Thursday, June 28, 2007, sometime before noon: A colorful pheasant materialized near the drive-thru window of the Burger King located at 7100 Amboy Rd. on Staten Island. Employees walked outside to greet the peacock with offerings of love and bread. Moments later, John Potts, 32, an area man with a known history of mental issues, entered the parking lot and began violently attacking the bird. Read more Read it in print

Over the last three decades numerous dubious foodstuffs have passed twixt my lips, from spicy horse jerky (chewy!) to sautéed lamb mammary (squishy!) to stir-fried pork bung (rubbery!). But till last week, I’d never experienced the gustatory pleasures of sperm. To rectify that glaring culinary omission, I licked my lips and sought out shirako, aka cod milt, aka cod sperm. Come winter, the cod is mature and raring to mate. Before it can spread its seed, the cod is caught and its baby batter—a fat blob that recalls brains—is carefully harvested. Read more Read it in print

If nothing else, New York City is divine at destroying itself. I could harp on Penn Station and Ebbets Field—architectural monuments martyred to the gods of progress—but I’m too hairy to be mistaken for Jane Jacobs. Besides, I’m more concerned with comestibles.Thus, this’ll be an elegy for the oyster. More than 150 years ago, New York’s waterways were choked with oyster beds, which provided sustenance for city-dwellers of every stripe: High-class swells could sup on oysters Rockefeller at Delmonico’s, while the proletariat dined on bivalves by the pail. Shuck ’em, slurp ’em, chuck ’em—oysters seemed as inexhaustible as bison. Oh, the 19th-century’s sweet naiveté. Read more Read it in print

I’m the kind of guy who apologizes for a bump on the subway in the middle of rush hour. I don’t want to ruffle any feathers or cause trouble. This is the same mindset that dictates avoiding eye contact and wearing a hood at all times. I guess this could make me a good target for scammers, seeing as how I would rather err on the side of caution and give a guy five bucks for accidentally breaking his bottle of booze, than fight with him over it. Ah, the follies of freshmen year. But that all changed one day when the con was so obvious, the lie so transparent, that I couldn’t help but take a stand. Read more Read it in print

During my hormone-ravaged youth, I’d often encircle my younger brother with elastic luggage straps then suspend him upside down, like a side of sevenyear-old beef. Or I’d lock him in a darkened closet with no company except his racing, panicked thoughts. “Let me ouwwwwwwt!” Jon would holler, cries drowned by Smashing Pumpkins cranked to 11.Yes, today was the greatest day I’d ever known. Read more Read it in print

PEOPLE ARE ALWAYS telling me that the early bird gets the worm, but for as long as I can remember, the satisfaction of sleeping in has far outweighed the promise of any worms that could have come my way. Read more Read it in print

It was a lazy weeknight, with a computer on my belly broadcasting horror flick Santa’s Slay, when my girlfriend’s scream pierced the night like a steam whistle. I hit pause—satanic Santa had just impaled a Jew with a menorah—and sprinted to the kitchen. Had hoodlums descended our fire escape? Or was something nefarious afoot at the neighboring assisted-care facility? Narcotics, the elderly and nurses can be a wicked brew. Read more Read it in print

Like millions of Americans celebrating baby Jesus’ birthday, I spent December 25 at a movie theater. But how many people prepared for a film by watching their girlfriend’s brother puff pot in a windy New Hampshire parking lot? “Want to get high?” asked the bro, his muttonchops as thick as his eyes were red. I reached for the smoking bowl and then recoiled, as if it were a hissing rattlesnake. Read more Read it in print

To the long, irrational list of substances I despise, allow me to add champagne, that celebratory bathwater better suited for spraying than sipping.Though bubbles can be as invigorating as a Coney Island plunge come January, I find champagne’s dry sourness as noxious as Glenn Beck. When toasting, I favor effervescent Stoudt’s Pils—a lively low-alcohol beer that doesn’t cause a temples-crushing hangover—to champagne’s morning-after gift. Read more Read it in print

LATELY, DEAR READERS, I’ve suffered in unthinkable fashion: I’ve worn pants and T-shirts and worked in a Midtown office. To blame? The monetary demands of a holiday I don’t celebrate. Read more Read it in print