With the cost of a subway ride climbing ever-higher, it's nice to see commuters like the guy in this gross video getting his money worth. Why pay extra for a box of tissues when you can simply use the train doors as your hanky? When you think about it, the MTA is really missing out on some merchandising opportunities in the personal hygiene department. Is it smart business to limit merch to MTA-themed socks and T-shirts when there's such a high demand for subway fingernail clippers and spittoons? We're sure this F train nose-picker would have preferred to wipe his booger on a linen handkerchief with an embroidered MTA monogram, but nobody ever gave him the choice. [Via The Awl] more ›

You'll probably want to avoid eating dinner during tomorrow night's episode of Inside Edition, which promises some pretty revolting video of street vendors doing all sorts of unsavory things with their hands while on the job. According to the press release, the show's "Investigative Unit" caught a number of New York food vendors on tape exhibiting some "unsafe food handling practices." These include:
• One food vendor touching his bare feet with his fingers between his toes before going right back to serving customers.
• Another vendor near Times Square, who while wearing gloves picked his nose, handled money, scratched himself and touched raw chicken right before preparing food and serving customers.
• A vendor outside the Museum of Natural History who licked his gloved hand and counted money. Then he left his cart to use a bathroom in the museum and returned to serve customers without washing his hands.

Cats in delis: they are ubiquitous, loved, objected to, necessary, and illegal. City inspectors are constantly on the prowl to ferret out deli felines, but deli owners say they are necessary fixtures to keep their businesses free of pests like mice, rats, and roaches. The New York Times has a story today on the ongoing battle between the city and the cats that are the sentinels of its delis--feline samurai who serve their masters in return for food, shelter, and the occasional scratch behind the ears.

To store owners, the services of cats are indispensable in a city where the rodent problem is serious enough to be documented in a still popular two-minute video clip on YouTube from late February (youtube.com/watch?v=su0U37w2tws) of rats running amok in a KFC/Taco Bell in Greenwich Village. Store-dwelling cats are so common that there is a Web site, workingclasscats.com, dedicated to telling their tales.