Well, that's a creative way to protest Scientology.........

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Photograph of investigation at Times Square recruiting center by kerfuffle & zeitgeist on Flickr Gothamist found that an explosive set off outside the Times Square army recruiting center may be similar to five past bombings in New York City.Seattlest worried when severed right feet and bottles of rat poison started washing up on local beaches.Shanghaiist was surprised by Bjork's rooting for Tibetan independence at her concert (see video), and the political fallout has only......

With a preliminary hearing for the case scheduled for tomorrow, the Inquirer takes another look at the 41-year long murder of Police Officer William Barclay. Pennsylvania officials will decide soon whether to spend $45 million to build a stadium in Chester as the final step toward securing a Major League Soccer team for the Philadelphia area. Right now, Philly is second behind St. Louis for the remaining expansion slot, its chances contingent on a stadium......

Rock chamber ensemble? What does that even mean? In case you were a bit fuzzy on the concept like I was, it means classically trained musicians have taken up rock instruments and play music composed by classically-trained composers. In short, high-art rock music. Not a bad idea, right? As a result, I was pleasantly surprised and very impressed with rock chamber ensembles Newspeak and Electric Kompany presented by Chamber Music Now! in their season opener.......

As it gets closer to Halloween for LAist, a contributer recollects her tale of staring down the serial killer, Richard Ramirez, otherwise known as the Night Stalker. Must think happy thoughts -- okay, free organic chocolate chip cookies for Los Angeles -- now that's a happy thought. Other happy Los Angeles thoughts include an interview with Jack Kehler of The Big Lebowski (he was the Dude's landlord), a beautiful and magical photographic moment in Venice......

The Daily News discusses the biggest appointment the next Mayor will have to make: the police commissioner. Nominations are being accepted now for the Citadel Heart of Learning Awards, which honor the best educators in Chester County. Anyone can submit a nomination online at www.citadelheartoflearning.com between October 1st and December 31st. There was a fire Tuesday night at a Northeast Philadelphia warehouse where a Mummers group stored its props, and Fire Department investigators ruled yesterday......

Protest over national vs. regional chains, the never-ending debate over the place of cars and bicycles in our metropolises, professional sports scandals, remembering a solemn day, and being issued a search warrant - it all happened across our sites this week! Another banner week at Chicagoist started off with daily reports from food writer Lisa Shames on her attempt to eat only locally grown and raised foodstuffs all week as part of a farmers market......

According to Phillyblog, there's a protest tonight from 5 to 7 at the Sugar House site on Delaware and Frankford Avenues: Many Northern Liberties residents and business owners, whether for or against casinos in general, have expressed opposition to the location of the Sugar House casino, which would be on the northeast corner of our community, as little as 190 feet from residential homes. Accordingly, the NLNA has joined with two dozen other neighborhood groups......

Plan Philly has an article about that roundtable discussion amongst bloggers, reporters, and academics about the future of Philadelphia. Our own Jill Ivey was there to offer her insights. Go Phillyist! An 18-year-old former Philadelphian has admitted guilt in two armed bank robberies in April in South Jersey, as well as an attempted carjacking and a home invasion following the second robbery. The Tut exhibit at the Franklin Institute is on track "to break......

So remember the other day when we told you how hilaaaaaarious Mike Birbiglia is, and how you should totally go see his show this week? We wouldn't tell you to do something we wouldn't do ourselves. (Well, that's a lie. We often tell people to do things we wouldn't, simply because the outcome is pretty funny. Example: Go try to eat ten saltines in under a minute with no water. We'll be waiting.) Our......

Banner week for SFist as the site's new editor introduced himself -- hooray for Brock! While the NY Times weighed in on SF's mayoral race, only SFist had the (insert tongue firmly into cheek) hard-hitting latest on candidate/activist Josh Wolf. Coverage of a protest vs. gentrification spawned a fantastic debate amongst SFist's readers. Finally, from the sublime to the ridiculous: video of a man that confused a Board of Supes meeting with "open mic......

We went because we miss Rage Against the Machine. We went because he's an amazing guitarist. We went because we were curious about The Nightwatchman's (aka Tom Morello's) brand of folk rock. Doesn't hurt that he's hot. We left a convert. Not a buy-the-album-and-stick-around-for-the-meet-and-greet convert, but a wow-I've-got-to-get-my-ass-in-gear-and-get-involved convert. What other musician is writing an album full of real protest songs these days? We're not talking about the b-side throwaway songs artists write so they......

Seattlest has a talk with the photographer from last week's "Segway Mom" and then experiences some dissension in the ranks over the question of wine vs. beer. It's not West Side Story, but about as close as they'll get. They're also still waiting on some inbox relief after a spammer is arrested. As Chicagoist counts down the days to its third anniversary party, they found all-organic pizza to be underwhelming amidst the hoopla, tried......

All across the Ist-A-Verse (or at least the American parts thereof), writers and editors are in the midst of enjoying their three-day weekend. But after the week we've all had, we feel like the break is not only needed, but deserved. Just look at everything we've been doing! Gothamist headed into the Memorial Day weekend with a number of tasks accomplished. They worried about Long Islanders giving New Yorkers a bad name. They tried......

We all know where the quote comes from, and with a show going up that's centered around music of the Vietnam era, it seemed appropriate enough. Now, on with the listings! Hair - Boobies! Onstage! May 26-June 17. Tickets online. Pirates of Penzance - The very model of a modern major general. June 1-17. Ticket reservations online. War Songs II: More Songs of the Vietnam Era - Because who doesn’t dig 60s-era protest music? May......

There's so much going on across the Ist-a-Verse that it's almost impossible to keep track these days. Fortunately, we do it so you don't have to! Londonist took a walk through Oliver Twist's London, thanks to a gorgeous map layer for Google Earth. They also caught up with modern-day fictional London, with the Fantastic Four and 28 Weeks Later. It was a week of insanity over at DCist. They started the week off with......

Usually, you think of writers as people who write, um, books and stuff. The things they write are meant to be read, not performed. Right? Well, not according to InterAct Theatre Company, which tonight will be presenting Writing Aloud: Coming to Terms, "an evening of four short fictional stories by area writers read aloud by Philadelphia's best actors," and the latest in InterAct's Writing Aloud series. Tonight's featured works will be: "The Haircut"Written by Linda......

With all that went down this week, we thought we'd cheer everyone up by giving everyone a double dose of dogs. It was a rollercoaster ride of emotions this week at DCist. Like the rest of country, we were floored by the news of so many dead coming out of Virginia Tech, and with so many of the victims and their relatives from the D.C. area, we felt it important to pay tribute to those......

The Inquirer has more on what Prince Charles will be doing on his visit to the city next weekend. The police are killing a lot of people this year, and the Inquirer is looking into why. Weirdly enough, the inspectors found no mechanical problems in the Pennsbury runaway bus. Meanwhile, the girl who was critically injured in that accident has had most of her left leg removed due to an infection, and as of Sunday......

As 2006 ends and 2007 begins, the -ists look back not at the past week, but at the past year. So here it is, your Best of 2006 Spectacular. And from all of us at the -ists, happy New Year! Austinist was all about controversy as new construction to increase urban density ran rampant in 2006, as did threats to the city's image from gigantic corporations looking to set up shop in town, leading......

Guess who Phillyist is going to see Saturday night? BOB FREAKING DYLAN, that's who!! Sure, he's getting old, and we hear he's not always the best live performer anymore, what with his froggy voice and all, but the guy is a living legend - one of the greatest, if not the greatest, songwriters of our time; a man who changed rock and roll and folk music forever; whose protest songs actually made things happen; whose......

- Thanksgiving is coming - which always means travel headaches, but Philadelphians may have more long-lasting travel woes. It has been proposed that the gas tax be raised 12.5 cents a gallon, and, naturally, there's still the ever-looming threat of raising SEPTA fares while cutting their service sometime next year. Clearly, we all need to find jobs where we walk to work. (via) - Geno's owner and champion of English-only ordering, Joey Vento, has donated......

Last night, as promised, I attended the Celebration, The Blood Brothers, and ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead show (Brothers and Sisters cancelled) at the Troc - hopefully our contest winner was there, too, and had plenty of fun. I want to be honest about my experience at the show, so I'm going to start by admitting something that may make you all think less of me: I had never heard......

Two local police dispatchers have allegedly crossed the Thin Blue Line by selling the names and addresses of suspected drug dealers to a would-be-robber. Only the erstwhile robber was, in fact, a government informant. More recent shootings means we might exceed last year's homicide count. Tomorrow is "The World Can't Wait" protest, when " people everywhere will walk out of school, take off work, and come to the downtowns & townsquares" to march against......

We got the heads-up a while back that a flash mob would be forming at Geno's on Saturday, 9/9 to order steaks in languages other than English, in protest of the infamous "English ONLY" sign. We debated whether to post about it here or not, fearing the news might get to the staff of Geno's before the big day, and ruin the surprise. By the time we were done debating, the event had already occurred.......

The Daily News tried to track down the people behind some T-shirts they'd seen that seem to glorify crime and violence. They didn't have much luck. We're personally a fan of the one that looks like the Warner Brothers logo, except it's been altered to read "If you see the cops coming...Warn a Brother." Besides freedom and democracy, we're also bringing soccer to the Iraqi people. A Marine who grew up in the Philly......

Taxi drivers were on strike yesterday morning at the Philadelphia International Airport, forcing travelers to use other forms of transportation (such as limos, vans, and the R1 line). The cab drivers are still up in arms about those new requirements for their vehicles, which include the installation of GPS units, and a limit of 250,000 miles. Speaking of transportation problems, you should be aware that the El will not be running (due to reconstruction efforts)......

U. Penn experts are going to train a new police unit called Homicide Prevention to try to spot potential killers amongst offenders already under the supervision of the criminal justice system. Those predicted to commit homicides will then be set aside for "intensified supervision and treatment." Of course, a vat of freaky bald precogs might be more effective and accurate, but probably harder to come by... Driving through Norristown and other areas of the city......

The lucky ones who got tickets before the multiple sell outs will gather together tonight at the Starlight Ballroom to mourn the passing of a great rock band: Sleater-Kinney. Yep, the girls are going on "indefinite hiatus" after this tour, so for all intents and purposes this will be their last show in Philly. S-K came together during the riot grrl movement of the early '90s, but quickly stepped out from the pack and......