Post, last night. And, yeah, it is beautiful, and haunting. Only problem: It wasn't taken last night, which the Post and others, initially indicated. (Those are in fact 10,000 migrating birds trapped in the lights, a situation we wrote about last year on this blog.)

After John de Guzman, who took the picture in September of 2010, realized it had been picked up by another Twitter user from his Flickr account and posted to that person's Twitpic account, then picked up and tweeted by the New York Post, he engaged in Twitter battle to get the rightful date and credit acknowledged, with folks coming to his aid. This morning, @MichelleMalkin tweeted a credit to Guzman, which the Post retweeted. The paper later tweeted a direct link to de Guzman's Flickr account, with the corrected date.

More »

@NYCMayorsOffice

Here is Mayor Bloomberg, Speaker of the New York Assembly Sheldon Silver, and a dashing kid in a tux all hanging to celebrate the first day of school for kids in New York City. As Mayor Bloomberg's photo captioner writes, "Remember kids: You don't get a second chance to make a first impression. Enjoy your 1st day of school!"

More »

Simone's photo

Erica Simone is a French photographer who recently published a Not Exactly Safe for Work photo collection called Nue York: Self-Portraits of a Bare Urban Citizen, in which she does average daily New York City things totally nude -- jogging, riding the subway, riding a motorcycle, buying a hot dog, and so on. Her show ran from April 14 through April 28 at the Dash Gallery, and got, as she wrote us, "quite an extensive amount of press in May/April." We even covered it on this blog. Now Simone has gotten in touch to let us know that Zappos may be ripping her off in a campaign that looks kind of a lot like at least one of her photos, in so much as it is of a naked lady, running. (Note that in the original photo of Simone running, she does not have her lady parts hidden with any bars, much less ones that advertise clothing.) Simone writes of Zappos, "Their campaign is scheduled to fully run in August. The copyright issue is significant and a lawsuit may result from it."

More »