And Then The Third Term Turned Magical

All it took was a bold prediction:

Officials shelled out [$10,400} to buy Keys to the City for the [New York Giants] days before Big Blue even squared off against the San Francisco 49ers in the NFC championship game.

Ashburns Engravers in lower Manhattan got the order to make 104 keys at $100 each on Jan. 18, store owner Dan DePrima, 78, said.

“Are you sure you want to order this? How do you know they’re going to win?” DePrima said he asked the city employee who requested the keys.

“They placed the order in the hopes the Giants would win.”

Will Wonders Never, Ever Cease?

Never, ever:

Weighing 267 pounds and measuring 29.2 inches in diameter, the biggest matzo ball in the world was unveiled Thursday and served up to hungry lower East Siders.

The giant kosher creation was schlepped across the city with a police escort after spending 19.5 hours on a slow boil in a custom-made 100-gallon New Jersey kettle.

The Achievement Gap

New York City sucks and it’s getting worse:

A New Yorker would have to make $123,322 a year to have the same standard of living as someone making $50,000 in Houston.

And with findings like this, it won’t be long before we have to seriously contend with the crushing burden of one million new residents, which underpins the mayor’s ambitious 2030 plan for the city. Or not:

Researchers said the combination of skyrocketing costs, stagnant wages and a deteriorating quality of life forced hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers to flee the city for cheaper areas during the boom years from 2002 to 2006.

The report found that more New Yorkers left each year during the boom than left during the dark days of the early 1990s.

Location, Location, Location!

And Mildew, Roaches and Bed Bugs!:

The Hotel Carter was named the dirtiest hotel in America Tuesday by TripAdvisor.com, marking the third time in four years that the W. 43rd St. dump has topped the list.

. . .

The hotel, used as a homeless shelter in the 1980s, gained infamy two years ago when a cleaning lady found a woman’s corpse stuffed under a bed.

A 17th-floor room rented by the Daily News was thankfully corpse-free. And while it was small and sparsely appointed, it wasn’t dirty. The bathroom was nearly spotless and the bed linens unstained.

The room’s most serious flaw was a lone picture frame, covered in a substance one can only hope was mildew. In the hallway outside, a garbage bag filled with used tissues, lay open on the dark-green carpet.

The hotel’s wretched reputation wasn’t news to one worker.

“Just Google ‘Carter and bed bugs.’ You’ll read all about it,” she said. “Roaches, bugs — you’ll find everything inside here.”

Hotel manager Erwin Lumanglas brushed aside its reputation.

“We are not bothered at all,” Lumanglas said. “Even when they tell us we’re the dirtiest hotel in the world, people are still interested in coming because of the price and the location.”

Location Scout: Hotel Carter.

The House That Ruth The Methamphetamine-Addicted Russian Prostitute Built

Another gentlemen’s club is reborn in the space formerly occupied by Scores:

“It’s like Yankee Stadium,” Antony, a security guard, said over his shoulder, leading the way through the thumping entrance of what used to be the original East Side location of Scores strip club.

Scores lost its battle with the state over its liquor license last year. Since then, the Las Vegas-based empire, Sapphire Gentlemen’s Club, has moved in, and last night was their official opening in New York.

Sapphire made sure to bring yards of neon sapphire blue back-lighting, a fluorescent, engraved pompadour-shaped ice-sculpture, plushier (much plush-ier, according to the dancers) leather chairs, new carpeting, a concierge service, and a new chef — Jayson Margulies from Robert’s Steak House at the Penthouse Executive Club.

Antony, like other security guards on Thursday night, wore a dark suit with an aquarium blue skinny-tie.

“Yankee Stadium,” he continued dreamily. “That’s what it’s like with this particular venue. This is the granddaddy of gentleman’s clubs, For years when I was growing up they were called strip bars or something else, some less politically correct kind of word, you know what I mean. But you walk in here and you are called ‘sir’ or ‘ma’am,’ and you get the white-glove treatment from the minute you walk in the door. That’s how this franchise does the thing.”

Sapphire’s main room looks largely identical to the old Scores, largely because there were no actual construction renovations done. The layout, too, is similar: bar to the left, mirrored wall and couches on the right, the stage front and center.