Not too long ago it was reported that Jennifer Lopez was ready to burst as her belly swelled with twins on the way. She had visited a Long Island hospital with husband Marc Anthony and her couture hospital gowns, but it must have been a false alarm, because soon after she was attending Fashion Week events. Initially it was reported she would have a Cesarean birth that was scheduled for Valentine's Day; no word yet......

Photograph by edEx on Flickr Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: Jail lockdown at Rikers, truck versus building on Nostrand Avenue in Brooklyn, and a stabbing in Times Square.The Clintons' Chappaqua neighbor accused of killing his wife is moving out and had a garage sale selling his late wife's belongings.Speaking of the Clintons, Congressman Nita Lowery was hospitalized after fainting at an event for Hillary Clinton.Bulletproof vests are distributed to the NYPD's auxiliary police force.Still......

A congenital defect left three chihuahua puppies lacking their forelegs, but between an employee at the North Shore Animal League on Long Island and a company in western Massachusetts, Venus, Carmen and Pablo are three para-pups on the move with aluminum walkers and foam wheels. The equipment only allows the three animals to walk independently for about ten minutes at a time, but if you're familiar with young animals, you probably know that's time well......

A three pound rock that fell from a truck flew through a car windshield, killing the front passenger in Old Brookville. Seventy-five-year-old Rita Oill was pronounced dead at North Shore University Hospital an hour after the 10:15AM incident. She and her daughter Marie Waters were out to do some Thanksgiving shopping. The truck's driver did not stop. Newsday reports that the rock was "about five inches in circumference and about two inches in diameter" and......

An orthodontist was killed while taking his 5-year-old daughter to the Annadale playground at Flushing Meadows Park. Around 11AM, Daniel Malakov was shot in the chest twice by someone who witnesses say was wearing a black fleece. Malakov had been taking his daughter to meet his ex-wife, and his family believes their divorce may be related to his killing. Malakov had won custody of little Michelleka last week "after a brutal court battle," according to......

A 23-year-old Queens woman was saved from a disease that was destroying her kidneys by a most-willing donor: her fiancé. Jarena Bates and Tye Johnson met when Johnson was delivering a couch in Queens and Bates answered the door. They began dating soon after and have been together for five years, getting engaged in January. Bates, who was diagnosed with a kidney disorder when she was 14 years old was diagnosed with nephrotic syndrome shortly......

The NY Times has an article this weekend that focuses on the overused and so over H word. Hipsters! They're still here, in all their b&w; print glory. This time they're settling down in Staten Island to make babies. The new slow-growing hipster mecca has been a nearly silent Siren for a few years, drawing the hipster crowd over from Brooklyn -- the Times even tells us that at least one resident there wears "black......

MUSIC: Not long ago we saw the movie Once, and absolutely loved it. Busker meets girl, deep connection through music...you get the idea. Now the two main characters are touring and singing the songs from the soundtrack. The male lead was of course the singer of The Frames, Glen Hansard, and his female counterpoint is Marketa Irglova. Tonight they take the stage at Gramercy, so it's your chance to see them off the big screen......

We briefly mentioned the wild melee between some Staten Island residents and the cops on July 4th, after the police investigated a call about illegal fireworks. Nineteen people had been arrested, while 10 others received summons, and residents are now complaining that the police were too aggressive. Cops, many of whom were injured, say they were doing their job. The police do admit "an all-out brawl" occurred around 11PM, after a neighbor called to complain......

Police have apprehended three robbers who robbed homes and businesses on Staten Island's North Shore during an 11 day crime spree. And it just so happens the thieves are 13, 14 and 15 years old. The teens used lock picks and other tools to break into the home during the day. Their school had no idea the students were gone, and the Staten Island Advance reveals, "The crew used the Goodhue Playground as a base......

Promoting a civil public school environment is important, but we had no idea that the price you paid for writing on a desk could be so severe. A 13-year-old girl was handcuffed and arrested by the police for writing "okay" on a desk at her Dyker Heights school. WCBS 2 spoke to the Chelsea Fraser and her outraged mother Diana Silva, who said, "I'm appalled, because here we have rapists, murderers, and you're taking a......

What police believe is serial burglar is striking fear into the hearts of many residents of Staten Island's North Shore. Burglaries have been reported in at least 13 homes in the West Brighton and Westerleigh neighborhoods since January 19th. The burglar, whose sketch was released yesterday by the NYPD, typically strikes between 1 p.m. and 9 p.m. and police believe he has been waiting until residents leave their homes during the day. Unlit homes without......

New York magazine has a big feature about the glitz, debauchery, and trouble of West 27th Street nightclubs. In the wake of murders, shootings, raids, accidental deaths, rapes and neighborhood complaints, the clubs have been under the microscope for almost a year now. New York reporter Isaiah Wilner also looks at the reporting the NY Post has done about the clubs. After Moore's murder, the Post's Sunday editor Lauren Ramsby "commanded her reporters to bring......

Brian Stack is a writer and performer on Late Night with Conan O'Brien. You might know him as Frankenstein in the segment Frankenstein Wastes a Minute of Your Time or you might know him for his terrific work as Special Agent in Charge in the film Spaceman. Now you'll know all about Brian's childhood, how he got to where is today, and his limited run Improv show Let's Have A Ball, featuring writers and actors......

You've got to keep your on those wicked scamps over at Property Shark! When their not adding insane data layers to their property map, they are cooking up crazy demographic overlays. For instance, we just noticed that one of their overlays is "Single Men in NYC." The hot areas for high guy percentages: Chinatown, the West Side, Red Hook, and Gowanus, Throgs Neck, and North Shore of Staten Island. Who knew?!......

Tonight, 30 dogs from China will be arriving at JFK Airport, to be put up for adoption at the North Shore Animal League in Port Washington. Newsday reports that these dogs were in a crowded Beijing animal shelter (crowded and Beijing seem synonymous to us) and the International Fund for Animal Welfare decided to step in, saying that the Beijing shelter had "more dogs in the shelter than they can adopt out." Certain breeds of......

Kevin Walsh, Forgotten NY...

If Robert Sullivan's riveting Times magazine article about city rats scared the bejesus out of you (an eleven inch rat, with a ten inch tail...shudder), Gothamist offers you this sweet tale: A sanitation worker came across a litter of day-old black Labrador puppies in Queens. At first, Stephen Falk thought the puppies, freezing behind a Dumpster, might be rats: "I looked down near my feet, blinked, took a second look, then a third, and decided......