Woody Allen on The Tonight Show: New Year's Eve 1965

This is a classic appearance Woody Allen made on The Tonight Show on New Year's Eve 1965. It was shortly after his first movie What's New Pussycat? had opened and suddenly Woody was a big star. He was about 30 years old at the time and was still, at the time, considered a daring comic. His comedy was cerebral and ironic, much different than the broad comedy of the time, and you can tell that Johnny Caron didn't quite know what to make of him. Forty-five years later, Woody Allen remains the gold standard.

You can check out part 2 here.

John Liu Iz Da Man

Last year Mr NYC endorsed John Liu for NYC Comptroller. Only one of three city-wide elected officials, the Comptroller is the city's chief fiscal officer whose job is to audit the city' government and manage its pension fund. Liu's candidacy and election was the only bright spot in an otherwise dull and unmemorable municipal race.

Well it appears that my vote was justified: Comptroller Liu just busted the Economic Development Corporation for hoarding over $125 million in secret accounts that it collected from taxes and fees. The city was doing everything it could to stonewall this audit and now you can see why: it didn't want to turn over this money to the city's general fund that would go to city services. Instead the city wanted the EDC to conceal this money so that it could go towards the city's development plans.

So, to put it blunty, the EDC was hiding this money to help developers and not the city's people. Outrageous.

This revelation just shows why it's so important to have checks and balances in government and, more importantly, the right people doing it. So good job Comptroller Liu, on behalf of all New Yorkers, thank you.

Keepin' the Yoga Real

A confession: Mr NYC is a yoga fan. Not a fanatic, I don't do it every day and say namaste to everyone I meet, but I do enjoy it and take classes about twice a week. It calms me down and Lord knows that's a good thing.

In the last decade or so, yoga has become something of a yuppie staple. And, like everything else, it's become commercialized what with hundred dollar mats and exercise clothes and super-expensive instructors. Not exactly chill.

But true, mellow yoga fans are fighting back! (As much as mellow people can fight.) Yoga to the People is a come one, come all, totally stripped down, back-to-basics yoga studio in the East Village that does yoga the way it should be: simply. There's a great article about it that gives you a sense of what yoga does, where it's gone, and where Yoga to the People is trying to pull it back.

Check 'em both out and see what you think. Namaste.

Royal New Yorkers

During her long reign, Queen Victoria was not only the monarch of her native land but was also dubbed Empress of India by one of her favorite prime ministers. India was then part of the British Empire (which covered a quarter of the globe at the time) and giving her this meaningless title is perhaps history's biggest act of flattery. Yet this silly title only helped to solidify her role as the world's most important ruler.

Today, there are very few monarchs left and many of them don't have much power. Even back then Queen Victoria didn't have any real political power. In fact, there's a whole bunch of descendants of European royalty living among us in NYC, quietly living their lives, devoid of any authority.

But if our city has one true monarch today it's Mayor Michael Bloomberg. He may not be an official royal but he's the closest thing we have. The richest and most powerful man in town, he wields political and economic power that even Queen Victoria might envy. He has been dubbed the King of New York and just about everyone agrees it's an apt title. None dare cross him. None dare question him. He rules. We are his subjects.

And he's not just the King of New York! He's also the Emperor of Bermuda. Mayor Bloomberg lives part time on that small island in the Atlantic ocean. This exhaustive New York Times piece examines Bloomberg's life in Bermuda, where he apparently goes at least twice a month and is well known by all. He travels there on his private plane, plays lots of rounds of golfs, hits the best restaurants, and parties down. Plus he has a lavish, enormous mansion that is apparently the most spectacular home on the island.

You gotta hand it to this guy. In the post-colonial era, where monarchs and empires are basically elaborate jokes, Mayor Bloomberg has managed not only to become the most powerful man in the world's greatest city but also the first citizen of an entire country. Louis XIV himself would be impressed. Mike really is the ultimate royal New Yorker, our city's first self-made king.

New York's Secret Garden

One of NYC's best kept secrets is the Central Park Conservatory Gardens. Far from the tourist crushed regions of the 60s and 70s, or the kid-infested areas of the 80s and 90s, the Conservatory Gardens rest in a quiet stretch of Central Park where real New Yorkers roam. And it is the most stunning part of Central Park by far.

When you walk through the beautiful Vanderbilt Gate on 106th street and Fifth Avenue, you feel like you've instantly left NYC in the 21st century and gone back in time to 19h century Europe. The Conservatory Gardens is a stunningly beautiful collection of three distinct gardens based on Victorian-era designs: English, French and Italian. The Italian gardens is full of wisteria as well as a twelve-foot high jet fountain. The French garden is full of pansies, tulips, and boxwoods, as well as another fountain called The Three Dancing Maidens. The English garden is the one you enter through the Vanderbilt gates and has a huge lawn and planting beds, as well as the Burnett Fountain which is based on the story The Secret Garden. If you want more info on the plants and designs of these gardens, go here.

The really stunning thing about these gardens is not just how gorgeous the plants and flowers are but how amazing well-designed they are. They really look like something out of the great palaces of Europe -- you'd be forgiving for thinking you were at Versailles or Windsor Castle. Walking through these stunning gardens, you almost feel like you're going to bump into Queen Victoria or Emperor Franz Joseph at any moment (and you'd want to apologize for walking there). You can tell that theses gardens were meticulously planned and lovingly constructed. The thought, care, and a generosity of spirit that brought them to life is probably the most beautiful thing about the Conservatory Gardens.

And the fact that these were built for us regular folks, not just the rich, brings a burst of joy to your heart just like one of the gardens' flowers bursting open in springtime.

Classic Mr NYC

There's a new show on HBO called Treme, about a neighborhood in New Orleans trying to pull itself up from the ravages of Hurricaine Katrina. It was created by David Simon, the genius behind the brilliant shows Homicide and The Wire. There have been two episodes of Treme so far, both really good, and it's looking like this will be another great show.

Last year I had a memorable weekend in New Orleans which I lovingly blogged about. So as a tribute to this new show, you can re-read about that trip here. And while I didn't make it to the real Treme last year, I certainly plan on visiting it next time I get to NOLA.

More People, Less Cars

Last year the city made radical changes to Times Square, Herald Square, and Madison Square when parts of them were blocked off to traffic and were replaced by pedestrian plazas.

The results have been wonderful: people are free and safe to walk around these very hectic areas, they can sit in beach chairs or at tables and eat, read, or talk, and it has brought a new vitality and relaxed energy to these crazy parts of town. Less car + more people = good.

But wait -- there's more! Now the city wants to create a pedestrian plaza around Union Square, closing the blocks just north of it to traffic. I was actually in Union Square last night -- a gorgeous, beautiful, Spring evening -- and the area was blazing with people and fun. Most of Union Square is already blocked off from traffic and is basically a big plaza anyway so extending it will only make it better.

Perhaps the most ambitious plan, however, is the DOT's proposal to eliminate most traffic from 34th street. The plan is to have traffic only going one way and to install dedicated bus lanes. Getting across 34th street, either by car or foot, is a nightmare so this will make buses go much faster and hopefully alleviate these bursting streets of people and get traffic across much faster.

It's nice to know that after almost a century of genuflecting and deferring to the automobile, finally pedestrians and public transportation are taking priority, at least in our city government's mind.

President Obama Tells Wall Street to Back Reform

Bloomberg Bombshell!

Being a billionaire, our Mayor Mike constantly insists that we can't tax the rich more because "They'll leave! They can afford to leave! They create jobs!" Yada yada yada.

So basically, in Bloomberg's mind, we have to cater to the rich and not make them pay more taxes because, if we don't, they'll move their money out of NYC and the rest of us will be screwed even more. How convenient for these super-rich people ... like him.

But guess what?! They're already moving their money out of NYC! Ever heard of off-shore tax shelters? Creepy little countries in the Caribbean and Europe where people can hide their money and pay no taxes? Ever heard of laundering money through non-profits and so-called charities and foundations?

Nearly every rich person in this city and country has some of their money off-shore or in some questionable tax-free organization. Including Mike Bloomberg! The New York Observer has an amazing story today called Bloomberg's Offshore Millions. Yes, that's right, our dear, incorruptible mayor shifts hundreds of millions of dollars of his money to accounts in the Cayman Islands as well as his charitble foundation.

This is really outrageous. Bloomberg keeps insisting that the rich are good for NYC because they pour their money into the city's economy. But just how good are they when literally hundreds of millions of dollars -- from this one New Yorker along who also happens to be the richest and most powerful person in town -- aren't going into the city's coffers or economy but literally out of the country? Why do we keep pandering to these people to the point of exhortation? I guess it's Mike Bloomberg and the rich people's city, we just live (or barely survive) in it.

This article is a quintessential example of why it's so vital that we have a free, robust press. Thanks to The New York Observer for doing this really important investigation and shedding light on this truly scandalous situation. This is reporting at its very best: afflicting the comfortable and comforting the afflicted.