Late night open thread

We'd like to extend greetings to those still stuck in traffic on the New Jersey Turnpike this evening. 4 hour 50 mile drives happen.

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

A Memorial Day open thread

Leave well wishes or your thoughts on Memorial Day and what it means to you.

Late night open thread

Getting a jump on Memorial Day. Here's something FOR our vets to put a smile on their faces.


Time for Jersey City, After Dark

If we told you an inebriated guy fell off a balcony in Chelsea last night and had a post impaled in his head, you'd think the worst

Johnny sure thought the worst in reading the headline in today's NY Daily News. Nicholas Blossom somehow fell off a third floor balcony, and when he landed it was on a fence posting of some kind, impaled in his head. Yes, that's pretty grim.

Firefighters had to cut the metal post driven into Blossom's melon and took the entire frightening scene to the hospital with him, still sticking out of his head.

Here's where the unbelievable part comes in, thankfully Blossom (and Nicholas if you'd like to contact us and give us a play by play and an update on your recovery, please email Johnny, we'd love to tell your story in this) is today listed in stable condition.

No way did Johnny expect to see the condition listed as stable when he read the headline in the Daily News himself. Good news, we think.

Law & Order leaves NYC, did you know just how many jobs that show created?

According to the New York Times the teevee phenomenon employed thousands of people over time. It was like some kind of floating jobs package moving all over Manhattan. Yes, thousands.

Interesting article on the social impact the show has had along with just how storylines got chosen back when the show started back in 1990. 1990 was a high water mark for murders in NYC, news stories and reporters were asking if the city itself wasn't dying. The show Law & Order, over time the article said the show helped allay fears of the viewing public and thus change perception of the depth of the city's troubles.

Very interesting read on reality vs perception.

Late night open thread

"At some point during almost every romantic comedy, the female lead suddenly trips and falls, stumbling helplessly over something ridiculous like a leaf, and then some Matthew McConaughey type either whips around the corner just in the nick of time to save her or is clumsily pulled down along with her. That event predictably leads to the magical moment of their first kiss. Please. I fall ALL the time. You know who comes and gets me? The bouncer."
--Chelsea Handler

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

An interesting proposal has come out of NYC, moving MSG one block west

A developer has proposed moving Madison Square Garden one block west during renovations/city improvements. According to the New York Times:

Steven Roth is quietly trying to revive a plan to move Madison Square Garden one block west of its current home atop Pennsylvania Station just as the arena is beginning a major $850 million renovation.

The interesting part here is if this proposal were to be somehow adopted and the Garden moved how much of the $850 million (like so much chicken feed in NY real estate deals) is already committed to the improvements, how many contracts have been signed and how much has been promised.

More on Roth's proposed move of MSG:

Now, Mr. Roth is proposing to scrap the zoning district and the development rights transfer. He would simply move the Garden into a new arena that would be built within the walls of the James A. Farley Post Office, which sits across Eighth Avenue from the Garden. The post office building would also become an adjunct for an expanded Penn Station, which would be renamed Moynihan Station.

It's an interesting IDEA to be certain and who knows how it all shakes out when you have three professional teams involved all looking out for their own interests. No worries yet anyway, this will take quite while to decide on.

Late night open thread

Henny Youngman night:

Was that suit made to order? Where were you at the time?

You have the Midas touch. Everything you touch turns to a muffler.

If you had your life to live over again, do it overseas.

She's been married so many times she has rice marks on her face.

She has a wash and wear bridal gown.

You look like a talent scout for a cemetery.

You have a nice personality, but not for a human being.

The more I think of you, the less I think of you.

Where did you get your haircut, the pet shop?

Those two are a fastidious couple. She's fast and he's hideous.

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

Friday night MULTIMEDIA EXTRAVAGANZA with THE ROMANTICS!

Four guys working in a Ford plant outside of Detroit are also a local garage band in 1977. They quit the Ford gig to play music full time. Although they've had 2 or 3 mainstream hits across the US they are legends in Detroit. That whole screw this I quit I'm playing rock and roll for a living now attitude.

The Romantics on 70's night with 'Rock You Up'

Friday night MULTIMEDIA EXTRAVAGANZA with THE BABYS!

Ah yes, John Waite and one of the better bands out of the late 70's scene playing that 2 and 4 rock pop sound. As many of our long time readers (all five of you) will know Johnny's a sucker fer some good backup singing. From the old Midnight Special show here are The Baby's with 'Everytime I Think of You'.

Friday night MULTIMEDIA EXTRAVAGANZA with THE SLITS!

Everyone's favorite English female punk/reggae band. Contemporaries of the Sex Pistols and The Clash, The Slits in fact opened for The Clash's White Riot tour in 1977.

Here are The Slits with 'Typical Girls'

The Cromwell Center Pier on Staten island collapses

And trust us, if it weren't caught on tape, we wouldn't be writing about it. The center was awaiting a multi-million dollar renovation when the collapse happened. The renovation project just became reclamation project we think.

Late night open thread

Johnny can't watch one of these old school instructional films without thinking of MST3K. The films skips a touch but it's well worth it.

Note the character 'Johnny' votes for kickball at recess. Damn straight. Oh, and swear to god Harvey is gay.


Time for Jersey City, After Dark

Public Service Announcement -- Please don't bring your metal coffins to the scrapyard

Some genius, known to the County Auto Wreckers as 'Rocco' dropped off a big pile of scrap metal and at the bottom workers found a coffin. A coffin they said that was smelling pretty awful. So, of course they called police who immediately set up a perimeter around the casket, called EMS and the bomb squad just to be safe. After the bomb squad x-rayed the coffin, they said it contained neither bomb nor body. Even if it had contained a body we're unsure what help the EMS crew would have been unless they were REALLY REALLY good at their jobs.

So, going forward, please don't drop off empty locked coffins at local scrapyards, Pep Boys, McDonalds, the Jersey City Desk offices, or city hall. Learn to dispose of coffins properly which as near as we can tell and from all we've learned of years of watching teevee, means burying it in the ground, roughly at a depth of six feet.

Thank you for your cooperation.

Late night open thread

Some gorgeous fireworks over the Statue of Liberty tonight. Well played on such a steamy evening.

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

You know it, you love it, but what would it be like to work inside the strangely apportioned Flatiron Building?

A wonderful article this morning from the New York Times on just what it's like to work inside the Flatiron Building with it's men's and women's restrooms on alternating floors, quirky office shapes and even a bathroom view of New Jersey. Great architecture tells many stories and here are a few.

On a side note, Johnny once talked to a person who seemed in the know that the very top room in the Chrysler Building, the highest room in the spire wasn't any kind of observation deck or office but instead a bathroom. Anyone help out on this?

New Jersey Transit is adding trains for tonight's Bon Jovi show at the Meadowlands

Yes, the same new Meadowlands stadium granted the 2014 Super Bowl will play host to Jersey's own Jon Bon Jovi tonight and for two more shows and NJ Transit promises to be ready. You may recall that NJ Transit left thousands of fans stranded after U2 shows last year at the olden times Meadowlands.

The temperature here today will be 94ish, with some pretty big boomers possible later in the day and right through the time Jon will be on stage, please dress and plan accordingly.

He's Bon Jovi with 'We Weren't Born to Follow'

Late night open thread

The traffic lights turn blue tomorrow
--Jimi Hendrix

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

BREAKING: New Jersey's new Meadowlands will host Super Bowl XLVIII

The NFL has awarded the first ever outside in a northern city Super Bowl (Detroit of course has hosted 2 already but both inside, one at the old Pontiac Silverdome and a couple years ago at the new Ford Field). Johnny will be throwing one hell of a Super Bowl bash and if the Cleveland Browns make the 2014 game, he's going. For those wondering on February 2nd, the date of the game the average temperature is 39º, however the record low on February 2 is -3º.

Hats off to both the New Jersey Jets and New Jersey Giants for their award winning bid. Well done gang green and big blue.

Dear Johnny's friends, you wanna come out? Book early. This is VERY VERY exciting news and a nice boost for New Jersey and New York too. Hundreds of millions of dollars will roll into both states.

Traffic that week will just, well, just take the damned train.

Detroit hosts Super Bowls while Johnny lives there. Johnny moves to Jersey City and the Meadowlands gets a Super Bowl. Coincidence?

Some New York City bus drivers need a lesson in 'waste management'

Spitting on someone is disgusting. For the most part public spitting that has been captured has been usually in a sports venue as two of the more famous cases of public spitting on someone were baseball player Roberto Alomar and NBA all-star Charles Barkley (who saved his spit for a young girl fan). Both incidents resulted in just penalties, again, it's a disgusting thing to do.

New York City's bus drivers have been reporting a lot more of these types of rage incidents where they are spat on. Here's where Johnny thinks the waste management lesson comes into play. Some of these drivers are taking time off, a LOT of time off after being technically 'assaulted' by the spitter. How much is a lot of time off? One driver took 191 days off after being spit on. No, you read that right, 191. Of the 51 drivers who took paid leave (and it's important to note not all took paid leave) took an AVERAGE of 64 days off to 'recover'.

Dear Transport Workers Union Local 100, this borders on out and out theft in our opinion. 64 days on AVERAGE? Do you not realize nor care the MTA is facing a $400 million dollar deficit? Know what helps run up such a shortfall? Taking time off you don't NEED and getting paid for it. If a driver is spit on and it enters their mouth or nose or eyes or somewhere a communicable disease like AIDS could be passed along, please, go to the doctor, get checked out, get all the tests run. If it takes a full day at the doctors and some follow up time to go over things sobeit.

But it shouldn't take 64 days. Ever.

Leona Beldini gets to keep her reservation for jail

Mayor Jerramiah Healy's former Deputy Mayor Leona Beldini tried, oh how she tried, to cancel her reservations to prison yesterday, but lost her bid. U.S. District Court Judge Judge Jose Linares tossed out all of Beldini's appeals on the charges she was recently convicted on, 2 counts of bribery. Beldini faces sentencing before Linares on June 14.

Leona, you'll simply have to email us here and compare the pancakes inside the county lock-up vs those at the Brownstone Diner where some of your malfeasance reportedly occurred. Yeah, that's it, you can be our new jail correspondent and or jail food critic. Shoot us an email, the people of Jersey City would no doubt love to know how jail will be working out for you.

Mmmmmmmm, jail flapjacks, made with love.

Late night open thread

Johnny isn't one to slather his name all over the pictures he takes from around town and making all kind of copyright claims. If you the reader like it or maybe wanna use one as a desktop image or you make a screensaver that's swell. Here's another picture with that idea behind it. From high atop the Empire State Building here's looking down on the New York Life Tower, which was built in 1926 and is 651 feet tall. Note the building to the left looks like an old Hasbro Lite Brite.

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

We got nothing this morning so run with your A.D.D.

Oh look a close up of the top spire on the Empire State Building being lit for the night taken May 16th, 2010.

Late night open thread

Ah Sunday night, all that's left is to watch The Simpsons, hit the hay, and get ready for Monday...

TIme for Jersey City, After Dark

Get your updates on the USA Soccer team warming up for the World Cup down at Princeton

Take some time and get ready for the HUGE World Cup and America's puncher's chance in it with a nice article in today's New York TImes. There seem to be a few injuries on the squad being worked through but nothing as bad as England and Germany are facing currently. June 12 it's the USA vs England in game 1 of the tournament, and it doesn't get ANY bigger than that.

The USA is still living large after their world shocking upset over Euro champion and #1 in the world ranked Spain last year and oh so close upset of Brazil in the final.


The team is practicing in Princton, take a ride down and wish them well...

Late night open thread

We'll get back to a more familiar format as company leaves tomorrow...

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

Quite the scene in Trenton this afternoon

Citizens expressing their right to air grievances totaling 30-40,000 is a good thing, it's democracy in action.

OK, off to play in NYC now.

Late night open thread

Music tomorrow we hope. More company this weekend.

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

If you think we're coming into the office on an 83º sunny day

You'll be waiting for a while....

We might be back for the music series tonight if we get bored ;)

Late night open thread

He leads the league in goals and drunk and disorderly arrests


Time for Jersey City, After Dark

Boycott BP

Yes, it's that simple. They have used outdated spill stoppers (sorry we're not up on our drilling lingo), were ill prepared for such a spill, whistleblowers have come forward to say they were shortchanging safety regulations and have taken to out and out LYING about how much oil is being leaked into the Gulf of Mexico, some experts are saying the BP's oil spill is 10 times bigger than BP will admit to. Another fact we're looking at with this uncapped oil gushing free over thousands of square miles in the Gulf of Mexico, in another 11 days hurricane season starts.

Now, according to CBS News and being reported by several sources, a division of the US Military, the United States Coast Guard is telling reporters to get off public beaches and NOT TO REPORT what they are seeing. Said one Coast Guard member high on himself "Those are BP's rules, not ours".

Wait, hold on.

A foreign owned company, causing a natural disaster in US waters is telling a US branch of government who can and cannot be on United States public beaches in Louisiana? F that. We'd say firebomb your local BP station if that weren't so irresponsible and illegal but it's how we feel. BP now thinks it can co-opt a branch of the United States military to protect their sorry asses and cover up the indefensible? Not only is it time to boycott BP, it's time to shut down every goddamned one of their gas stations here in America. If they're so wonderful let the UK and UAE and Europe buy their shit. How DARE BP think they can act like this. Call your legislators, call the President, and most of all vote with your dollars and boycott BP, the company who wants to dump oil all over American beaches, hide from their responsibility (they're already judge shopping in Houston people), and then tell Americans they are not allowed to see the aftermath. There ought to be BP executives heads on pikes along that shoreline to show BP we as Americans won't simply allow them to walk away from this mess.

*BP is trying to get Louisiana fisherman to sign sign indemnification waivers so they get some money right now because there are no fish to fish but after that, they're on their own.

*BP, when they are found guilty for this will claim a timely bankruptcy limited fund so they don't have to pay out what they owe even though they make tens of billions in profits per QUARTER.

*BP tried to get workers who were either blown from, or rescued from the Deepwater Horizon rig were told to sign company release forms freeing BP and Deepwater Horizon from any blame BEFORE they were allowed to call their families back home on shore.

Johnny hereby DARES some lackey from BP to show up and defend this crap in the comments section....DARES them.

Just watch this INDEPENDENTLY filmed video against the wishes of BP and try not to cry and then ask yourself who is right, BP saying only 1000 barrels of oil a day are leaking or real experts who say it could be at least 5-10-20 times as much.

We are not in the business of taking someone else's work...

While some of the better pictures Johnny puts up here he freely allows you to use so long as you're not making money on it, we're not in da bidness of ripping off other photographers. We're pretty relaxed when it comes to such matters on our end. We're going to run an image today and first off we want to give FULL credit to Jersey Journal's Reena Rose Sibayan. Sometimes pictures are worth a thousand words, in this case it's worth two thousand words.



Society Hill pimp Allen E. Brown got a little testy in court this morning and was sentenced to 18 years in prison by Judge Kevin Callahan in Hudson County Superior Court in Jersey City.

That's the lead on the story and we're certain you'll wanna read the rest, just click HERE.

Late night open thread

Ugh. feel better tomorrow....

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

Dear coughing and hacking jackass on the PATH back to Jersey last Saturday night

So Johnny does the polite and right thing and makes sure his wife, mother and father in law have seats while he stands coming back from 33rd. Some Thimble headed gherkin is coughing and horking without covering his mouth or even trying to protect the general public. Well guess what fartknocker, now I have your disease. Show some class man, show you care about somebody else. Next time you're sleeping with the rats at 23rd St. Johnny thinks the track rats at 23rd St. are the biggest on the PATH line.

Late night open thread

Famous last words edition:

"I die hard but am not afraid to go."
-- George Washington, US President, d. December 14, 1799

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

And we're back....

After a lovely visit with family.

Here's our question of the day, in reading a lot of newspapers in traditional Big Ten country, the opinions are pretty evenly split about adding schools like Rutgers (And maybe Pitt, Syracuse, Missouri, Notre Dame and maybe even Nebraska) to form the super conference of all superconferences.

What say you Rutgers fans? Does this appeal to you?

Late night open thread

Well kids we're outta here until sometime later Monday, the family thing and all. Johnny's even giving Kiki and Zoltron the days off too. Kiki is going to give an audition for the new Jersey Shore.

And since there's always the chance Johnny could get hit by a train or bus or there could be some kind of severe shoving incident on the top of the Empire State Building, we'd rather leave you all with something uber cool. Here is Neko Case on the Sundance Channel's show Spectacle hosted by Elvis Costello. Here Neko performs the magnificent song 'Prison Girls' all stripped down with Elvis on geetar and Steve Nieve on piano with this brilliant arrangement. Normally Neko has old friend Kelly Hogan singing backup but of course Sheryl Crow will do in a pinch.


Time for Jersey City, After Dark

Mayor Bloomberg is over in Merry olde England to get a look at how a surveillance society is run

Because apparently Mr. Bloomberg seems to think such a society is how he may want to run New York City. Cameras on every corner, people living in "freedom" under constant surveillance. Seems to be Mayor Mike's new mantra after the failed junior varsity car bomb failed to go off last weekend. Johnny walked right down Broadway last night on his way to Promises Promises and there were police cars in and around Times Square everywhere. Police standing around keeping a watchful eye everywhere. How much safer can you make it?

Newsflash to Mayor Bloomberg, these new cameras you'll soon be wanting to install everywhere (and will cost millions) are not going to stop ONE SINGLE ACT OF TERROR. Got that? Anybody willing to blow themselves up, anybody willing to drive a bomb laden car into a group of people, anyone willing to set one of these devices off cannot be stopped by camera. They can be stopped by wary citizens and police trained in what to look for. Cameras will do diddley-poo to STOP a terror attack. All the cameras will do is give CNN and MSNBC some excellent video of the actual attack to run every 5 minutes until people in Nebraska are ready to either pee their collective pants or surrender.

Better police training, possible barricades set up blocks from where a car could access say the New Year's Eve celebration and continued public vigilance will help stop acts of terror. Hell this last car bomb that never went off was discovered by a local citizen (A Muslim we might add) who pointed it out to police. There were cameras everywhere that car was left. Didn't stop shit-for-brains Faisal Shahzad from leaving it now did it?

Everytime the powers that be want to take away freedoms, citizens should get the pitchforks and torches and show the powers that be what terror really looks like.

Late night open thread

Johnny always crushed low inside fastballs and slow curves meant to be considered 'back door' pitches. Newsweek theater critic Ramin Setoodeh (and it is important in context to mention by his own admission that Mr. Setoodeh is gay) just tried a slow backdoor breaking ball and Johnny had a chance to consider it up close and personal and it now going to drop it into oh, the third deck.

Ramin Setoodeh wrote for Newsweek that the star of the Broadway play Promises Promises Shawn Hayes (Of Will and Grace fame) and the spot on Kristen Chenoweth doesn't work on Hayes' end because he comes across as wooden (his word) and unbelievable as a straight character and can't pull it off because we know he's gay. Setoodeh said in the play's funniest scene we just don't buy a drunk Hayes trying to pick up a bawdy barfly on Christmas Eve.

Johnny went to see Promises Promises tonight and as always he has some opinions that may be considered harsh. Mr. Setoodeh, here's why you're having an issue with it and making it a gay thing and where you run off the rail. You're critiquing the performance of a very drunk straight male ONLY from a gay perspective if that's only how you see Hayes. You are basing your review on a gay point of view which of course you'd do. Johnny is straight. Johnny has been as drunk as Hayes' character in a bar where a perfect 10 is hitting on you not so slyly (A perfect ten mind you meaning a 4 and six Jim Beam and waters). It's Johnny's guess Setoodeh has never been in this position as a drunken straight man just wanting to score and willing to enter into any witty banter to get those pants off. Sean Hayes played the part of a drunken straight guy better than I've seen some drunken straight guys play it at 2:20 am.

A lucky fan from Keego Harbor will take home that ball in the third deck.

Reviewers need a more open mind if this is only how this reviewer sees Hayes role. Chenoweth has written back on this topic and she gets even madder than Johnny.

Busy night on Broadway, Johnny didn't know you could get so worked up.

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

It's quite obvious that no police presence will keep you safe on Communipaw Avenue

Time after time after time we read about citizens out walking on Communipaw Ave. (not just in the wee hours) that are being robbed, stabbed, shot, kicked and left for dead. Sometimes it's one person committing the crime, more often it's a band of roving young jagoffs. For whatever reason, you the Jersey City resident cannot feel safe all the way from the 1&9 out to where Comminipaw ends just past the New Jersey Turnpike. The entire length is seeing crime spikes.

We will ask police if they have stepped up patrols on Commumipaw Avenue, especially using that handy computer program that Mayor Healy was touting in his last run for re-election in which he claimed the police database using algorhythms works to put police where they could prevent some of this crime. Our guess is that they'll have no comment about exactly HOW the system works and exactly how much crime it's stopping but we'll see. In the meantime call your city councilperson, often. Call the mayor's office, often. Call the non-emergency police line and let them know Communipaw has become an unsafe thoroughfare that cuts through the heart of this city. Maybe some tendrils of crime spring up on this street outta Greenville but case and fact, Communipaw is far too long to JUST be Greenville troublemakers. If you see someone suspicious call it it, you have a cell phone.

What is happening right now all up and down Communipaw Avenue is a cancer spreading to surrounding blocks and neighborhoods where crime is being allowed (oh yes it is) to grow and strengthen it's grip on neighborhoods where families once lived and hung outside now live under the "Snitches get Stitches' rule of the streets when criminal enterprise moves in.

We call on our mayor and chief of police to police this wreck and use WHATEVER FORCE IS NECESSARY to clean this up. We simply can't have this in a prospering, growing Jersey City.

Late night open thread

On this day in history, in 1775 Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys captured the British held fortress at Ticonderoga NY.

Suck on that England.

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

So lets check the lunch menu in the Jersey City School District today

Mmmmm, lunch!

Pizza burgers or spaghetti tacos
Chicken nuggets
Baked and burned green beans
Tater tots
Vegetables floating in hot water
Some congealed brown stuff
Ketchup
Cookie

Late night open thread

Just a word of warning fair readers, we're gonna take a few days off next weekend and clear the offices and welcome some family to Fun City. Trust us you'll be fine.

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

How about a Sunday ghost story from right here in Jersey City?

Johnny loves ghost stories. He's hunted ghosts from New England to the midwest and as far south as Tennessee. His favorite show is Ghost Hunters, who by the way have had some of their most harrowing encounters right here in the Garden State. So why not have a Sunday ghost story about the ghost of Pearl White? Click here for the spooky details.

Late night open thread

Johnny's pretty sure about 11:30 pm he saw a sheep blow by his living room windows. Baby its windy out there

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

The wind is right, the moon is up late and Johnny wants him some TriBeCa property cheap

So if you see a guy skulking along the river before the moon comes up tying up plump plague rats to helium balloons and loading hundreds of others onto a makeshitft rafts with sails set to catch the 50 mph winds from the west, ignore that guy. Johnny figures nothing will bring down the price of a loft in TriBeCa faster than plague rats running around. Property is gonna open up pretty fast once the coroner's office gets it in gear and the price per square foot drops lower than a pregnant wiener dog.

Now, granted, a couple of the boats could skirt lower Manhattan and find their way to Brooklyn and the wind is pretty strong so some of those helium balloons are gonna be dropping rats all the way over the East River into Queens. Oops. Our bad. And for the balloons that might get caught up on the shall we say taller buildings -- well PETA has rapid response teams for that.

Johnny tried knocking on doors asking for some cheap prices and put in some lowball bids which was going nowhere fast. Then one night he caught a Powerpuff Girls rerun and noted a similar plan from super evil genius monkey Mojo Jojo.

Rodents away! Now whip out those checkbooks and let's move some property.

Staten Island Ferry crashes into terminal -- Dozens injured -- Witnesses: It was narwhals!

MSNBC:
A Staten Island ferry boat with a history of accidents struck a pier as it approached a terminal Saturday, seriously hurting at least one person and leaving as many as 35 with minor injuries.

People were reported screaming and crying, no doubt some using their iPhone's speed dial to call their lawyers to get that paperwork started (Charles 'Speedy' White, "If I can't beat your rap I'll eat a bug" would be Johnny's choice) and the injured were being treated. Some passengers reported the captain of the ferry was traveling too fast as he approached the docks but at least two witnesses said the captain was merely taking evasive actions; "Narwhals, at least six came right at us flashing their tusks and threatening to ram holes in the boat dawg" said Vinnie 'The Situation' Barbarino. "Our driver had to speed up or these things with horns was gonna hit us," said Tamiquia White "They were like swimming unicorns, all frontin".

Mayor Michael Bloomberg was too busy dealing with actual terrorism threats in his city to comment on this possible narwhal attack and ferry crash but a city spokesman, Chuck U. Farley did say that many of the guns picked up off the streets and bought back from hoods in the city recently could be handed out to Staten Island Ferry riders to fend off future narwhalian attacks. "The fact there could be killer narwhals in New York Harbor and in the Hudson and East Rivers angries up my blood" said Farley.

Late night open thread

Q. Why do vampires need mouthwash?
A. They have bat breath…

You sleep on that...

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

Friday night MULTIMEDIA EXTRAVAGANZA with 10,000 MANIACS!

Hey-Hey-Give 'em what they want...

10,000 Maniacs with 'Candy Everybody Wants'

Friday night MULTIMEDIA EXTRAVAGANZA with KELLY HOGAN!

Oh the terrific Kelly Hogan and the heartbreaking song 'Gone', but done in that awesome rocking bar kind of way.

Rock on Kelly, you're a gem

Friday night MULTIMEDIA EXTRAVAGANZA with AD-LIBS!

Straight outta Bayonne the Ad-Libs had a huge hit with 'The Boy From New York City' and yes, this is the original which was also covered by The Darts and Manhattan Transfer

Life is like a box of chocolates...

No not because you never know what you'll get but because is was spoken by a dim bulb just like the group Johnny's going to describe here.

A Jersey City man, Luis M. Perez, went to Hoboken to try and buy an illegal gun. Why he had to go to FuHo is beyond us as the Greenville street gun emporium was more than likely open at the time. As he haggles with three teens about the gun he wants to purchase, the three Hoboken teens pull knives and rob the guy wanting to buy an illegal handgun. So after the kids take off, Lopez follows them on foot and via a cab and THEN involved the police. You read that right, he involved the FuHo police. The three teens were taken into custody for having an illegal weapon or two. It was at this point one of the teens ratted on Lopez saying he was trying to buy the illegal handgun. So, police being police did a search of Mr. Lopez's person and found a razor and a baggie with 50 grams of weed in his back pocket. Well played Mr. Lopez, well played indeed.

So booking was having a busy night last night in FuHo but let this be a lesson to your wannabe gangstas, shop locally for guns, no need to travel all the way to Hoboken on the Light Rail or PATH train. Spend your bad money right here in Jersey City. Just call it a Mayor Healy enterprise zone if questioned.

Late night open thread

Boy some people can be real pigs at the trough when it comes to helping themselves to sushi. The Red Wings Johan Franzen had FOUR helpings of raw shark tonight in the first 11 minutes of game 4. Franzen damned near had a fifth helping that was originally credited to him that tipped in off Todd Bertuzzi. In fact after what was Franzen's second goal as the announcement of the change in the first hadn't been announced, hats rained down upon the hallowed ice of Joe Louis Arena.

OK four helpings of shark is fine, five is a bit much.


Time for Jersey City, After Dark

News from the world of White Trash TeeVee

A federal racketeering charge against MTV is being allowed to go forward after the luddites who star in the show 'Jersey Shore' (Where the kids are from Lawng Eyelund and film in Miami) attacked a man during filming last summer. Actually, the brain-dead cast members have been involved in several alleged assaults. MTV producers would never encourage such violent behavior for ratings and to add some spice to the otherwise unwatchable mess that is 'Jersey Shore' would they?

Kenneth Hoffman who was in the same bar that the show was being filmed in was taunted and then viciously attacked by cast member by Paul Delvecchio all while being held immobile by bouncers/security of the Bamboo Bar in Seaside Heights. The beating was so severe that Hoffman required surgery to his spine. Hoffman's attorney in this case, John Novak, had this to say:

“Ocean County residents should not be used as props for this production company’s profits and ratings. [Hoffman] was savagely victimized and sustained permanent injuries as a direct result of the defendants’ continuing course of profit-motivated criminal conduct.” (Hence the racketeering allegation.)

In yet another case of the male cast members acting like troglodytes, On Friday, a Superior Court judge in Toms River allowed RICO and assault claims to stand in two other lawsuits filed by three people who also say they were attacked by a “Jersey Shore” castmate (Ronnie Magro, who still faces felony aggravated assault charges in one of the cases.)

Makes you long for the day when the worst thing on MTV was a Rick Springfield video.

Late night open thread

So the In-laws are coming into town for the weekend in a couple weeks and Johnny's mother-in-law wants to go see The Lion King. Can someone give Johnny one good reason to go see a play about former Lions coach Wayne Fontes?

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

So Jersey City, where is the best place to buy flowers?

Johnny likes to make the windowsills of his high rise condo look real nice with fresh cut flowers and was wondering if you had a favorite place in the Grove Street PATH area that you can get some nice posies for a good price. Also any luck in helping Johnny find fresh herb plants such as thyme and basil and chives for a windowsill herb garden would be greatly appreciated.

Late night open thread

The city of Detroit, and baseball in general lost a GIANT of a man tonight when legendary Tigers broadcaster Ernie Harwell passed away at his home in Novi Michigan at age 92. Much like Yankee fans grew up listening to Mel Allen, and St. Louis fans grew up listening to Red Barber and certainly Los Angeles who still enjoys Vin Scully, Harwell was a treasure.

Harwell WAS Tiger baseball on hot summer nights. You'd hear his southern drawl coming out of car windows, houses, and radios left on in backyards. The way that wonderful voice that simply meant baseball wafted on the hot summer breeze or quiet humid August night, or those crisp clear exciting September nights, somehow you knew all was right with the world.

Rest well Ernie, rest well.


Time for Jersey City, After Dark

Well well well, the would be Times Square bomber isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer

Or, as Johnny's dad was fond of saying "He's not playing with all the dots on his dominoes".

We'll start out with a quote on alleged terrorist and all around dumbass Faisal Shahzad, from Kevin B. Barry, an official with the International Association of Bomb Technicians and Investigators: "he left more clues than a guy walking into a bank to rob it without a mask. This guy left everything here but his wallet." James Cavanaugh from ATF takes it from there: "I call this a Rube Goldberg contraption," Cavanaugh told the newspaper. "It's the 'swing-the-arm-with-the-shoe-that-hits-the-ball-and-knocks-over-a-stick-that-knocks-something-off-a-shelf' and it is all supposed to work."

He said that whoever made the bomb had "more desire than ability."

So Mr. Shahzad, we sure hope you didn't have any plans for, well, the rest of your soon to be short but long enough to be raped in prison life. And when you try to kill a lot of Americans by setting a car bomb most kids who take the short bus could have made better, it's exactly what you deserve. No 72 virgins, no martyrdom, no nothing but bad food and a cellmate with love in his eyes.

Late night open thread

Tell Johnny this show wasn't written under the influence of drugs.


Time for Jersey City After Dark

Sorry kids, sometimes real life intrudes on a day

And ya know what, you can actually get busy doing other things. True, as strange as that seems. Johnny had to drive back to Detroit to make sure the hotel food where the San Jose Sharks are staying had some extra, *ahem* seasonings.

Late night open thread

On this day in history, one of the most famous sightings of the Loch Ness monster took place:

Although accounts of an aquatic beast living in Scotland's Loch Ness date back 1,500 years, the modern legend of the Loch Ness Monster is born when a sighting makes local news on May 2, 1933. The newspaper Inverness Courier related an account of a local couple who claimed to have seen "an enormous animal rolling and plunging on the surface." The story of the "monster" (a moniker chosen by the Courier editor) became a media phenomenon, with London newspapers sending correspondents to Scotland and a circus offering a 20,000 pound sterling reward for capture of the beast.

For more follow the link.

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

We urge every reader of the Jersey City Desk to boycott BP gasoline because of BP's inept response to their oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico

Look, if British Petroleum (BP) can make billions and billions in profit from the open waters of the United States of America and then have no plan in place should one of their oil rigs kill 11 workers and then unleash an oil slick bigger than the Exxon Valdez all while doing next to nothing to even stop it, it's time to stop going to BP for your gas or 44 oz soda.

Let's let some of the experts tell you how bad things in the Gulf of Mexico are (and spreading fast):

*Venice charter boat captain Bob Kenney lamented that there was no boom in the water to corral the oil, and said BP was "pretty much over their head in the deep water." "If they weren't, they would have cut the oil off by now," he said. "It's like a slow version of Katrina," he added. "My kids will be talking about the effect of this when they're my age."

* The oil slick over the water's surface appeared to triple in size over the past two days, which could indicate an increase in the rate that oil is spewing from the well, according to one analysis of images collected from satellites and reviewed by the University of Miami. While it's hard to judge the volume of oil by satellite because of depth, images do indicate growth, experts said.

* "The spill and the spreading is getting so much faster and expanding much quicker than they estimated," said Hans Graber, head of the university's Center for Southeastern Tropical Advanced Remote Sensing. "Clearly, in the last couple of days, there was a big change in the size.

* The well is at the end of one branch of the Gulf Stream, the warm-water current that flows from the Gulf of Mexico to the North Atlantic. Several experts said that if the oil enters the stream, it would flow around the southern tip of Florida and up the eastern seaboard. "It will be on the East Coast of Florida in almost no time," Graber said. "I don't think we can prevent that. It's more of a question of when rather than if."

So there you have it BP, we're done with you and you can take your "We're such a green company here in America" meme and stick it up your oily ass.

Fear not for us America, the Tri-State is fine this morning

It's gonna take more than a truck filled with fireworks and gasoline to ruin our mood. Assholes, you can't break us.

Late night open thread

A crude car bomb forced the evacuation of thousands from Times Square tonight. Police have since dismanted the SUV that drew attention when it started smoking. A man police are seking was seen running from the truck.

A show of hands from everyone planning on changing how they live of if they plan on being afraid/.........Didn't think so.

Time for Jersey City, After Dark

Saturday night MULTIMEDIA EXTRAVAGANZA with ELO!

Yes 70's AM Gold night kicks off with Electric Light Orchestra with a multi layered masterpiece which of course was so often lost on the limitations of AM radio. The sheer brilliance of the backup singers, the richly arranged strings, and the perfectly layered voice tracks. Here's ELO with 'Livin' Thing'.

Saturday night MULTIMEDIA EXTRAVAGANZA with JOHN STEWART!

No no no, not the Comedy Central John Stewart, no the John Stewart with the mega-hit 'Gold' from 1979. Extra credit if you can tell us who is singing backup and who is laying down the lead guitar track on this 'un.

Saturday night MULTIMEDIA EXTRAVAGANZA with LOVE!

We finish off AM Gold night with the band Love and their hit 'My Little Red Book'.

If it's the first Saturday in May, it must be the Jersey City Derby!!

So ladies put on those crazy hats, gentlemen start pounding those Pabst Blue Ribbons (no mint juleps allowed here) and get those $2 paramutual bets down.

Here is a clip from last year's race won by 'Jerry Healy' who ran away with the race on the backstretch over 'Cammarano's Cutlery', 'Chris Christie goobermint piggy' and 'Beldini at the Brownstone'. What an exciting race.

Head on over to Jersey City Downs, over by Journal Square near Kennedy Blvd for the 5:20 pm post time.

Late night open thread

We'll do the music series tomorrow. It's looking like a warm one kids...

Time for Jersey City, After Dark