All stories about "Amanda Kludt"

I'm writing this post, my last as associate editor of Gridskipper, to announce to our regular readers that after a year and change, I am leaving the safe womb of this lovely travel blog. Gskips and I have grown together over the year. The site got prettier, more popular, and more useful to readers. I became more bedraggled and reclusive as I realized I never needed to leave my house (or sweatshirt) to be a blogger. But I also became a better writer, editor, researcher, and traveler. Along the way I learned about RSS feeds, the ups and downs of pandering for traffic, and the great satisfaction that comes from running photos of small animals (see above). I've also gotten the chance to research everything from where to get the best hand jobs in New York to where to find hot chocolate and churros in Barcelona and have loved (or begrudgingly accepted) every minute of it.

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We've done some posts here about where to drink a good cup of coffee, but never on where to buy great coffee beans. The Kitchn foodblog ran a post yesterday suggesting coffee meccas Ninth Street Espresso and Gorilla Coffee, but their commenters chimed in with a trove of other good retailers, including big names like Brooklyn's Gimme Coffee and SF's Blue Bottle Coffee, national retailers like Fairway and Whole Foods, and little-known shops from Westchester to Vancouver. [via]

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The Financial Times has a great piece today about pop-up shops around the world. For the last five years, more and more designers and artists have been establishing these cheap, somewhat spontaneous shops that stick around for a year or so before moving on. The "rogue" stores are especially popular in London, Berlin, all over China, and American cities like New York and Miami. [via]

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Amy Winehouse and Kate Moss, two of Britain's most famous troubled celebs, are campaigning to save their favorite pub and music venue, the George Tavern. Mind you the place isn't closing or in financial straights. Rather, the problem is that a housing development being built next door to the pub will potentially block out the "special" light that makes the East End drinkery a go-to spot for photo and film shoots in London. Popular with both photogs for the 360-degree light and with musicians for its status as one of the city's best venues, it attracts celebs like Moss and Winehouse along with the likes of Adrien Brody, Justin Timberlake, the Rolling Stones, and Duran Duran.

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A baby red panda was born at the Wellington Zoo just after Christmas and the first picture has been released. The cub (they won't know if it's a boy or a girl for another two weeks) is no Zhen Zhen and doesn't have its own cute video like the new polar cub, but it gets extra points for being so rare and fragile. [via]

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Yesterday the Chicago Menupages blog published this incredible gallery of bacon Bloody Marys from across the country. I first heard of the brunch concoction when researching the much buzzed-about Chicago restaurant Sepia, and it's one of their most popular creations. However, this photos prove that great minds think alike, or at least that restaurateurs know a good idea when they see one, especially when pork is involved.

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Anyone who's lived in or visited Brooklyn enough knows the frustrations of calling car services (frequent busy signals, indecipherable dispatchers). All these problems should be resolved with SMS Cab, a startup text messaging car service now in five BK neighborhoods. Whenever you need a car, text your address and where you're going to 767222, and in three minutes the dispatcher will text you back the time a car can come and the fare. [via]

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Urban Tailgate, every sports lover's dream site, makes it their mission to connect fans with bars showing their home team's games. For the Super Bowl, there's only one game in town, so UT made this incredibly exhaustive map featuring almost every sports bar offering Super Bowl specials in Manhattan. Patriots bars are in red, Giants bars in blue, and neutral bars (though I highly doubt they will be all neutral considering it's NYC) are in green. The map points also explain any relevant specials, menus, cover charges, etc., which range from free buffets to wings and pitchers specials to $30 entrance fees.

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Check out these terrifying machine animals on display in Nantes, France. Totally effing scary right? The exhibition includes a giant squid, prehistoric creatures, a weird deep sea monster, birds, and an especially nefarious-looking 40-ton elephant. [via]

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Artists have been toying with the ideas of pop-up cinemas for awhile now (see NYC's DRV-IN), but now they have finally gone too far. Introducing Amsterdam's Cinema 41, the smallest movie theater in the world with only one seat. Entrance is only €3 and comes with soda and popcorn. The screen is, of course, super teensy. [Cinema 41]

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Typographers and font lovers all know about the trove of old "Gotham" lettering around Manhattan, but a new piece by Paul Shaw reveals Brooklyn has just as much to offer the amateur font lover. Shaw visited almost two dozen Brooklyn neighborhoods last year, noting every building or street with important typography. Check out his article to find the addresses and photos of all the compelling sights in your favorite BK nabe. [via]

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Never ones to shy away from controversial ads, Ryanair's newest ran in yesterday's Le Parisien and featured a picture of France's first couple, President Nicolas Sarkozy and girlfriend Carla Bruni. A thought bubble over Bruni's head says, "With Ryanair, my whole family can come to my wedding." Ryanair has apologized for the ad, but the president threatened to sue the company anyway for improper use of his image. [via]

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Here's a fun one for historians, sci-fi geeks, and budding cartographers: Neu York, a map of the way New York would have looked had the Nazis conquered America. Artist Melissa Gould made the map by transposing elements of Berlin in 1939 to that year's NYC cityscape. All Jewish synagogues are removed of course, and all street names, train stations, parks, neighborhoods, and bridges are renamed for their German counterparts. [via]

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As you very well know, the Super Bowl is less than a week away, and since the New York Giants are involved, there's even more interest than usual this year in the city. If you don't want to pack in to a crowded and expensive sports bar and would rather throw a party of your own, you'll need some serious snacks and beverages. Hit the supermarket and cook up the classic Super Bowl dishes, or call up one of the following places, put in your order, and let someone else do the work for you.

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It's time for the second installment of Scene Report, a new feature where we give you the lowdown on dining scenes in major cities around the world. At a glance, you'll find out about dining trends, up-and-coming restaurant neighborhoods, where you should drop $300 on a meal, and where you can save a few bucks. In our second installment: Chicago.

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We just came across this little public service gem: Bedbug Registry, a free public database of bedbug infestation reports from around the country. As expected, most of the red dots congregate around big cities like New York, LA, San Francisco, DC, and Philly. And while this is a great tool for finding out if your hotel has bedbugs (you can enter hotel names in the search fields), it covers residential addresses too -- including my former NYU dorm. Happy hunting! [via]

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Two British teenagers on a shopping trip to New York with their mother endured a horrific experience after the mom went to the emergency room with a bad case of pneumonia. Since minors aren't allowed to go unsupervised, the hospital staff called social services after the mother was admitted, and the girls were sent to an orphanage, strip searched, separated, forced to shower in front of staff, and heavily questioned about gang alliances and whether they were rape victims and/or homicidal. Now that everyone is safe and back in the UK, the city of New York has informed the mother she's under investigation since her children were admitted to the orphanage. [via]

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Running up to the Super Bowl, Menupages' Boston blog is pitting Boston and New York's culinary prowess against one another. They battled it out over sandwiches, pizza, and ice cream yesterday and bread, BBQ, and hot dogs this morning. It's been a tough contest so far, and one can only suspect bias on the Boston blogger's part, but right now NYC is in the lead. [Menupages]

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A mirrored, well-lighted dressing room can make or break a shopping experience. And as every female who has traipsed through Nolita, Soho, and the LES stopping in every tiny vintage and designer store knows, it's a crapshoot out there. The city is rife with horrible lighting, rooms with no mirrors or hooks, and shoddy curtains that leave you exposed to every perv or judgmental shopper in the store. This goes for chain stores too, which have mass-produced their substandard dressing rooms and implemented them nationwide. That said, there are some real winners out there, and they deserve their due praise. The following guide points out the city's best dressing rooms with "skinny" mirrors and ample space -- and the worst offenders that leave you feeling ugly, sweaty, and exposed.

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The first Virgin Galactic spaceflight is still a ways off, but at least now we know what the vessel will look like. Yesterday, Sir Richard Branson unveiled the model of SpaceShipTwo (here for the slideshow), the vehicle planned to bring tourists into space, along with White Knight Two, the four-engine jet that will launch the ship. Passengers willing fork over the $200,000 fee will be able to experience zero gravity and views of Earth for 4.5 minutes before gliding/careening back to land. (That's a little over $740 per second for those keeping score.) The ships begin tests this summer, with a prospective launch date of 2009. However, they will have to pass some rigorous safety tests first, as an 2007 engine explosion -- which killed three people -- has brought the safety of the entire operation into question.

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For those looking to eat in Berlin on the cheap, try one of the city's Mensa cafeterias -- subsidized dining halls most often found on college campuses, yet open to the public. The food isn't revelatory, but it's inexpensive, authentic, and often organic. Plus you'll be dining with real Berlin students and local skinflints. [Eurocheapo]

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Expert on all things pie (pizza included), Ed Levine is compiling a Pie Honor Roll for National Pie Day, and he's looking for your suggestions and nominations. The Northeast -- and NYC specifically -- dominates the list so far; any West Coast or Midwest submissions could even out the playing field. [Serious Eats]

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The New York Times reports today that they found dangerous levels of mercury in a sampling of bluefin tuna bought at 20 New York restaurants and grocers. Some of the highest levels came from the city's most upscale sushi palaces, including Blue Ribbon Sushi (just 2-starred in the Times last week), Nobu Next Door, and Sushi Seki. One expert says after seeing the results, "No one should eat a meal of tuna with mercury levels like those found in the restaurant samples more than about once every three weeks." The article does not imply this problem is endemic to Manhattan, though New Yorkers do have mercury levels in their bloodstreams that are three times the national average.

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Check out this amazing commercial for New York City. Look at how lovely it is! Muppets on tour buses, bobble-head dolls playing at Yankee stadium, cartoon sailboats on the East River -- it's like the New York city conjured up by a five year old. And the Statue of Liberty hasn't waved at me like that since I tripped at the Red Hook Fairway last summer. New Yorkers are always complaining about the "Disneyfication" of Times Square and the like, but this really takes NYC to a whole new level of colorful nonthreatening fairyland. That said, it does vaguely remind me of Yellow Submarine, which is never a bad thing. [Cityrag via Gawker]

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To follow up on the highly successful Ugliest Buildings in New York According to the Experts, last year I solicited opinions from some of London's top architects about the monstrosities in their own city. For various reasons (time constraints, few and wordy responses), we didn't run the piece. But looking back months later, I've realized this is some real gold gathering the proverbial dust in my inbox -- rife with biting commentary, insightful observations, and pure hatred for Norman Foster. So without further ado, I present some of London's most promising architects' answers to the question, "What is the ugliest building in London?" Though many mention the ego-driven ugliness that dots the skyline (the Gherkin for example) the biggest offenses seems to come from lazy and uninspired projects. And almost everyone mentioned the ugliness of St. George Wharf and Tower.

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Turns out that whole idea about chefs getting hazed by their superiors isn't just a rumor -- nor a phenomenon specific to Gordon Ramsay and old-fashioned French chef-tyrants. According to this James Beard site feature, everybody gets harassed, stripped naked, and/or thrown into the garbage and covered in pig's blood. [via]

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Sad: Massachusetts' beloved American Sanitary Plumbing Museum (a.k.a The Toilet Museum), with its collection of 19th-century toilets, sinks, and tubs, will close its doors this spring after 20 years in Worcester. Luckily the company inheriting the collection from the aging museum owner say they will open a new toilet museum in Watertown, just outside Boston. [via]

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In most European cities, getting from the airport to the city center via public transit is a breeze. Not so in the US, land of the highway, where we have to rent cars, take cabs, or beg friends to pick us up in most cities. After contemplating this problem, Gadling complied a list of the most well-connected airports in the US, where you get get from the terminal to City Hall (or your mid-priced hotel) in under an hour. [Gadling]

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