Posts Tagged ‘Brooklyn’

We were swamped at work and I didn’t get a chance to catch my breath until well into the afternoon. Even if I hadn’t forgotten my lunch at home, I wouldn’t have been able to eat until 4:00 at the earliest. But by then I had gone beyond hunger. Ever been there? When you wait so long to eat that you no longer feel like eating? It’s like your hunger fed on itself until it disappeared.

So I decided that I wouldn’t run out and get something awful in the area (the deli around the corner makes a semi-competent egg sandwich; the owner of the deli two doors down is still mad at me because I refused to comp him a doctor’s appointment; the Chinese buffet next door makes Panda Express look like Shun Lee; the Burger King next door is a Burger King). Instead, I’d wait until we closed at 9:00, hightail it to Zito’s Sandwich Shoppe on 7th Avenue (in Brooklyn, not Manhattan) and get my new most favoritest sandwich ever: The 8-Hour Slow-Cooked Pork Bracciole.

It’s a butterflied loin of pork (from Faicco’s!) stuffed with provolone, garlic, parsley and a pinch of bread crumbs, covered in their deceptively simple tomato sauce, and sprinkled with parmigianno reggiano — all served on a perfect hero (from Brooklyn’s own Il Fornaretto Bakery!). It’s absolutely amazing.

Zito’s closes at 10:00, but I called them at around 8:00 and asked when they stopped taking orders. “10:00 p.m.” Perfect. If I left work at 9:00, I’d be between the Carroll Street station and the 4th Avenue and Ninth Street station (which is an area that gets great cell reception as it isn’t in a tunnel) by 9:45. I’d call in my order and arrive at Zito’s by 10:00 at the absolute latest.

I wasn’t hungry until around 8:30, but from the moment I devised my plan I could only think of that sandwich and how good it would taste when I ate it with my face.

A patient arrived at 8:15, so I started tidying and closing down what I could. He was on his way by 8:50 and I considered calling in my order and telling them that I’d be there in an hour. “Nah,” I thought. “No need. My plan is foolproof.”

Cut to 9:30, when we actually locked up.

I calmly walked to the R train, frantically doing math problems in my head (what if I get off the train just before 10 and call in the order and then get back on the train — would that work?). I didn’t see myself getting a sandwich. So I started considering the places near Zito’s that would still be open. Mediocre pizza, horrendous Mexican, Dunkin’ Donuts, Rite Aid… nothing really tickled my fancy. Then I heard the R train coming. I raced down the stairs and then raced up the other stairs (I hate you, Cortland Street station) and made it onto the Brooklyn-bound R. I looked at my watch phone. It was 9:35.

“Hmmm… I could get to Jay Street by 9:48… if there’s an F train there by 9:53, my plan will still work!”

I maneuvered through the train so that I was standing exactly where the entrance to the escalator at Jay Street would soon be. When we arrived at the station, I hurriedly climbed the escalator (it’s like walking fast on an airport treadmill except not fun and it makes me wheeze). In all the time I’ve made this commute, there has never been an F train waiting for me at Jay Street. Tonight, there was. At the doors closed as soon as I started down the steps toward it. A crazy person was loudly trying to seduce a morbidly obese station agent as she pretended to sweep the floor. It offered me no succor. I would arrive home sandwichless.

An F came about 10 minutes later. When we were finally out of the tunnel, I called Zito’s. It was 10:02.

“Zito’s, how can I help you?”

“He wants to help me!” I thought. “A place that wasn’t taking orders wouldn’t offer me assistance!” I tried to hide my giddyness from the dead-in-the-eyes commuters surrounding me. “Are you still taking orders?” I asked.

“Sorry, no. We’re no longer taking delivery orders. We stop at 10. Have a good night.”

***

But… but… what of his offer of help? What did he expect me to ask for that he would have been able to aid me with? “Would it be possible for me to not order a sandwich?” I was gutted. But then I had another thought. They aren’t taking delivery orders, but what of pick-ups? What of pick-ups? We were back underground, but I started to feverishly imagine various scenarios wherein I exit the subway and call and ask to make a pick-up order and am told, “Sure thing!” or that I arrive just as they’re about to throw away a pile of unclaimed but perfectly OK sandwiches or that I appeal to the kindness of Zito and he smiles and nods and hands me the sandwich that he had been saving for me all along.

[Full Disclosure: I don't think anyone who works at Zito's is named Zito.]

I started walking towards the shop and saw their sign was still illuminated. “That’s a good sign,” I thought. Then I thought about what a horrible pun that was and winced. I crossed the street and approached their door. As I did, I noticed people sitting and eating. Then, as I was about to reach for the knob (and feign surprise when I found it locked), someone opened it to take out the trash. I saw my opportunity and seized it.

The first employee who saw me wasn’t any of the three guys behind the counter. They all had their backs turned to me and were dealing with various closing duties. No, the one who immediately took notice of me was one of the cooks. He had a slight note of “you’ve got to be kidding me” on his face. I smiled weakly at him and waited by the register. Finally, someone turned around and asked if he could help me.

“Can I get a sandwich to go?”

He looked at the cook, then at his register, then at me — all while wearing a mask of “please notice that I am trying to make it clear that you cannot.”

I would accept a “no,” but he would have to say it to me. I wouldn’t say it to myself. At this point I was getting deliriously hungry.

“…OK,” he surrendered. The cook rolled his eyes. I didn’t care.

I sat down to wait. I could hear various people saying, “I told him not to take out the trash yet” and “lock the damn door” and “we’re supposed to be closed by now” and “what is wrong with him?” I went from fearing that I cost someone their job to wondering if the last remark was directed at me to not caring about anything except bracciole. In fact, I started imaging the man getting killed by his co-workers for unknowingly letting me in and, at his peasant funeral, a rockslide wiping his entire family out. I imagined everyone at Zito’s pointing and laughing at me for being so pathetic that I needed to swindle my way into a meal. None of it mattered to me. I just wanted my dinner.

After what seemed like two minutes (but might have been three), I was handed my sandwich. I profusely thanked the man who handed it to me. Then I profusely thanked the man who unlocked the door to let me out. I almost started to cry.

It took me another 25 minutes to get home, but I didn’t care. As soon as I walked in the front door, I washed my hands, ripped open the foil and paper casing and did unspeakable, inhuman things to my first real meal of the day (the semi-competent egg sandwich I ate at 8:00 a.m. doesn’t count).

You know what? This would be a terrible movie.

We closed early today, so I went to Target to see if I could find Teresa a nice treat. Memo to self: NEVER DO THAT AGAIN (especially on December 24th but also, ever).

So I went down 5th Avenue (in Brooklyn, not Manhattan), got some Chinese take-out and have settled into bed for an old-school Christmas like I used to have when I was single:

(Teresa is at our friend’s Christmas party but the MTA and my job are not conducive to my raging in Williamsburg tonight)

I didn’t make a holiday wage at my not-in-a-Seattle-movie-theater job (which I actually enjoy), but other than that this song feels especially appropriate.

Also, I drank vodka all day and wound up naked in front of the patients.

Happy Holidays!

Demi Moore has decided to end her marriage to Ashton Kutcher after just six years. Everyone pretend to care and/or be surprised.

But that story only gets one page of follow-up. The real front-page story is on the bottom third of the cover — Occupy Wall Street “selfishly made life miserable yesterday for the working stiffs whose jobs they claim to be protecting.”

“But the demonstrations — part of the movement’s ‘Day of Action’ — ultimately failed to accomplish their goals of crippling the New York Stock Exchange and shutting down subway lines and the Brooklyn Bridge.” And those were their goals according to… who (besides this awful paper)?

“Even top NYPD brass weren’t afraid of mixing it up with the masses. NYPD Chief of Department Joseph Esposito, the city’s highest-ranking uniformed officer, went face to face with protesters near the Stock Exchange. At one point, Esposito held a demonstrator by the throat while he exchanged heated words with another.” I wish the Post provided a photo of this. Preferably one featuring Esposito’s boner.

“Rep. Michael Grimm has had it up to here with grime. ‘Buy a bar of soap, and head home,’ the freshman Republican from Staten Island snapped at the Occupy Wall Street crowd. He called the protesters a bunch of ‘lowlifes.’” Will Staten Island allow this putz to become a sophomore representative? Probably. Because they’re all a bunch of lowlifes.

(And if anyone from Staten Island takes offense at that, they should equally take offense to the man that represents them referring to the OWS protesters using the same derogatory term. They should, but they probably won’t. Because they’re a bunch of lowlifes.)

But my favorite piece is Hannah Rappleye, Ikimulisa Livingston and Jeane MacIntosh’s Ready riot cops whack back at OWS hooligans on page 8. It begins, “It was a blur of batons, beatings and blood.” I want to say that that’s the most offensive thing I’ve ever read in the Post but, sadly, it isn’t even close.

“‘I saw somebody kick the [barricade] — and all of a sudden, the police kicked in and cracked his head,’ a protester named Tim, 20, said after witnessing a Zuccotti Park confrontation that left a comrade bleeding profusely before he was hauled off to a police van. ‘They were stepping on his face… They were hitting with batons. They bum-rushed him and slammed his head down,’ said the bystander. ‘One put his foot on the guy’s head.’”

His name is Brandon Watts. He was the first person to set up a tent (besides the medical tent) in Zuccotti Park. He is accused of grabbing the hat off of a police officer’s head.

(waves miniature American flag)

John Podhoretz’s Rally is really a tantrum by decry babies is a smarmy, condescending dismissal of everything about OWS. “Wall Street is no longer the issue, if it ever was. The protest remains a series of vague bleats against student debt and income inequality… Occupy Wall Street has come to play a role in this city not unlike the role an emotionally explosive child plays in a caring and concerned home.” I’m not sure who the caring and concerned home is in this metaphor. Is it New York City? America? Zuccotti Park? Capitalism?

“It is not purposeful. It is raw negative emotion. It is about itself. It accomplishes nothing. It is collective narcissism at its most unattractive. Just like Occupy Wall Street yesterday. Just like Occupy Wall Street for the past two months.” You could apply the first five sentences here to almost everything Podhoretz writes.

Geoff Earle’s Obama’s Asian sales trip is only six paragraphs long. Why so short? Because it discusses the “$25 billion worth of deals between US companies and Asian buyers” and how “the deals could support 127,000 jobs, with the Boeing deal alone producing 110,000 jobs in 43 states.”

Much more ink is devoted to Singer’s ‘bimbo’ limbo: Suit: Mgr. called me slutty! It tells the story of Annet Artani, a singer I have never heard of (and will never hear of again).

Remember when I told you you’d hear more about how Lord Tim Bell hates The Iron Lady (which he hasn’t seen) because “its only value is to make some money for [Meryl Streep]“? Well, Page Six (today on pages 14 and 15) reports that Streep “cut her fee on the film to $1 million and donated the proceeds to charity.”

Oops.

In today’s column, Thou can steal a bit, Cindy Adams would like you to make her feel better about her lack of scruples.

“Ever grab a newspaper and, lacking the correct change when the seller’s busy and it’s raining and you’re late and the train’s leaving, just cop a copy without plopping down the required amount? No?? Never???”

Cindy, there’s almost no way to justify buying the New York Post. Don’t try to justify stealing it.

The death of Natalie Wood is being looked at again by Los Angeles police. They say they have “new information.”

This should make the 28th anniversary edition of the Brainstorm DVD sell like hotcakes!

“A longtime assistant coach [Bernie Fine] of Syracuse University’s famed basketball program is under investigation for alleging [sic] sexually abusing a ball boy, police said yesterday.”

His defense? He just assumed that’s what ball boys were there for.

James Panero’s A Boring Blasphemy: B’klyn Museum’s shock schlock begins, “Why wait for Black Friday to begin the tedious ‘War on Christmas’? The Brooklyn Museum has already begun the annual attack on Christian sensibilities in the name of free speech with its ‘controversial’ exhibition, ‘Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture.’”

Even the people who make up the War on Christmas find it tedious! Bonus Points: James includes a full-color photo from the “controversial” piece (even he can’t call it that without putting it in quotes) — of ants crawling on a crucified Jesus Christ.

Why do you hate Christianity so much, James?

The editorial Loud, But Lame is a retread of John Podhoretz’s immature poo-pooing of yesterday protests.

“As apocalyptic acts of public protests go, yesterday’s Occupy Wall Street act-out was a bit of a piffle… There was an effort to disrupt subway service. Didn’t happen. And there were to be acts of ‘massive’ civil disobedience at Foley Square and the Brooklyn Bridge. Didn’t happen, either.”

1) There was no effort to disrupt subway service.

2) There were tens of thousands of people both at Foley Square and on the Brooklyn Bridge.

3) Only homosexual Europeans use the word “piffle.”

“There were nowhere near the ‘tens of thousands’ of demonstrators who were supposed to fan out across the five boroughs and convulse New York.” Yes, there were.

“Bottom line, though: It seems that Occupy Wall Street has passed its sell-by date — and even the Occupiers know it.” You’ve been saying that for over a month. You continue to be wrong.

Bill O’Reilly’s Media Remain Obama’s Ace is hilarious.

“So far in 2011, morning network correspondents have labeled Republican candidates as conservative 49 times. They’ve referred to Obama as a liberal only once.”

And how many times have those Republican candidates referred to themselves as conservatives? Hundreds? Thousands?

MOVIE REVIEWS!

Sara Stewart gives two stars to The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn — Part 1 (“everything’s all soap-operatic close-ups and weirdly political hand-wringing”).

Kyle Smith gives one star to Another Happy Day (“So the title is ironic. Thanks for that profound insight.”), one and a half stars to both Happy Feet Two (“It would be exaggerating only slightly to say this film stinks on ice.”) and Tyrannosaur (“sorry British art-house exploitation”), and two and a half stars to Garbo: The Spy (“fascinating”).

V.A. Musetto gives two stars to The Heir Apparent: Largo Winch (violence, sex, nudity) and three stars to both In Heaven, Underground (preoccupation with death) and King of Devil’s Island (male nudity, violence).

Lou Lumenick gives two and a half stars to The Lie (“interesting low-budget adaptation of a T.C. Boyle short story”) and two stars to Rid of Me (“mumblecore-ish, horror-tinged romantic drama”).

Paul Schwartz wrote a full-page article about how the New York Giants’ Justin Tuck is underperforming. I will now give you ten seconds to come up with Paul’s headline.

Eight seconds left.

Five seconds left.

Two more seconds.

Pencils down.

The correct answer is… JUSTIN ‘SUCK’

But you all guessed that, right?

Linda 3Starsi reviews the PBS documentary American Masters: Woody Allen (or, as she calls it, Woody Allen: American Masters). She gives it…

…three stars.

And that’s… last Friday.

I’m really going to have to re-think how I write this blog.

Happy Saturday!

Ashton Kutcher claims he hadn’t heard about the Joe Paterno/Jerry Sandusky when he tweeted “How do you fire Jo Pa? #insult #noclass as a hawkeye fan I find it in poor taste.”

Fun Fact: Paterno never coached the Hawkeyes.

The front page also includes a tweet from Eric Stangel in response to Kutcher’s: “All due respect, you’re a fucking idiot.”

Fun Fact: Eric Stangel didn’t write that tweet. Ohio resident Josh Hara did.

This is a terrible newspaper.

Kutcher has since turned over his Twitter account to his production company. “Up until today, I have posted virtually every one of my tweets on my own, but clearly the platform has become too big to be managed by a single individual… It seems that today that [sic] twitter [sic] has grown into a mass publishing platform, where ones [sic] tweets quickly become news that is broadcast around the world and misinformation becomes volatile fodder for critics,” he wrote on his blog.

Demi Moore is a very lucky woman.

Occupy Wall Street gets coverage on most of page 3. Not the movement as a whole, mind you. Just “two booze-swilling grifters” who have allegedly “raked in as much as $200 a day at the Occupy Wall Street protest” in Zuccotti Park by claiming to be diabetic and in need of money for juice.

All day, all week, write about unimportant and distracting things!

All day, all week, write about unimportant and distracting things!

Billy Crystal will host the Oscars this year.

When will the Academy stop pandering to the youth demographic?

“An off-duty Brooklyn police officer was busted for driving drunk near Green-Wood Cemetery yesterday, cops said. Scherson Lotin, 33, was arrested after he got into an accident on 37th Street at about 12:15 p.m.”

He has been suspended for 30 days.

How about a zero tolerance policy for law-enforcement officials who break the law? Especially if their criminal behavior could result in the deaths of innocents. Please?

“An East Harlem cop [Maribel Soriano] is under investigation for allegedly posting online grisly photos of an apparent suicide victim and videos of suspects handcuffed to chairs.”

At least she didn’t pepper-spray anyone. That I know of.

“A remorseful Bronx woman [Angela Barksdale, 48] will spend the next 15 years in jail after pleading guilty yesterday to the February 2009 beating death of her 4-year-old grandson [Kevion Shand] because he had soiled his clothes.”

Angela has now replaced Avon as the most despicable person — fictional or real — with the last name Barksdale.

Page Six is on pages 14 and 15 today.

Cindy Adams’ column is all about bagels today. She concludes it by saying, “Although a bagel midweek is frowned upon, at the very instant I’m writing this, I am pleating one — with lettuce, tomato and mayo — into my mouth.”

Fun Fact: Today is Friday. Which means that she writes her column days (if not weeks) in advance.

Steve Cuozzo’s op-ed Mike is blowing it: No leadership among Zuccotti mess complains about all of the business being lost by places like Milk Street Cafe because of the barricades the NYPD put up around them.

Fun Fact: The barricades were removed many days ago and Milk Street Cafe’s owner (Marc Epstein) recently told the Post that business is booming again.

Otherwise, great op-ed, Steve.

Bill O’Reilly’s latest column begins, “The cult of celebrity has reached a new low. No, I’m not talking about Kim Kardashian making millions from her wedding and then dumping the groom less than three months later. We could have predicted that. What is even worse is that one of the late John Lennon’s body parts has sold for more than $31,000 at an auction.”

That someone bought one of John Lennon’s teeth is lower than Kim Kardashian’s fake wedding? Really, Bill?

“I just hope the Occupy Wall Street people don’t hear about this. They’re already down on capitalism, and the tooth transaction will not likely change their opinion.”

1) No, they aren’t.

2) You hope they don’t hear about it because it won’t change their opinion?

3) Shut up, Bill.

Garett Sloane (aka Garrett Sloane aka Garret Sloane) reports that, under the terms of a new settlement with the Federal Trade Commission, “Facebook will need the express consent of users before changing their account settings, and users would have to opt-in to changes that affect their privacy settings.”

That’s all well and good, but how do I get rid of that annoying ticker?

MOVIE REVIEWS!

Lou Lumenick gives zero stars to Jack and Jill (“[directed by Dennis Dugan] with all the skill of a blind parking lot attendant”), and three and a half stars to Melancholia (“one of the year’s most emotionally resonant art movies”).

Kyle Smith gives two stars to Immortals (“notable for its repetitive violence”), three and a half stars to Into the Abyss (“it does not escape being tendentious”), three stars to both London Boulevard (“vicious, spirited gangster drama”) and The Love We Make (“the documentary, arriving far too late, [doesn't] have much new to say about 9/11″), and zero stars to A Novel Romance (“Ick to the utmost. Squared.”).

V.A. Musetto gives two stars to The Conquest (mature themes) and three stars to Elite Squad: The Enemy Within (profanity, unrelenting violence).

Sara Stewart gives one and a half stars to The Greening of Whitney Brown (“our heroine is awfully shrill”).

“Shock jock Howard Stern is in active negotiations to replace buzzer-master Piers Morgan on NBC’s top-rated variety show, America’s Got Talent, The Post has learned.”

Maybe now that farting prostitute will finally get her shot at stardom!

The color-coded TV listings have once again been published in black and white.

That’s Friday.

More to come…

Last night I worked a 13½-hour shift and went right to sleep when I got home. Now I am (and have a) super behind. Additionally, the F train is not stopping at our station this weekend, so getting to and from tonight’s show will be even more time-consuming than usual. But I will try to get through as much of these horrible newspapers as I can over the next two days, starting with…

I’m not sure who came up with the follow-up headline HE JUST CAIN’T REMEMBER HER: Herman says no way he harassed No. 4, but Kate Sheehy, Geoff Earle and S.A. Miller’s piece informs us that Cain remained defiant (at yesterday’s press conference) “even though he acknowledged that ‘there will probably be others’ coming forward to accuse him, fueled by his political enemies.”

The article also features not only what might be my favorite sentence about Herman Cain of all time (“Cain acknowledged that there’s a ‘remote’ possibility that his memory could just be failing him, but he doubted it.”), but also my new favorite Herman Cain quote (“Sexual harassment is a very serious charge. Yes, I have seen instances… and if I saw it… I dealt with it immediately. [But] it’s not just men who harass women. I also have seen situations where women sexually harass men.”).

Cain’s explanation of the alleged sexual harassment that accuser #4 (Karen Kraushaar, 55) is accusing him of is a close second (“One day in my office at the NRA, I was standing next to Ms. Kraushaar, and I gestured… [and said], ‘You’re the same height as my wife,’ because my wife came up to my chin.’”).

And, in the last four paragraphs of the 41-paragraph article, we learn about Donna Donella, 40, of Arlington, Virginia. (aka Accuser #5).

Kate Sheehy also tells us about two women (one of whom Andrea Peyser recently cited anonymously) who have come forward to discredit Sharon Bialek — Chicagoan Amy Jacobson, who allegedly saw Bialek talking to Cain last month at a Tea Party rally (“It sort of looked flirtatious.”), and Mandrea’s source, Anna Alexander, 64, of Queens (“I got a phone call [from Bialek] one day. I thought she was calling to wish me happy birthday. She was sobbing and crying that she was going to lose her apartment. She said, ‘Please help me out’… She said, ‘I will give it to you when I have it. In the meantime, go on welfare.’”).

The Post is treating the allegations leveled by these two women against Bialek as far more credible than the allegations being made by the two three four five women against Cain.

Correction

“The Post incorrectly reported that bettors pumped $15 million into the slot machines and electronic table games [at the Aqueduct racino]. The correct figure was $177.85 million.”

I had really high hopes for MTA finally gets it: ‘Patience’ wears thin, until I read it. It isn’t about the MTA making the trains run more frequently — it’s about how the end of their announcements have been changed from “Please be patient” to “Thank you for your patience.”

“‘How patient can I be?’ griped Deborah Draughton, 47, of Queens. Considering that her regular route — the problem-plagued F line — recently underwent substantial construction, she pointed out, ‘We’re already patient as it is.’” Actually, the substantial construction starts on Monday. Good try, though, Julia Marsh and Jennifer Fermino.

“Joshua Echevarria, 19, a Brooklyn subway rider, noticed the change on the M train recently. He shrugged it off. ‘At the end of the day, “we apologize, sorry for the inconvenience” doesn’t make a difference,’ he said. ‘If we’re late, we’re late.’” Amen, brother.

Candy Spelling, widow of Aaron and mother of Tori, won $90,000 in a single slot machine pull in Las Vegas. Three years ago, she won a $180,000 slots jackpot. The year before, she won a $200,000 slots jackpot. She also won a Toyota Prius in a charity raffle in 2007.

“She recently sold her 123-bedroom Los Angeles mansion for the bargain-basement price of about $85 million. That was reportedly $65 million below her original asking price.”

She’s very wealthy, even if you don’t count all of the money she made as singer/songwriter Paul Williams.

Post Wire Services is credited with the eight-sentence Ohio union victory, about the state’s rejection yesterday of Gov. John Kasich’s recent anti-union law (Kasich, a Republican, isn’t mentioned anywhere in the article).

Sentence #2: “The legislation, which would have allowed the more than 350,000 workers to bargain on their wages, would have banned ther right to strike, and eliminated binding arbitration or promotions based solely on seniority.”

Sentence #5: “Labor and business interests poured more than $30 million total into yesterday’s referendum.”

Sentence #8: “Also in Mississippi, voters rejected a referendum asking that life be defined as beginning at conception.”

This is a terrible newspaper.

There’s a lot about Joe Paterno and Jerry Sandusky and Penn State, but the only thing I want to share with you from Tim Bontemps and Leonard Greene’s A tragic end of the ‘Lion’ as Penn State gets set to sack Coach Paterno is this: “The backlash against Paterno has been mounting like an aggressive pass rush ever since child sex-abuse charges were leveled last week against Sandusky.” See what they did there?

Mike Vaccaro’s Sad flicker from beacon of integrity is less flippant and more heartfelt (albeit mildly confusing). “But even for Joe Paterno, there is a difference between what is legal and what is right… Penn State is a marvelous university. It has clearly tried to do what is proper across the decades. But it is no more infallible in its own world than the Catholic Church is in its world. I was raised in a parish ransacked by a rogue priest; I was subjected to many days and nights of inappropriate behavior, spared the worst of it by a saying the nuns would drill into us: There but for the grace of God go I. Others were not so fortunate.”

So… Vaccaro knew there was a priest molesting his peers, but he wasn’t molested because the nuns said “there but for the grace of God go I” to him a lot? Am I missing something?

Vaccaro doesn’t mention what happened to that priest — or if he ever reported the sexual abuses that “others” were subjected to. But he does spend an entire page shaming the various Penn State officials for not reporting Sandusky’s actions.

In Cain’s ‘time’ bomb, Michael Goodwin writes, “Polls showing that Herman Cain hasn’t lost much support over allegations of sexual harassment remind of the story of the man who jumps off a 40-story building. As he passes the 20th floor on the way down, he’s heard saying, ‘So far, so good.’ Be patient. It takes time, as much as two weeks, for most events to work their way through the political bloodstream. Ordinary voters don’t pay rapt attention to the daily drip of campaign drama the way pros and pundits do… Herman Cain, despite the denials, is about to hit bottom.”

Let’s see where Cain is in the polls on November 23rd.

Page Six (today on pages 12, 13 and 14) reports that Jennifer Aniston now has an “incredible bosom” and is probably pregnant (by Justin Theroux). But she recently told Hello! that “she was neither engaged nor pregnant. She explained: ‘It’s just I quit smoking, so I’ve gained a couple of pounds.’” Congratulations to Jennifer for whichever part(s) of that story isn’t a lie.

And in Oscars fire Ratner, Page Six reports that “director Brett Ratner was last night dramatically fired as producer of the Oscars after making bizarre remarks including, ‘Rehearsal is for fags.’” Five sentences later: “The Academy said in a statement: ‘[Ratner] did the right thing for the Academy [by resigning].’” I guess Oscars fire Ratner by accepting his resignation was too long for headline.

Finally, Elliott Gould talked about his friendship with Groucho Marx after a recent screening of California Split. “I once changed a light bulb over his bed, and he told me, ‘That’s the best performance I’ve ever seen you give.’ I said, ‘Well, that’s the best review I ever got.’” Neither man was kidding.

Cindy Adams writes, “Although Leonardo da Vinci passed away weeks ago, he’s returning. Coming is a film about his youth.” I wonder if Cindy will play herself.

B’also? “Question: A lifesaving paramedic makes $30,000 a year. A slam-dunk basketballer earns $20 mil. What’s wrong with this picture?” That you’re still alive?

B’also’also? “Murray Kellman sent [this query]: ‘Why drive on a parkway and park on a driveway?’” And Steven Wright’s attorney is sending him a cease-and-desist letter.

Heavy D (real name: Dwight Arrington Myers) passed away at the age of 44.

He will be remembered and then missed.

“The Obama administration cautiously offered up more areas in the Gulf of Mexico and off Alaska’s coast to oil and gas drilling yesterday. But the proposal didn’t go far enough to satisfy Republicans.”

Really? That’s so weird.

“A hulking, beer-guzzling rugby jock suffered a stroke in a freak training accident — and woke up gay. Chris Birch was a straight, 266-pound Welsh bank worker who liked sports, girls and booze and was engaged to his girlfriend before the lifestyle-changing event. Now he’s a 154-pound hairdresser who bleaches his tresses and lives with his 19-year-old boyfriend above his salon.”

Before:

After:

Fabulous.

Jennifer Fermino’s DA: No spit, Sherlock! claims, “Law enforcement is mulling a plan to use DNA samples to prosecute expectorating hotheads who hock loogies on transit workers.” I guess I’d better stop.

“From the beginning of the year through October, 145 bus and subway workers were spit on, officials said.” Maybe a better (and cheaper) way to make the number of (alleged) salivacides go down is to not award the (alleged) victims six months of paid leave (or to not give people numerous valid reasons to spit on MTA workers).

Over on page 32, you’ll find Kate Sheehy’s tiny article A win for BamCare.

“The conservative-leaning US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia upheld a lower-court ruling that defended President Obama’s universal-health-care package as constitutional, despite the fact that the law will force all Americans to buy insurance or pay a penalty… A lawsuit brought by Pat Robertson’s American Center for Law and Justice contends not only that Americans should not be forced to buy health insurance, but also that Obamacare [sic] discriminates against those whose religious beliefs are anti-medicine.”

I’d forgotten how stupid Pat Robertson’s followers are.

Danny Gold’s Thief nailed at Zuccotti reports that “a raging lunatic” was caught stealing money from “a plumber who was taking up a collection for himself and 9/11 first responders” who knocked him unconsciousness. “When he regained consciousness, cops escorted him several blocks away but did not arrest him. Several protesters said the man has been harassing them for days.”

And people wonder why the Occupy Wall Street protesters don’t report more crimes to the NYPD.

(but only really stupid people)

John Podhoretz spends most of A Pack of Scandal Addicts: Media’s insane Cain obsession reprimanding the media for spending so much time on the sexual-harassment allegations against Herman Cain (as Bart Simpson once said, “The ironing is delicious.”). He also explains Twitter: “You can’t underestimate the attraction of Twitter to people like me who’ll always wonder whether we should have tried stand-up comedy earlier in our careers. A Tweet [sic] is basically a one-liner. ‘Take my wife — please’ was a Tweet [sic] half a century before Twitter’s creators were even born.”

John? I recommend trying stand-up much later in your career. Much, much later.

“Now you can add bigoted comments to the list of challenges facing Carsten Kengeter, the head of UBS’s investment banking operation… At the dinner with banking heads of several divisions inside the embattled bank, held to discuss strategy and rally the troops, Kengeter, 44, implored the bankers to make a more concerted effort to streamline the firm and likened the strategy to slashing expenses like a ‘Jewish shopkeeper.’”

Fun Fact: Kengeter was born in Germany, as were negative Jewish stereotypes.

MOVIE REVIEW!

Lou Lumenick gives three and a half stars to J. Edgar (“Clint and Leo ‘a dress’ the rumors in fascinating biopic”).

In honor of Kim Kardashian and Kim Kardashian’s ex-husband’s 72-day marriage, Michael Riedel writes about Ethel Merman and Ernest Borgnine’s 38-day marriage. Borgnine claims that during their honeymoon in the Far East, Merman “was furious that, while everyone recognized [Borgnine], nobody knew her. She had her revenge by refusing to give him some of her Kaopectate when he had diarrhea.”

“In Merman’s memoir, there’s a chapter titled ‘My Marriage to Ernest Borgnine.’ It’s followed by a blank page.”

But they looked so happy together!

“Dancing With the Stars host Tom Bergeron believes the dance show ought to pare back its schedule to one season per year from two.”

I think that’s a good start.

“Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, the stars of TLC’s popular 19 Kids and Counting, are expecting one more bundle of joy.”

In all seriousness, someone needs to solder that woman’s vagina closed.

And that’s Wednesday.

And now, I’m off to wait for the bus I have to take to get to the bus I have to take to get to the train to Manhattan.

I hate the MTA.

The Post continues to besmirch every aspect of Occupy Wall Street. ZUCCOTTI PARK’S BIG TOP: Gals-only structure set up to guard against pervs perfectly illustrates the damned-if-they-do-and-damned-if-they-don’t position the Post has put OWS in. First they claim the protesters allow sexual assaults in the park, then they mock them for doing something about it.

“Some of the male OWS protesters remained in denial over the growing number of sex attacks. ‘Sexual harassment gets called rape, and it’s not,’ one scoffed when told of the women’s tent. ‘There’s no way that it’s happening as much as people are saying it has. It’s just word spreading and getting misunderstood.’”

How come when a protester says that sexual harassment gets exaggerated he’s scoffing, but when Herman Cain says it he’s heroically fighting against a racist, liberal media smear campaign?

“Yesterday, former Mayor 9iu11ani said President Obama must take responsibility for the ‘very dangerous’ OWS movement. ‘Barack Obama owns the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ movement; it would not have happened but for his class warfare, 9iu11ani told the conservative Americans for Prosperity Foundation summit in DC.”

In case you forgot, the AFP was founded by the Koch Brothers. And they are two of the only Americans that the foundation wants to make more prosperous.

Other OWS articles include Todd Venezia’s $kinning fat cat Moore, which begins, “Gasbag Michael Moore went ballistic yesterday after a reporter asked him if he was really among the hated richest ‘1 percent’ of Americans during an Occupy Denver event.” That reporter is Evrod Cassimy. Here’s a photo:

Sexy.

“Moore had just finished railing against greedy rich people to a group of Occupy Denver protesters — while also showing some corporate-style synergy during his Denver visit by holding a signing to promote his new book, according to CBS.”

You know who else is currently on a book-signing tour?

Rebecca Harshbarger and Helen Freund’s Camper’s Mac attack reports that “a Zuccotti Park protester threw a violent fit in a McDonald’s yesterday after employees refused to give him free food. Fisika Bezabeh, 27, ripped a credit-card reader from a counter and threw it at workers at about 2:30 a.m. at the Mickey D’s at 160 Broadway, a bathroom spot for protesters.”

I like how a homeless person goes crazy in a McDonald’s near Zuccotti Park and he’s automatically an OWS protester.

Don’t forget to do nothing while your phones and computers set themselves back an hour for Daylight Savings Time.

“Mayor Bloomberg spent more campaign funds in 2011 than any candidate in New York — and he’s not even running for office.”

Yet.

“A United Express pilot convicted of flying while drunk will serve six months in prison.”

Maybe if the consequences were more dire, there wouldn’t be so many pilots flying drunk?

“A Bronx man [Karriem Barrow] was convicted yesterday in White Plains federal court of robbing a Bronx restaurant and seven suburban banks at the beginning of last year.”

He now faces… “a minimum of 200 years in prison.”

But when banks steal money from us, they don’t even get charged.

“ABC/Washington Post poll taken after the Herman Cain scandal broke shows he’s jumped 7 points among GOP voters in the past month.”

What else can he do to boost his support? He’s already said he’d force victims of rape and/or incest to carry their babies to term, he’s against homosexuals doing pretty much anything… maybe he can murder an illegal immigrant with his bare hands?

“‘I have attracted a little attention,’ [Cain] joke, in a defiant speech in Washington to a Tea Party-affiliated group Americans for Prosperity… Cain went on to pitch his 9-9-9 tax plan and called for an ‘attitude adjustment’ at the Environmental Protection Agency, drawing a big response from the crowd.”

Of course! Bashing the EPA! That ought to help him widen his lead.

According to Page Six (today on page 10), Lindsay Lohan “crashed the party for Leonardo DiCaprio’s movie J. Edgar‘ and made such a scene she made A-list attendees uncomfortable’… Lohan has to turn herself in to jail by Wednesday to serve a 30-day sentence. But this didn’t stop her from turning up at the Hollywood Roosevelt with her hair and makeup still done up from her earlier Playboy shoot.”

I’m really going to miss her.

Former Gov. Jesse Ventura has vowed that he’ll “never stand for the national anthem again” and will “spend more time in his beloved Mexico” after a judge ruled that his airport-security lawsuit (which he filed against the government, alleging that airport scans and patdowns constitute unreasonable search and seizure) should have been filed in appeals court.

Ventura “said he has not decided whether to continue pressing the suit.”

My, what strong convictions you have, Jesse.

Todd Venezia writes today’s Weird BUT true sidebar. He tells the story of Rickie La Touche, who was recently convicted of killing his wife — because she smashed his collection of Star Wars action figures. Sadly, Todd got his name wrong (it isn’t “Rickie La-Touche”).

There’s also the story of a man in Alabama (Montigo Arrington) who updated his Facebook status to “Has any 1 else eva thought bout strappin a bomb on n walk n a police department n blowin da [expletive deleted] up?” Arrington was on probation at the time, so the police went to his home and discovered a stash of kiddie porn. Todd almost makes a joke in the first sentence of this three-sentence piece: “Here’s a good way to turn to Facebook status to ‘jailed.’” Todd’s really good at his job.

Bonus Points: I found a picture of Montigo:

And ladies? He’s single…

Daniel Freedman’s Patron Devil of ‘Occupy’ is all about Guy Fawkes. It even includes a photo of OWS protesters wearing Guy Fawkes masks. Oddly, there’s a word that doesn’t appear anywhere in the entire half-page op-ed: Anonymous.

Is it possible that Freedman forgot that Anonymous popularized the use of the Guy Fawkes masks long before OWS started? But why would he forget? I know of no reason why the hacker group’s fashion should ever be forgot.

Happy Guy Fawkes’ Day!

Brooklyn’s George Najarian writes in about Kim Kardashian divorce from whoever she was married to (Kris something?). “When I heard about the impending divorce, I became so upset that I ran into my kitchen and stuck my head into the oven. I even lost a bet with a friend when I said the marriage wouldn’t last longer than two weeks.” I love it when sarcasm contradicts itself.

But Sydney, Australia’s Jane Wallace sides with Kim (and loose women in general). “My grandmother used to say that men came good at Christmas and went bad at Easter. Christmas to Easter is about 72 days. Now Kardashian lives by my grandmother’s old wives’ tale. She was married for 72 days and now wants a divorce. That’s long enough to put up with any man. Why should any woman waste herself on just one man per year when she could have four men per year?” Um… love?

Bill O’Reilly’s The Measure of Experience claims that “a new Quinnipiac survey [asked]: ‘Does the fact that Herman Cain never served in public office make you more likely to vote for him for president, less likely to vote for him for president, or doesn’t it make a difference?’ Well, 43 percent said it doesn’t make a difference, 41 percent would be less likely to vote for Cain, and just 14 percent would be more likely to support him. The takeaway from this poll is that close to 60 percent of Americans don’t believe any political experience is necessary in order to run the country.”

Actually, Bill, 14% of the respondents said Cain’s lack of experience makes them more likely to vote for him, 43% said his lack of experience doesn’t affect their intention to vote (or not vote) for him, and 41% said his lack of experience would make them less likely to vote for him. The true takeaway from this poll, then, is that you aren’t very good at interpreting poll results.

Linda 3Starsi reviews Lifetime’s The Pastor’s Wife.

She gives it…

…three stars.

And that’s Saturday.

More to come…

The two pages of follow-up (GOONS OCCUPY BRAWL STREET) tell the story of a “deranged homeless man” going “on a violent, early-morning rampage yesterday.”

“The only thing that could stop Jeremy Clinch from his Godzilla-like rampage was a left hook delivered by a paranoid fellow protester who claimed to be an ex-Turkish diplomat — and charged that his assailant was carrying out a plot hatched by Mayor Bloomberg.”

“It was just the type of increasingly violent incident that has downtown residents — already bombarded by megaphones, incessant drumming, graffiti and public urination — feeling on edge as the OWS takeover of Zuccotti Park enters its third month.”

Isn’t it amazing that Kevin Fasick (or KEVINFASICK as the byline reads) was there at just the right time to videotape the fight (it’s on the Post’s Web site)? Saki Knafo thinks not. Read his rebuttal here.

Todd Venezia, Danny Gold and Carl Campanile join forces to write Mama’s boys on the rise, which begins, “Forget about ‘Go west, young man’ — today the battle cry for the younger generation is ‘Move back in with Mama!’”

“The epidemic of mama’s boys has struck both New York City and the country as a whole, as the terrible economy and massive unemployment have forced grown men back into their childhood bedrooms.”

I blame gay marriage.

Andy Soltis finally gets around to reporting on Occupy Oakland — can you guess what he focuses on? The headline offers a strong hint: Pressure cooker pops in Oakland. It begins, “More than 80 Occupy Oakland protesters were arrested yesterday after a peaceful rally turned into a violent postmidnight [sic] clash between police and masked, fire-setting, concrete-tossing vandals.”

“Hundreds of police officers flooded the area, two blocks from an Occupy encampment and fired tear-gas and deafening ‘flash bang’ grenades.”

The 16th paragraph (of 19): “Police were almost invisible during most of Wednesday as crowds of up to 7,000 people marched and rallied in what was described as a general strike.”

Thanks for the condescending acknowledgement, Andy!

Kevin Fasick is back (with Bob Fredericks) for more anti-OWS fun on page 7 with SACHS AND SEX ADD TO INSANITY.

“It’s gone from simple chaos to sheer madness. The violence and depravity continued to mount at the Occupy Wall Street protest yesterday, as cops busted 16 people for blocking the entrance to Goldman Sachs and an Alabama woman came forward to report another sick sex attack at Zuccotti Park.”

If you are a woman who say someone sexually harassed you in Zuccotti Park, the Post will champion you. But if you say you were sexually harassed by Herman Cain, you’re a liar and proof that liberals are racists.

Speaking of which…

“[Cain's chief of staff Mark] Block said he wants to ‘move on’ with the campaign, adding, ‘Let’s get over these things that don’t mean anything to the American public.”

“Cain kept up his defiant stance yesterday in a Daily Caller interview with Ginni Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. ‘That is the DC culture: guilty until proven innocent,’ Cain vented.”

Cain, who says he refuses to play the race card (despite insisting that all opposition to his 9-9-9 plan and all accusations of sexual harassment are based in racism), decided to sit down for an interview with the wife of Clarence Thomas — who called his confirmation hearings “a high-tech lynching for uppity Blacks.” Let’s watch Thomas say that in an ad for Herman Cain (who refuses to play the race card):

91-year-old Coney Island Bialys and Bagels was going to go out of business, but it was saved by… “Muslim businessmen Peerzada Shah and Zafaryab Ali.”

Muslims? Running a kosher bagelry? Now I’ve seen everything!

“LA Dr. Gregg Homer has conjured up a new procedure that uses a laser to permanently change brown eyes into blue ones — and has even started testing on human subjects.”

He said he got the idea from Josef Mengele.

“A brave Brooklyn woman stared down the man who allegedly raped her, as the alleged attacker, acting as his own lawyer, sat in court at his rape trial yesterday. Adam Wright is charged with raping the woman in the elevator room on the roof of her Canarsie apartment building in 2002 — when she was 12 years old… The woman testified for the prosecution yesterday and is expected to face Wright’s cross-examination today.”

There ought to be a law against that.

“Country singer Keith Urban said yesterday he’ll undergo throat surgery to remove a polyp on his vocal chords.”

That’s what he’s telling people but, really, he just needs a break from constantly denying that his wife’s plastic surgery is horrible.

According to Page Six (today on pages 14 and 15), “Richie Sambora last night confirmed that he and Denise Richards have rekindled their romance.”

I wish them both the best during the next two to four months.

Today, Cindy Adams complains about holidays and hotels.

“Why’s a hanger clamped in? Who ever stole a hanger? That’s like locking a toilet. You know anyone ever stole a piece of poop?” Die.

“I’m hearing more holidays may be coming down: In 1930, Herbert Hoover stubbed his toe, shouted ‘Dam’ and they built one. Shouldn’t that be remembered? People ran for tickets when Powerball lottery hit more than $200 mil, although winning chances were 80 million-to-1. Same odds as Jennifer Lopez giving birth to Richard Simmons’ love child. Shouldn’t such a moment be enshrined?”

Four people are credited with GIVING UP THE ‘BIEBY’: ‘Justin’ vixen mulled adoption. They could have really used a fifth.

“‘She didn’t know if she was going to keep him,’ Samra Fae Stepper told The Post at her Fredericksburg, Va., home… ‘We kept asking about the father, but I didn’t press it,’ said Stepper, whose brother Anthony Simeonoff is Yeater’s stepdad.”

Fascinating.

There’s yet still more OWS-bashing from Rich Lowry on page 31 (It’ll Only Get Uglier: ‘Occupy’ primed for violence).

“It’s become clear during the past few weeks that there is a lawlessness at the heart of Occupy Wall Street. It has created little ungoverned spaces in cities around the country, into which homeless people, addicts and criminals have flowed.”

“Mere protests probably won’t satisfy the movement, though. It is a self-styled ‘occupation,’ which inherently involves taking what is not yours. It’s already ugly and will probably get more so.”

Actually, the movement is about taking back what was stolen from us. But we’ve established that you only write about current events — you rarely understand them.

And the rest of page 31 is devoted to Charles C.W. Cooke’s In New York, the Enablers Wake Up.

“There’s increasing concern that the authorities have made a rod for their own backs. ‘Are we seriously suggesting that if a jihadist or neo-Nazi group moved in, they’d have been indulged like this?’ one [community] board member asked pointedly.”

Occupy Wall Street ≠ jihadists. Occupy Wall Street ≠ neo-Nazis. And what the Hell does “made a rod for their own backs” mean?

The editorial Call the Cops, Mike is also about “the very real possibility that even greater OWS violence… will soon bubble up here.” But the Post offers a completely rational solution: “Send in the NYPD to lance the Zuccotti Park boil. Before it’s too late.”

Don’t mince words. Tell us how you really feel, terrible newspaper.

Manhattan’s Vivian Riffelmacher writes, “It’s time to send in the troops to clear out Tiananmen Square — I mean Zuccotti Park. We believe in freedom of speech and all that stuff, but protesters should never be such a nuisance.”

Um… Vivian? If Zuccotti Park is Tiananmen Square, does that mean the NYPD are anti-democracy?

Crude oil is back up to $94.07/barrel.

MOVIE REVIEWS!

Kyle Smith gives three and a half stars to Tower Heist (“cunningly engineered”), three stars to Killing Bono (“a charming admixture [sic] of Goodfellas and Almost Famous“), and two and a half stars to Pianomania (“an enticing but flawed character study”).

Lou Lumenick gives one star to The Son of No One (“a laughable police melodrama… ineptly written and directed”), and three stars to both A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas (“there are moments of brilliance”) and The Last Rites of Joe May (“Dennis Farina gives one of the best performances of the year”).

V.A. Musetto gives two stars to Young Goethe in Love (sex, violence) and three stars to Charlotte Rampling: The Look (nudity).

Linda 3Starsi reviews Logo’s Bad Sex.

She gives it…

…three stars.

And that’s Friday.

This shirt is being sold in Walmart. In children’s sizes.

It says “NOTHING SAYS ‘I love you’ QUITE LIKE FISTING.”

And while it is technically true, I still think it’s inappropriate for children.

“Time’s up: The Zuccotti Park vagabonds have had their say — and trashed lower Manhattan — for long enough. They need to go. Be it voluntarily — by packing their tents and heading off in an orderly fashion. Or by having the NYPD step in — and evict them… But go they must: Their lease on Zuccotti Park has expired. And it’s their own fault. What began as a credible protest against bank bailouts, crony capitalism and the like has, in large measure, been hijacked by crazies and criminals.”

1) When did the Post ever refer to Occupy Wall Street as a credible protest? From the start, this terrible newspaper has ridiculed the protesters as dirty, stupid and/or wealthy Brooklynites (“trustifarians”) who think they’re being cool and/or alleviating the guilt they have for being wealthy.

2) The Post still hasn’t mentioned the numerous reports of the NYPD directing crazies and criminals to Zuccotti Park.

“No one has greater respect for the First Amendment than this paper.”

“And we certainly respect the right of Brookfield Properties, owner of the park, to permit the protests. But there comes a time when enough is enough… Sure, we understand the pressure the company’s been under — including, most shamefully, from cynical New York pols looking to cozy up to the heavily out-of-towner-based group, local radicals, and their manipulators in the labor unions seeking to capitalize on the ‘occupation.’”

“Brookfield wasn’t speaking yesterday. But surely, it wants the nightmare to end — even if it’s too frightened to say so.”

I like that the Post feels they can (surely) speak for Brookfield Properties.

B’also, am I right in thinking that the Post wouldn’t mind the protesters as much if they weren’t out-of-towners? If they were born-and-raised New Yorkers?

“Added the mayor, ‘Other people have rights, too, and I am very concerned about the other peoples’ rights, as well as those of the protesters.’ Spot on.”

Spot on? I can guarantee you that the person who wrote that wasn’t born anywhere in America, let alone New York.

“If they choose not to leave — which they probably won’t — then Bloomberg needs to instruct the NYPD to clean the mess up. Today wouldn’t be a day too soon.”

And that’s just the cover story. Pages 4 and 5 feature OTHER 99% FIRES BACK: Raging shop owners claim OWS scares away customers. In it, a jeweler blames the fact that his October sales in 2010 were double what they were this year entirely on OWS. It also contains this: “[Mayor Bloomberg] ordered cops to clear hundreds of metal barriers from Wall and Broad streets, and bluntly told the motley masses that their unruly antics were making life miserable for the people who live and work in the neighborhood. This isn’t an occupation of Wall Street. It’s an occupation of a growing, vibrant residential neighborhood in lower Manhattan, and it’s really hurting small businesses and families,’ Bloomberg fumed.”

I work across the street from Zuccotti Park. It is not a residential neighborhood.

“The complaints came a day after Marc Epstein, owner of the Milk Street Cafe on Wall Street, revealed that he was forced to lay off 21 workers after his business had plunged 30 percent since the protest began Sept. 17. After the barricades were removed, Epstein saw a ray of hope. ‘We’re so busy here — we haven’t been as busy as this in seven weeks,’ he said.”

But… but… the protesters are still in Zuccotti Park! How is it possible that Epstein’s business… unless… maybe the barricades that the NYPD put up were the real reason his business was down?

Bonus Points: Occupy Oakland — and the general strike they called for and got — gets the final sentence of the article — all nine words of it. “In Oakland, demonstrators shut down the city’s busy port.” Now that’s good journalism!

(this picture ran in The New York Times, who actually did some reporting on the strike)

“Tonye Iketubosin, 26, of Crown Heights, Brooklyn — who’s been working at the [OWS] protesters’ makeshift kitchen at Zuccotti Park since last month — was charged yesterday with sexual abuse in the groping an [sic] 18-year-old protester in the tent he helped her pitch on Oct. 24… The [victim] told cops about the pervy protester Tuesday night, telling officials she knew the man by sight… [Iketubosin] was apprehended soon afterward.”

But this must be the exception to the rule, as the Post continues to claim that the protesters refuse to tell the police about criminal activity in the park.

“Federal airport screeners find four or five handguns in people’s luggage every day, the head of the Transportation Security Administration revealed yesterday.”

Since we all know that the TSA finds only a fraction of the weapons people try to smuggle on planes, this makes me sad and afraid.

Fun Fact: The head of the TSA is… John Pistole.

Remember Lana Rosas? Maybe you remember her as Lana Rosa (the Post has a real problem with getting people’s names right)? She was punched by Oscar Fuller –over a parking spot on East 14th Street — so hard that she collapsed onto the pavement.

“The blow to the back of Rosas’ head caused so much swelling, doctors needed to remove a piece of skull from her forehead to relieve the pressure, according to testimony.”

The Post ran this photo of Rosas today:

And here’s the caption: “Lana Rosas, outside court yesterday, wears a helmet because part of her skull is being stored in her abdomen while she awaits reconstructive surgery.”

As for Mr. Fuller, his attorney announced yesterday that he is no loner pleading self-defense. “Instead, he will argue in closings slated for tomorrow that Fuller couldn’t have foreseen that his single punch would cause such a serious injury.”

Good luck with that, Oscar.

Pages 8 and 9 contain three stories. Each story is accompanied by SKANK #1, SKANK #2 or SKANK #3 in giant type.

SKANK #1 is Lindsay Lohan. ‘Jailed’ star nixed by nuns explains that Lindsay was sentenced to 30 days in jail yesterday and that nuns refused to let her perform her community service at their shelter (the Good Shepherd Center for Homeless Women) because they thought “she would be a bad example” t0 the women they serve.

Ha.

After her 30 days in jail (which I doubt will last more than 3 days), she’ll do another 424 hours of community service at the Los Angeles morgue. Well, she’ll be ordered to do it anyway.

SKANK #2 is Kim Kardashian. Kim’s ex: Gimme the rock reports that Kris Humphries wants the $2,000,000 engagement ring he gave to her back.

I don’t care either, but here are some things about the article that made me laugh:

1) The Post thought that most people wouldn’t know who the headline referred to if they went with Kris: Gimme the rock.

2) “‘It’d be the classy thing to return it, but she wouldn’t be out of form not [giving it back],’ said Daniel Post Senning, great-great-grandson of etiquette guru Emily Post.” I like to think that if Emily Post was still alive and the Post called her to comment on any aspect of Kim Kardashian’s wedding, she would yell “Eat a dick!” into the telephone and hang up.

3) “Kardashian said she didn’t want to undergo marriage counseling because ‘you have to listen to your intuition, and follow your heart.’” Also, E! passed on Kim & Kris: In Counselin’!

SKANK #3 is Mariah Yeater. BIEBER’S BABY BIMBO BLABBING reports that Yeater wants $12,000/month in child support from Justin Bieber. Candace Amos and Dan Mangan also report that Bieber’s reps called Yeater’s claims “‘malicious, defamatory and demonstrably false.’ [Bieber's] fanatical follower, meanwhile, used much more colorful language on Twitter.” He only has one follower on Twitter?

“As it turns out, because Bieber was — and remains — younger than California’s age of consent, Yeater’s claim of having sex with him when he was just 16 and she was 19 leaves her open to prosecution for statutory rape.” Don’t worry. After the DNA test, the DA will have no case against her.

Bonus Points: I looked in Google Images under “skank new york post” hoping to find the graphic they used for the “SKANK” headers. This was the first image that came up:

Page Six (today on pages 10 and 11) reports that Christine Quinn told a story about her grandmother yesterday at an event. Her grandmother was a passenger on the Titanic when it crashed. “When the boat was going down, most of the Catholics dropped to their knees and prayed, but my grandmother ran for it. She was one of the few survivors. She spoke to a priest about her guilt over it. He told her not to worry, because God knew she had figured out that you could run and pray at the same time.”

I look forward to voting for her.

According to S.A. Miller’s Third ’strike’ for Cain: New accuser surfaces — as he blames Perry, a third woman has come forward to say that Herman Cain sexually harassed her in the 1990s. But Herman Cain still refuses to discuss the allegations.

“[Cain] snapped at reporters hounding him in Washington. ‘Don’t even bother asking me all of these other questions that you are all curious about,’ he warned. When questions persisted, he barked: ‘What did I say? Excuse me. Excuse me!… What part of ‘no’ don’t people understand?’”

That’s what she said (to him when he was sexually harassing her)!

Andrea Peyser describes Lindsay Lohan as the “walking, breathing, drinking, drugging, obscene human train wreck” and “the product of scumbag dad Michael and trailer-trash mom Dina.” She also discusses Lindsay’s “sad, little sister, the actress Ali, whose dramatic, recent weight loss can’t be helping her career, her health or her looks. Have a sandwich, Ali, and forget about yourself.”

She goes on to say that Sautner “hinted that she could throw Lindsay in the slammer for 270 days.” Another warning? Surely this one will scare Lindsay straight, right? Right?

But the highlight of her page is Cain we give it a rest, already? (see what she did there?)

“This is what Herman Cain is not accused of doing: 1. Touching someone uninvited. 2. Propositioning a lady not his wife. 3. Making raunchy jokes or, heck, telepathically broadcasting them.”

Two pages earlier, S.A. Miller wrote: “The new allegations closely resembled the others: That Cain made sexually suggestive comments or gestures while president of the National Restaurant Association.”

But back to Mandrea. “Question: What’s more threatening to liberal rule than a black, conservative Republican presidential front-runner? Answer: Candidate Barack Obama.” Didn’t you hear, Ms. Peyser? He’s President Barack Obama now.

Boy, if it turns out that Cain really did harass those women (or worse), I hope Peyser issues an apology. And that her husband stays away from unattended children.

Cindy Adams relays something her “friend” allegedly said.

“My mother-in-law cooked Thanksgiving last year. I actually said grace over grease. It was gross.”

Get in grave.

“An Alabama auto dealer has been forced to fork over $7.5 million for calling a rival’s business ‘Taliban Toyota.’ The slander judgment was spurred by workers at Bob Tyler Toyota telling customers that nearby Eastern Shore Toyota, owned by an Iranian immigrant, gave money to Islamic militants.”

I did a little more research (as this is all the Post has on the story) and in addition to accusing him of being a member of the Taliban, manager Fred Kenner accused the Iranian immigrant (Shawn Esfahani) of being an Iraqi.

$20 says he also refers to Obama as a Nazi.

George J. Marlin’s op-ed Hang Tough, Andrew begins: “The radical leftist Working Families Party is pushing the old hippies and young narcissists of Occupy Wall Street to champion one of its pet issues.” Marlin later explains that Gov. Cuomo “must answer John Kennedy’s ‘call to responsibility,’ defined in Profiles in Courage as choosing the right side of an issue over the popular side.”

Marlin is referring to the expiration of the Millionaires Surcharge Tax.

Marlin believes that ignoring the majority of his constituents and allowing millionaires to pay less in taxes — despite our state’s deficit growing beyond Cuomo’s predictions — would be courageous.

Yeah, that’d be right up there with ending segregation and allowing women to vote.

Frank J. Fleming asks “Are we too sissy for freedom anymore?”

The answer is “everyone should stop reading Frank J. Fleming.”

Linda 3Starsi reviews AMC’s Hell on Wheels.

“Hell on Wheels is not a perfect show — there are too many missteps.”

She gives it… three stars.

And that’s Thursday.

More to come…

1) Mariah Yeater, 20, has served Justin Bieber with a paternity suit in San Diego, “demanding that he take a DNA test. Yeater said she had sex with Bieber, now 17, after meeting him backstage at a Los Angeles concert last year, RadarOnline reported. Yeater was 19 when she allegedly hooked up with Bieber, who would have been 16 then… ‘He told me he wanted to make love to me and this was going to be his first time… After walking away from the other people backstage, Justin Bieber found a place where we could be alone — a bathroom,’ [Yeater] said, adding he refused to use a condom.”

I was going to make a joke about determining whether or not Yeater is carrying Bieber’s baby, baby, baby, oh, his baby, baby, baby, oh, but I decided it was too easy. Instead, here are a couple of photos of Yeater:

If you were Justin Bieber, is this who you’d want to lose your virginity to?

B’also? Can Mariah and Justin please go on Maury?

2) The Kim Kardashian story is about how her friends “yesterday launched a hardcore smear job on the reality-TV star’s hubby, New Jersey Net hoopster Kris Humphries, who had been recruited to play the glorified-extra role of groom in her made-for-TV wedding last month.” One of Kim’s “friends” told the Post that “[any establishment] who books [Humphries for endorsements or appearances] will be blacklisted [by Team Kardashian].”

How soon before Cindy Adams complains that there’s too much media coverage of the Kardashians? I’ll guess three days.

3) “The revolution has backfired. A heartbroken Shamil Cepada is one of 21 employees of a Wall Street cafe who just got laid off because business has bottomed out due to the ragtag Occupy Wall Street protesters.” Here’s the photo of owner/victim Marc Epstein sitting in his humble cafe that appears on page 7:

It’s such a shame that such a small cafe gets put out of business by Occupy Wall Street. Actually, I’m surprised that 21 people could work in such a tiny cafe. I’d love to know more about this place’s humble beginnings… oh, look. It’s an interview Epstein gave in June.

Waitaminute… this isn’t a small cafe! It’s a gigantic restaurant! Let’s take a tour!

So a giant restaurant (8,000 square feet for the restaurant, another 15,000 square feet for the kitchen) located at 40 Wall Street (aka The Trump Building) — almost four blocks away from Zuccotti Park — is blaming their financial difficulties solely on the OWS protesters? Really? It has nothing to do with their $10.50 soup? Or their $10.95 sandwiches? Or their $4.00 hot dogs? Or the $47.95 they charge for a dozen Sesame Chicken Satay skewers?

I guess it doesn’t. Otherwise the Post wouldn’t be able to use the follow-up headline REAL JOB KILLERS: Protesters force cafe layoffs as biz drops. Right?

By the way, every eatery around Zuccotti Park has been packed full every time I’ve been in the area. It has become a huge tourist draw.

B’also? Buried in the last paragraph of the 25-paragraph piece is this: “In another development, the protesters’ security team spotted a man suspected of sex assault in the encampment and notified cops. They took him into custody for questioning.” Does this mean the Post will apologize for yesterday’s editorial that insisted the protesters take pride in hiding crimes from the NYPD?

[SPOILER: No.]

“Herman Cain is turning past sexual-harassment allegations into a fund-raising bonanza, hauling in more than $250,000 Monday alone.”

Which shows you what kind of people support Cain. You know, the same ones who champion family values.

“The House yesterday cast a symbolic vote to reaffirm ‘In God We Trust’ as the US motto and encourage its placement in all public buildings and public schools.”

Jobs! Jobs! Jobs!

“The looming state budget deficit ‘appears to be getting worse,’ Gov. Cuomo warned yesterday… ‘It’s fair to say’ that state revenue collections have ’slowed down’ and the projected deficit for the state fiscal year that begins on April 1 will top the $2.4 billion his administration officially forecast, Cuomo said.”

Hey, I just had an idea! You know what would provide the city with a billion dollars? Extending the millionaires tax!

“A blind man miraculously survived a terrifying fall yesterday onto Brooklyn subway tracks by rolling beneath the platform and avoiding an oncoming train.”

I predict the MTA will pay him a settlement of… $2,000,000.

Jon Huntsman recently referred to Mitt Romney as a “perfectly lubricated weather vane.”

Jon Huntsman is the only sane GOP presidential candidate. Which is why he has no chance.

Page Six (today on pages 12, 13 and 14) ran this photo today:

They say it’s Lady Gaga. But is it? I don’t think it looks like her, but I also don’t pay much attention to her.

After that Amy Winehouse photo they ran (that wasn’t actually a photo of Amy Winehouse), I can’t trust anything in Page Six.

Cindy Adams says: “May this country shrivel at Kim and kin and the whole family of Karcrashians. She itches to make money and be famous — fine. But thumbing your nose and shaking your behind at a second go-round of marriage is horrendous.”

Judges?

The judges say that this isn’t a plea for America to stop talking about Kim and her kin and her family and her relatives. So my prediction that she’ll make that plea in two days might still come true.

Unless she dies painfully before then.

“A Republican lawmaker [Sen. Marty Golden] vowed yesterday to kill a proposal that would make it easier for New Yorkers to find a parking spot in their neighborhoods.”

“Two Brooklyn pols are pushing the idea in anticipation of the opening of the new Barclays Center, an 18,000-seat arena for the NBA Nets in Prospect Heights that will have just 1,100 parking spots.”

$20 says Marty Golden has a garage. And doesn’t live near the Barclays Center.

“French producers are planning to make a porn film about the scandal surrounding Dominique Strauss-Kahn and his alleged sexual assault of a New York maid.”

The working title is DXK and, surprisingly, Strauss-Kahn will not be playing himself.

But if they cast him as the maid, I’ll buy a copy.

Remember that sentence from yesterday’s paper that I told you to remember? Here it is again: “While unionized state workers are getting hit with three years of wage freezes, and Gov. Cuomo and his top aides are taking 5 percent wage hikes, state Senate Republicans are doling out pay hikes to most of their Capitol staffers, The Post has learned.” And here’s why I told you to remember it:

Correction

“Due to an editing error, yesterday’s edition of The Post incorrectly reported that Gov. Cuomo gave raises to his staff after he came into office, when, in fact, he reduced his salary and the pay of his top aides by 5 percent.”

Oops.

From the editorial Leadership at Zuccotti Park:

“OWSers (and the prospect of free food, drugs and sex) have lured all sorts of unsavory types, outright criminals included. Many clearly see the First Amendment as a license to break the law.” Surprisingly (I write sarcastically), the Post still hasn’t written about the allegations being made that the NYPD is sending mentally-unstable homeless people and criminals to Zuccotti Park.

If you are drinking anything, swallow it before you read the next sentence.

“No one is a greater defender of free speech than we are.”

I told you to swallow, Kevin!

Kurt Schlichter’s op-ed FACTS ARE OPTIONAL: How sex-harass suits work defends Herman Cain because, where sexual-harassment claims are concerned, “Facts are optional. Maybe Cain did harass some employees. But the dirty little secret among lawyers that defend business people from lawsuits — and among those lawyers who bring them — is that an enormous percentage of such claims are frivolous, if not flat-out lies.”

So… Cain might be guilty, but many of these claims are frivolous, so we shouldn’t treat him like he’s guilty. Even if he is.

“Where sexual-harassment law once protected women from being forced to be the playthings of crude lechers, it’s been transformed to enforcing a prim puritanism that drains the humor and humanity from the workplace.”

“Cain is damned if he does, and damned if he doesn’t — and the liberal media is going to damn well enjoy harassing him.”

No, he’s damned if he did. Especially after all of the denials he’s been issuing.

The Yankees re-signed Brian Cashman to a three-year contract and added a year (and a surprisingly small amount of money) to CC Sabathia’s current four-year contract.

Sadly, A.J. Burnett is still alive.

Linda 3Starsi reviews Bravo’s Top Chef: Texas. She gives it…

…three stars.

Bonus Points: Maxine Shen provides a sidebar to let people know what Top Chef’s past winners are up to. That’s where I learned that Season 2’s “Ilan Hall blends ethnic flavors at his Los Angeles restaurant, The Gorbals, where he’s currently working on a bacon-flavored pina colada.” Good luck with that, Ilan.

And that’s Wednesday.

I’m off to a rehearsal and I’m working tomorrow and Saturday, so updates will be terse for a couple of days. But I’ll catch up ASAP.

The weekend is almost here! Yay!

“District attorneys in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island have dismissed tips that cops in their areas are involved in the ticket-fixing scandal — despite The Bronx DA’s indictment of as many as 500 as many as 400 16 on felony charges. Politically, ‘no one wants to touch it,’ a source said.”

(from the follow-up on page 7) “The elected DAs also have to worry about the political fallout of declaring war on the NYPD in cop-friendly boroughs. ‘They don’t want to shoot themselves in the foot,’ said a law-enforcement source. ‘[Bronx DA Robert] Johnson shot himself in the foot. His already-abysmal conviction rate will get even lower.”

So the police plan on doing sloppier work — and letting more criminals go unpunished and/or purposely botch cases that are brought before a judge? Isn’t there a (great many) law(s) against doing that?

“Germany’s mountain of national debt has been declared $78 billion lower because of a bad calculation by a mortgage lender.”

Silly Germany. Don’t they know that debt is never the fault of the mortgage lenders? It’s those Spendocrats in Washington!

Yesterday’s 1.2 inches of snowfall from a “freak killer wintery storm” broke the New York record for October (since 1925, it was 0.8 inches). In the last 135 years, we’d had snow in October just four times (including yesterday).

“More than half a million were without power in New Jersey — including Gov. Chris Christie.”

Christie reportedly panicked and ate his family and house.

Tim Perone’s Herman surges in Iowa reports that “Herman Cain’s surprising climb to the top of the Republican presidential field continues as a significant new poll released last night has him leading the pack in the all-important state of Iowa.” The article also mentions Mitt Romney (who got 22% to Cain’s 23%), Michele Bachmann (who “embarrassingly fell 14 points from the August straw poll, which she won”) and Rick Perry (who “was in fifth place with 7 percent”).

Not mentioned? Ron Paul, who won two separate tallies for the National Federation of Republican Assemblies Presidential Straw Poll — one of them with 82% of the vote.

“A dozen Americans were among 17 people killed in a suicide bomb attack in Kabul yesterday that underscores Afghanistan’s instability as the United States and other nations withdraw troops.”

Actually, what the deaths underscore is that we aren’t withdrawing quickly enough.

Michael Goodwin complains that Hillary Clinton gloated and laughed about Moammar Khadafy’s death on a video, “saying, ‘We came, we saw, he died.’ Now imagine the outrage if a Republican behaved that way.’”

You mean like when Mike Huckabee said, “Welcome to Hell, bin Laden” after his death?

Or how the GOP’s most influential member (Rush Limbaugh) responded to Khadafy’s death (“Barry did it!  Barry did it again!  He killed another bad guy. Barry did it!  Now, Hillary is over there, and she might want to take credit for pulling the trigger, but Barry did it, folks.  Mubarak gone.  Ali Velshi or whatever of Tunisia gone, Bin Laden gone, Khadafy gone, Barry did it!  The Drive-Bys are having orgasms.  We’ve never had this competent a foreign policy president ever.  Why, this guy, Barry, has done what eight presidents starting with Nixon couldn’t do.  Reagan tried it. Nixon tried it.  Every president since Nixon tried to get rid of Khadafy, but Barry did it.”)?

Goodwin also has a lot to say about Occupy Wall Street (‘Lord of Flies’ in Zuccotti Park).

“Their invasion is costing downtown Manhattan businesses and residents a boatload of money. But watching the Occupy Wall Street vagabonds bang their heads against the laws of human nature — that’s priceless!”

“In fact, the problems the protesters face are almost enough for me to hope the police don’t break up the party. The Lord of the Flies descent from utopia to petty power struggles, in front of TV cameras, is a political-science lesson, not to mention deliciously ironic. Running a protest movement apparently involves a lot of dirty work and isn’t so much fun. Imagine how hard it is to run the world!” OK, so Goodwin is an asshole. We’ve known this for some time. But wait — it gets better.

“A radical group called the Alliance for Global Justice is legally sponsoring the protest… Its Web site says the group sponsors operations in the Gaza Strip, with Hamas, and boasts of an alliance with Anarchists Against the Wall, which contests Israel’s security barrier in the West Bank. The group suggests it has a relationship with Iran, supported the Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua and expresses solidarity with Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez against the United States.” So if you support OWS, the terrorists win.

“On the campaign trail, [Obama] often invokes the phrase ‘We can’t wait’ for Congress to act. The Global Justice site links to a group called The World Can’t Wait that has the latest information on the occupations. Hmmmm.” OMG! Obama is also a terrorist! And so is the band Nu Shooz!

Page Six is on pages 10 and 11 today.

“Cops in Indianapolis are searching for a guy who broke into a day-care center, found the children’s bathing suits, and tried on several before strolling through the building in a two-piece pink bikini.”

Andrea Peyser’s husband, Mark Phillips, has neither confirmed nor denied his guilt.

Fishermen found a three-eyed fish in a reservoir near a nuclear power plant in Cordoba, Argentina.

Not quite as adorable as The Simpsons led me to believe it would be.

Susannah Cahalan’s MEET THE WORST FAMILY ON EARTH: A glimpse inside the heartless, miserable, greedy and vain world of the Madoffs (also featured on today’s cover) features photos and bios of what we can only assume are the five worst Madoffs: Bernie, Ruth, Andrew, Mark and Stephanie.

And how is Stephanie heartless, miserable, greedy and/or vain?

“Mark Madoff’s second and last wife had met with a divorce lawyer and changed her last name — two things that made Mark even more despondent. Andrew blames Stephanie for ‘taking a bad situation and making it worse.’”

What a bitch.

Southern Peru was hit with a magnitude-6.9 earthquake yesterday.

Thus disproving global warming climate change.

Kate Hudson’s father Bill Hudson’s new book (Two Versions: The Other Side of Fame and Family) “portrays his ex-wife [Goldie Hawn] as a cocaine-sniffing sexpot who loved European men and referred to herself in the third person.”

That still doesn’t explain why Kate Hudson married that old hippie… or does it?

More Occupy Wall Street coverage on page 23!

ZUCCOTTI PERV: Fiend attacks protester in her tent reports that “A sex fiend barged into a woman’s tent and sexually assaulted her at around 6 a.m., said protesters, who chased him from the park. ‘Pervert! Pervert! Get the fuck out!’ said vigilante Occupiers, who never bothered to call the cops.”

A woman “who called herself Leslie, but refused to give her real name” (allegedly) told the Post that “weeks earlier another woman was raped. ‘We don’t tell anyone,’ she said. ‘We handle it internally. I said too much already.’” Sounds like she’s afraid of her fellow Occupiers.

Not mentioned in the Post is this:

Hey! Sam was right!

GET A GRIPE!: No matter how hard it tries, New York can’t outlaw being annoying is Kyle Smith’s latest smug and hateful attack on people who didn’t go to Yale and don’t believe what he does.

On his list of things the city should do to improve (his) life is to “cool it on the Christmas culture and dial back expectations so the kiddies won’t bleed us dry.” He’s waging a War on Christmas! Tell Mandrea and Bill O’Reilly!

B’also? Kyle doesn’t have any kids because he’s against gay adoption. So I’m not sure how he expects to get bled dry. Though I hope he does.

Today’s context-less Harris poll asks “Republican voters” the following: “If you were voting in a primary today, who would you vote for?”

Herman Cain placed 2nd with 20%, Mitt Romney placed 3rd with 17% and Rick Perry came in 4th with 11%. The other candidates all got single-digit support (Newt Gingrich — 7%, Ron Paul and Michele Bachmann — 4%, Rick Santorum and Jon Huntsman — 1%).

So who came in 1st with 32%? Not sure.

I wonder who his running mate will be.

From Peggy Noonan’s While Rep. Ryan rises: “Occupy Wall Street makes an economic critique that echoes the president’s, though more bluntly: the rich are bad, down with the elites. It’s all ad hoc, more poetry slam than platform. Too bad it’s not serious in it’s substance.”

She goes on to lavish praise on Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin). “I don’t think his role in the current has been fully recognized. He is doing something unique in national politics. He thinks. He studies. He reads. Then he comes forward to speak, calmly and at some length, about what he believes to be true.”

And what he believes to be true is what Ayn Rand believed to be true (before she collected Social Security and Medicare benefits). B’also? Ryan has his constituents arrested for asking him questions.

Brooklyn’s David Podesta writes in to object to Obama’s new college-loan plan. “I couldn’t pony up the money to put my own kids through college. I’ll be damned if I want to pay for someone else’s kids to be educated.”

USA! USA! USA!

Michael Riedel’s NIGHTMARE ON 39TH STREET includes a photo of the author “drenched in fear and an unknown liquid” and this: “I got drenched, and was forced to put my hand in places that gave me pause. I was also forced to put something in my mouth that you won’t find on the menu at Orso.”

He gives it four stars.

ASK ASHLEY!

Last weekend my soon-to-be ex-husband called asking for sex to see if there’s anything still there. I’ve moved on so my answer was no. Now he is threatening to stall the divorce. How do I get him to move along and also calm my current boyfriend who is aware of what’s going on? — Thrown for a loop, Manhattan

ASHLEY: “If someone wants to see if there is ‘anything still there,’ they shouldn’t jump right into sex, especially after being separated!”

ME: “Have sex with him and shit the bed in the middle of it.”

I eloped with my husband six years ago after knowing each other for three months. We faced a lot of judgment from our friends and family. We have now hit a rough spot in our marriage. We’re in counseling and it’s going well, but whenever I bring it up with a girlfriend of mine I get the same eye-rolling looks I got back then. She actually said, “That’s what happens when you marry a guy you don’t even know” in front of a group of people. We’ve been married six almost-always happy years. How do I let her know firmly but nicely that she’s being mean? — Anna, Park Slope

ASHLEY: “A friend should voice her opinion once, but then move on. Frankly, she is acting like a moron.”

ME: “By telling her. Frankly, you are acting like a moron.”

And that’s Sunday.

More to come…