SFist saw Christmas Day turn tragic after a Siberian tiger escaped from her pen at the San Francisco Zoo, killing a visitor and mauling two others. Phillyist counted down the top ten items on Philadelphia's New Year's wish list. Gothamist looked at the wooden bikes being offered for NYC's first bike share program on Governors Island. LAist received a Christmas present in the form of a drunk Santa Claus in a g-string. Bostonist launched......

One of the most famous editorials of all time appeared in September 21, 1897 issue of the The NY Sun. Ten-year-old Virginia O'Hanlon's letter asking, "Is there a Santa Claus" was published with a response by editor Francis Pharcellus Church that now appears reprinted in newspapers year after year (though many times with one paragraph - the third to last - deleted). The video above has veteran newsman Gabe Pressman of WNBC reading the......

Have some extra cash to spend around the holiday season? Even the littlest bit can go a long way in the over 80 year old Operation Santa program. Every year letters pile up at the James A. Farley Post Office from (mostly needy) kids writing to Santa Claus (read one of them here). Their wish lists don't make it to the North Pole, but with New Yorkers pitching in every year, it's as if they......

Perhaps it was the near-freezing temperatures at yesterday's Jets-Browns game that kept breasts covered, but that weather didn't stop crowds from flocking to Gate D at Giants Stadium for a halftime ritual - men yelling at women to expose their breasts and throwing bottles or spitting at them if they don't. Despite an attempt to shut down rowdy fan behavior at Gate D, things didn't seem to change that much at all since new procedures......

'Tis the season...not only for typical holiday shopping, but for auctions as well (the auction season kicked off earlier this month when a Matisse sold for over $33M). So what's the ultimate gift this year? If you missed out on the $18.5M Faberge egg, how about the Norman Rockwell painting of Santa Claus? The painting, titled Extra Good Boys and Girls, is expected to take in between $2.5 and $3.5 million, according to Christie's New......

An update about the Tuesday-night incident where a reckless 19-year-old driver hit a bicyclist in Staten Island: The Staten Island Advance reports that Leon Wilson was high on painkillers while driving. And his past driving experience was so terrible that his learner's permit had been revoked in January. Yet somehow, he was behind the wheel of a rental car on Tuesday night, crashing into 47-year-old Juan-Han Guan, who had been biking home. Guan, who was......

If you ever thought that military spending was ill-advised, think again. NORAD, the North American Aerospace Defense Command is tracking Santa with the NORAD Tracks Santa 2006 website. There's a live map of Santa's whereabouts, as well as videos at some places he stops. And how do they do this?Detecting Santa all starts with the NORAD radar system called the North Warning System. This powerful radar system has 47 installations strung across the northern......

Happy Holidays! Chances are, you're reading this the day after Christmas, back at your day job after all-too-short a holiday, and the last thing you want from us is stuff about the holidays. But that's just too bad. Because, see, here in the Ist-A-Verse, we do things ahead of time. It might be December 26 for you, but that's what you get for not checking your Favorite Local Blog on Christmas Eve. Austinist is......

A look at some noteworthy programs this week: The Investigators: Riker’s Island (CourtTV , Monday, 8 p.m.) CourtTV’s law enforcement documentary series takes a look at Rikers The Year Without a Santa Claus (WNBC 4, Monday, 9 p.m.) A new version of some Christmas cheese from NBC. If anyone cares Santa decides to take a year off and the elves have to cope. Sounds like hard hitting drama. Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole......

THEATER: The Gershwin Hotel hosts a reading of History of Man, “an irreverent look at the past, the fear of aging and the meaning of plastic surgery.” It’s the second collaboration between award-winning director Esther Bell, whose feature films Exist and Godass (starring TV on the Radio’s Tunde Adebimpe) made a big splash, and Bruce Mason, who describes himself as a “freelance publicist/consultant/drifter.” (The Times dubbed him a “swarthy Noel Coward”.) - John Del Signore......

On Saturday afternoon, Jose Sanchez and his fiance Sonia Lopez took their baby son to see Santa Claus at Macy's. Later that evening, Sanchez was crossing Conduit Avenue in East New York when a speeding car struck and killed him. The driver, Rudolph Daniels of Cleveland, was arrested and charged with manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, and driving without insurance; Daniels's license was already suspended in New York. The Post reports that he was driving "at......

After the display of a Santa Claus holding a decapitated doll's head in front of his East 18th Street townhouse, it's not surprising to think of Joel Krupnik as a wacky and/or eccentric neighbor. However, chasing a 13 year-old girl and attacking her with dog poo that her Chihuahua left in front of his house is pretty much going into new territory in terms of bad neighbors. The Post reports that the 13 year-old's 4......

It might be hard to get to a theatre in time to see any of these picks, but here goes. Even with our fairly averse attitude toward holiday-specific performances, it’s hard not to notice that the current crop of shows is pretty heavy on the fractured fairytale side of things. Except for kids, there’s almost no straightforward telling of a Christmas- (or other holiday) related story. We’re not complaining, but it does make it harder......

This past weekend, the city's main post office, the James A. Farley branch started its annual Operation Santa program. The post office receives thousands of letters to Santa from needy children, and people can pick up a letter (or two or ten) and give gifts to the children. You can get letters one of two ways: (1) Go to the Farley Post Office (8th Avenue at 33rd Street) in person to pick from the letters......

Anyone who has ever worked in a bar will tell you that Thanksgiving is one of their busiest days of the year- what they don't tell you is that the day, like Black Friday, also begins the Christmas drinking. We thought that there was no better place to start drowning the sorrows that sing Christmas carols than at a bar so festooned with tinsel and lights, it actually makes us wonder if they are hiding......

Strong winds caused the M &M's balloon in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade to hit a street lamp whose light fell onto two spectators. The light, at 43rd Street and Times Square, dropped 30 feet onto a pair of sisters - and as you can see in the photo of the light, those suckers are big. The NY Times reports that 11 year old Sarah Chamberlain "had a chipped tooth and was cut in......

The first, and very possibly best, advice we got when we returned to the Big City after our self-imposed exile to the Midwest was twofold: "Don't take taxicabs and don't pay ATM fees." Not taking taxis wasn't such a hard trick to pull (we love our unlimited metrocard) but not paying ATM fees proved more difficult. Oftentimes when we need cash our bank is nowhere near where we are (damn you Citibank!). That's why we......

The Metrocard is dispensable in ways that the MTA probably never guessed. In fact, the subways seem to be the transport of choice for suspected sex attacker, Peter Braunstein, who has been dodging the police for the past two weeks. The NY Post says that the NYPD has been able to track Braunstein's whereabouts because he purchased an unlimited Metrocard with his credit card, putting him at West Fourth Street and near Richmond Hill on......

Gothamist loved loved LOVED the City section article about the teacher's cat who answers sixth graders' questions at MS 391, a specialized school known as Tapco, the Theater Arts Production Company, in the Bronx. Not only can kids write to Sophia the cat for love advice or to say that their teacher (and Sophia's owner) Craig Roberts shouldn't use their slang ("Please tell him to stay in his age group"), but they get class visits......

Doug Williams, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man...

Sure, all the news is obsessed with how well Black Friday shopping was, but Gothamist was more interested in a twist on Christmas shopping madness. The pepper spray incident at Toys R Us at Times Square on Saturday, which forced an evacuation of the store. Luckily, it seems that pepper spray only causes a "rotten egg" smell, burning in the throats, and coughing, so everyone was all right, but the store was closed for a......

This article is both logical and perverse. CNN.com - Teens, sex, and the 'Santa Claus effect' - Dec. 24, 2002......