Results tagged “rat”

Game 6 will now be played tomorrow night at 8:20 p.m... up against the Giants-Cardinals football game.

                     

When Gothamist reader Wayne sent us a picture of a rat stuck in a sidewalk, apparently trying to emerge, others readers decided it was depressing, hilarious, tempting, disgraceful, an opportunity for considering ethics and morals, and time to bait other commenters. Finally, we have an update from Wayne plus a number of Photoshop renderings of the Sad Rat:

     

Reader Wayne sent us this photograph and explains, "I was walking along and texting. Not really paying that much attention. Then something caught my eye. I thought I was about to step in dog shit, but quickly realized it was a rat stuck in the sidewalk. A big rat. It had tried to squeeze through a crack in the sidewalk and failed."

Back in 2003 Mayor Bloomberg declared: "Our administration has zero tolerance for rats. And I've got one message today, `City to rats: Drop Dead.'" But there are still rats running rampant, even in this city's pizza trucks... even at Peter Luger. So maybe the focus should be on dead rats — they're just easier to capture — especially if someone were to create a dead rat map.

No one likes bedbugs—except maybe bedbug exterminators who make bank for (hopefully) getting rid of the bedbugs—and it turns out, shocker of all shockers, that potential buyers don't like them either! The NY Times' real estate section has a big article on the effects of bedbugs on deals and opens with an example of an "elegant two-bedroom co-op in an Upper East Side prewar building had drifted on the market for nine months by the time the first-time buyers laid eyes on it this spring." The buyers loved it, especially when they could get it for $50,000 less at $625,000. But then, in their "due diligence" phase, their lawyer said, "The [co-op board] minutes referenced multiple attempts to exterminate bedbugs in the building." Oh, crap.

His pet store closed up shop at the end of October, and now it looks like Bansky only paid for one month of wall time for his rat murals that prequeled its opening. The one that went up last month on the corner of Howard and Broadway is now available for future advertisers (or street artists looking for a nice blank canvas)!

From a reader: "This past Friday when riding the subway (G train), the woman next to me jumped up and started screaming.Turned out it was a roach that was on her leg that caused her to do so. This morning on her way to work, my girlfriend was on a jam packed L train only to have everyone start screaming between 1st & 3rd avenues. A rat was on this train and caused quite a panic! Has anyone else been seen an influx in pests on trains as of late or is this just a strange coincidence that this is the first time I'm experiencing this? Thanks!" We've only seen rats on the tracks or in the platforms, and we'd like to keep it that way. Related: This Metropolitan Diary about a rat's unwelcome subway car appearance.

The second Banksy mural to go up in the past week is now complete (the first one was done over the weekend). As you can see, he added some text to the subtext, saying "Let them eat crack." Any bets on where the next rat will pop up?

Following a new Banksy piece going up over the weekend, another one is taking form right now! This one is at the corner of Howard and Broadway, and the guys putting it up look like the same ones (with the same equipment) from Colossal Media who did the previous piece. While it's still unclear if Banksy is paying for these, or getting paid for them...there's clearly there's a rat theme going on here.

While it's not as scary as a dozens of rats running around a fast food restaurant, seeing a rat at your local Duane Reade can be alarming. WABC 7's Eyewitness News thought so when they spotted a rat at the Broadway and West 94th Street location. The Health Department is on the way to investigate, but an employee reportedly told WABC 7 "the rat entered from the street when a customer opened the door."

A look at some noteworthy television this week: Mr. Warmth: The Don Rickles Project (Sunday, 8:00 p.m., HBO) A look at America's favorite insult comic and last surviving member of the “Rat Pack”, the octogenarian Don Rickles from director John Landis. Everyone from Chris Rock to Bob Newhart to Clint Eastwood to Sidney Poitier talk about the comic. 1968 (Sunday, 9:00 p.m., History Channel) 1968 was a turbulent and tragic year and Tom Brokaw not...

An appellate court ruled this week that a 71-year-old woman could remain in the West Village apartment she shares with her two cats, despite a no-pets clause in her lease. Siiri Marvits has lived in the same apartment for 43 years and has had her two cats Athena and Apollo for more than ten years. The Daily News reports that according to the New York City Law Journal, a landlord must begin eviction proceedings within...

The New York Sun is reporting that the operator of the midtown Japanese restaurant Naniwa has been arrested for trying to bribe a city health inspector in order to avoid a summons. Kazuo Mitsuya allegedly tried to slip the inspector $200 to make the restaurant’s violations just go away. Presumably offended by the low sum offered, the inspector got on the horn with the Department of Investigations, who sent in an undercover officer posing as...

Forget the new JJ Abrams film about a fictional monster attacking New York...the Mulberry Street monster is a real-life city menace: the rat! Many rats actually, like more rats than they have at Peter Luger and Da Silvano's...combined! The movie, which came out last year, is summarized as follows: "a deadly infection breaks out in Manhattan, causing humans to devolve into blood-thirsty rat creatures. Six recently evicted tenants must survive the night and protect their...

City Councilman Simcha Felder's proposed legislation to fine people $1,000 for feeding pigeons has struck a nerve. Felder and other elected officials claim that pigeons' poop is harmful to New Yorkers and, therefore, various ways to limit pigeons' eating and procreating should be explored. But some pigeon lovers are unhappy with the level of vitriol directed at the city's unofficial bird. Hence the video from Animaniacs, "Goodfeathers" (it's 10 minutes, so settle in to...

The elements that have made City Hall Park so attractive to New York's humans have also made the area hospitable to the city's rodent population--so much so that the park has become overrun with rats, who don't seem to mind people company as much as people mind rat company. Regardless of the time of day or the number of people congregating there, rats--lots and lots of them--have made City Hall park their home. The New...

The Writers Guild strike continued into its second day today; in L.A. Jay Leno delivered donuts to strikers on his motorcycle, while here in New York Seth Meyers joined the picket line and the giant rat outside Silvercup Studios in Long Island City (30 Rock and Gossip Girl are among the productions filmed there). The Saturday Night Live star and head writer had this to say:TV is completely changing, the way people are watching...

As health-code inspections in bars and restaurants continue apace in the wake of The Great Rat Rodeo of Aught Seven, strange, unheard of violations are coming to light: a bartender at Red Hook’s Moonshine bar was recently cited for “having bare-hand contact with one slice of ready-to-eat lime while placing on top of beer bottle for patron in bar.” In other words, every time you see your bartender poke a wedge of lime into your...

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a pedestrian struck on 11th Ave. and West 43rd St. in Manhattan, a shooting on 21st St. in Queens, and a shooting on Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn. Veteran political reporter Gabe Pressman weighs in on the wave of mortgage foreclosures sweeping New York and finds overwhelming evidence of racism. A privately funded program to encourage lower income and minority students to take Advanced Placement courses will pay cash for...

The MTA has announced the times of public hearings where the agency will discuss the impending bus and subway fare hike. There are eight meetings across the five boroughs, Westchester, and Long Island. We've all heard about the two kinds of fare hikes - a traditional across-the-board hike and another hike that would give discounts during off-peak rides. The a single ride would be $2.25, up from the current $2. And the early mentioned off-peak fare was $1.50, but now the Daily News finds that the off-peak fare might be higher at $1.75.

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a carjacking at Tompkins and School Rds. on Staten Island, a person was killed by a 5 train at Bowling Green station in Manhattan, and an armed robbery at 51st Ave. and Northern Blvd. in Queens. Bidding closed at $2,600 for the new owner of the Seinfeld ASSMAN license plate prop on eBay. Another Mister Softee driver was busted for selling drugs out of his ice cream truck, this...

Reuters is reporting that today New York was named "the U.S. city most vulnerable to a rat attack as warmer weather and aging infrastructure fuels rodent populations across the United States." At least we don't have to worry about earthquakes (yet)?

Some readers have wondered why people are tuning into Gossip Girl on Wednesday nights at 9PM, not only because the CW repeats its shows later on. The other 9PM television draw is Kitchen Nightmares on Fox. The show is the American version of chef Gordon Ramsay's British show named Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares.

After over eight years of relentless touring and quiet musical evolution, Austin-based indie-rockers Okkervil River broke out in 2004 with Black Sheep Boy, a captivating album fueled in no small part by front-man Will Sheff’s lacerating vocals and careening compositions that thrillingly threatened to fall apart at every turn. But on the band’s latest release, The Stage Names, Sheff finds a different source of musical propulsion with a more subdued approach; the lacerations are often eschewed for a gentler sort of lyrical storytelling. This slight change in tack has perhaps alienated some in the fan message board camp, but other newer listeners have found the band more accessible. And more significantly, Sheff has firmly demonstrated his determination to let the band musically meander any way they like. Gothamist recently spoke to Sheff via telephone from California, where Okkervil River is once again on a tour that rolls through Webster Hall on Friday. (Tickets.)

Vynl, 507 Columbus AvenueOn three separate nights cameras caught the critters feasting "on scraps that were left on the dirty kitchen floor and climbing over crates of glassware" at Da Silvano's (pictured top left). The owner there said the problem was caused by nearby construction and recent renovations and claimed he will be throwing out everything edible in the restaurant and starting fresh. Ah, not even the celeb hot spots can escape the wrath of roaches and rodents.

From 1910 until 1963, when New York actually had a Pennsylvania Station instead of a dingy 1960s subterranean rat warren beneath a hockey rink and office towers, twenty-two stone eagles stood guard over the McKim, Mead, and White masterpiece. The eagles themselves, along with almost all the other stone artwork on the station were the work of artist Adolph A. Weinman, who among other things created Civic Fame atop the Municipal Building and the Walking Liberty half dollar coin.

Submitted for your consideration: menu choice #93 at Carluccio’s Italian Hero Shop in Bensonhurst, the Joey Fatone: “This hero is really N SYNC”- Bologna, pepperoni, yellow American cheese & mustard. $8.00

• Over 120 waiters from Sparks Steakhouse, both current and past employees, have been permitted to join a class-action lawsuit in federal court over money alleged to have been deducted illegally from tips. The plaintiffs' lawyer classified it as "the largest class-action ever against a restaurant." [NY Post]
• Pete Wells chimes in on the lobster roll legal battle between Rebecca Charles and Ed McFarland, and focuses for a moment on the fiduciary duty aspect of the claim rather than the intellectual property issues: "In legalese, a 'fiduciary duty' is like a kind of loyalty that you owe somebody who places their trust in you. You’re not supposed to put your own interests above theirs. . . . Ms. Charles’s lawyers are arguing that as sous chef of Pearl Oyster Bar, Mr. McFarland had a fiduciary duty to the restaurant." [NYT Diner's Journal]
• A former executive from Cipriani got sent back to the slammer yesterday for filing false insurance claims. He had previously served time for tax evasion and racketeering. [NY Daily News]
• The sushi spreadsheet has been updated for 2007! [Snack]
• And food-lovers are going crazy for Ratatouille, Pixar's latest animated blockbuster, featuring a rat (modelled after the likes of the French Laundry's Thomas Keller) who dreams of being a chef. [NY Daily News]
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(directed by Brad Bird)