The woman who had to give up her 44-pound cat--who took the country by storm as Princess Chunk when it was thought she was a girl (but actually he's a boy named Powder!)--spoke out, hoping to set the record straight. Powder was found wandering around Voorhees, NJ before the Camden County Animal Shelter took him in, and some have wondered why the cat wasn't sent to the shelter in the first place. After her......

Princess Chunk's visit with Regis and Kelly was very enlightening: America learned that its favorite 44-pound obese feline was actually a boy! The Camden County Animal Shelter had originally named the cat, found wandering around Voorhees, NJ, "Captain Chunk," but gave it the royal, feminine name after thinking it was actually a girl. What happened to gender-neutral names, like "Whiskers"?! It also turns out Princess Chunk did have an owner: An elderly woman who,......

Today will be quite the media tour for newly-minted celebrity Princess Chunk. So what if she's a 44-pound cat, found wandering in Voorhees, NJ without a collar? The cat will be on The Today Show and visit Regis Philbin and Kelly Ripa, so be ready for some crazy daytime antics (will Ann Curry try to walk Princess Chunk? will Regis ask the full-figured feline to be his co-host when Kelly's on vacation?). And on Friday,......

Let it to an obese NJ feline to give the NY Post a chance to have a "Pussy galore!" half cover. Camden County shelter officials in NJ say the cat, who they named "Princess Chunk," was found wandering around without a collar. A volunteer told the Courier-Post, "How do you lose a 44-pound cat?!" Princess Chunk, described as being "built like a quarterback," was weighed on the dog scale because she was too big for......

This week a story got some ink that raised the question: can't a man just save a cat? 49-year-old Chris Muth was put in a psych ward (where they called him "cat man") for doing just that...but upon his release the NY Post reports that he lost his home, his job and his girlfriend. The Carroll Gardens condo owner told him, while hospitalized, that he was "a nice guy" but "too exciting" and had to......

The Brooklyn Paper reports on a 7-year-old cat that was trapped in a narrow shaft in a Carroll Gardens apartment building, three floors below where it was supposed to be. It took over two weeks to get it out, but that's not was garnered the story so much attention. Turns out Rumi, the cat, was just fine, but Chris Muth, the cat-sitter, landed in a mental hospital during the ordeal! His medical records were brandished......

We have wondered why people put their cats on leashes and it seems the only answer is "Why not?" Today, the NY Times' City Section confirms that answer, with a charming article about Corcoran broker Court Hassinger whose Abyssinian Radar enjoys constitutionals around the Upper West Side. In spite of Radar's previous escapes and in spite of people asking, "Is that a rat there on the end of that leash?”, Hassinger takes Radar (who he......

Attention, outgoing felines and their human companions: The Meow Mix Game Show is having auditions tomorrow and Sunday to find contestants for "the world’s first game show to test how well people can think like their cat." Sleep...groom...chase a fly...sleep. We're told the audition includes a written quiz on cat knowledge/trivia (for the humans, we imagine) and then a Hollywood-style screen test to see how the person-putty tat pair look on camera. For every......

Sadie, by AllWaysNY at flickr Given that the MTA project billion-dollar budget gaps in future years and that the cash cow of congestion pricing never made it to the altar, there may be a good idea of increasing revenue by way of Japan. The Associated Press has a story about a "money-losing Japanese train company" whose new lease on business life is thanks to a calico cat named Tama:All the 9-year-old female cat does......

Images of the shrapnel-damaged bedroom from WNBC A NJ family is very angry at the Army for "misfiring" a projectile and having part of a shell crash through their roof and onto their daughter's bed. Their 10-year-old daughter had just left for a sleepover, but the family cat who was sleeping there was so seriously injured she had to be euthanized. The 6-inch by 4-inch, 2-pound piece of shrapnel lay smoldering on the bed......

Another heartbreaking tale of animal abandonment reached our inbox this weekend, but this one could have a happy ending. Here's the story:While walking my dogs this afternoon I found a cat with magical green eyes, a cat that looks to be a housecat, who has lived her entire life safe and cared for, suddenly now abandoned on the New York winter streets in her cat carrier with the door open left to die. Someone......

What is it about people who abuse their significant others' pets? A 24-year-old construction worker David Wrigley was charged with aggravated cruelty to animals after crushing and squeezing the cats. The cats, tabby Madeline and black cat Jynx, belonged to his girlfriend Sara Sabol, whose Selden, Long Island home Wrigley moved into at the beginning of the month. According to police lieutenant Michael Murphy, "The cats didn't take to him. They didn't like him, wouldn't......

Georgia, the runaway subway cat rescued by a Con Ed meter reader and two determined MTA track workers, is resting up not just from her 25 days in the subway tunnels, but from surgery yesterday to repair a fractured leg. The doctors at Fifth Avenue Veterinary Specialists waited until yesterday to perform the surgery because Georgia was dehydrated at the time of her rescue and they wanted her stabilized before they performed the procedure. The......

One cat owner is hoping that her kitten will turn up after escaping at the 59th Street uptown 6 platform earlier this week. Ashely Phillips had just gotten black kitteh Georgia (pictured) spayed at the Humane Society when the feline somehow escaped her carrier "and just took off." Phillips told the Daily News a train was pulling in when Georgia "jumped onto the tracks": "I'm hoping she's down there somewhere and she's okay...but I'm also......

Photograph by lisacat on Flickr; full photo set here Our heart melted when we read how this adorable kitten made its way to the Brooklyn Animal Resource Coalition:BARC Shelter's kennel manager, Jose, made an unusual rescue last Saturday afternoon. A man named Richard thinks he has a kitten under the hood of his Chevy Tahoe. He's driving and has his dog Duff in the car with him. Duff doesn't like other dogs and really......

Thank goodness WCBS 880 updated its story about a stray cat who was seen in NJ with a bottle stuck on its head. Raritan Township Animal Control and ASPCA helped save the cat! The cat had been without water or food for at least 10 days, because it was first seen with the bottle on its head on New Year's Eve. The cat was "near death" when it was rescued; the rescue took so......

In recent weeks both a man and a woman have been charged with senseless violence against small defenseless animals - the woman for beating her boyfriend's cat to death, the man seriously injuring a girlfriend's dog. Sarah Favorite is a 25-year-old woman who allegedly became angry at her boyfriend's Siamese cat Yoda. Annoyed by the animal, the young woman allegedly throttled the 17-year-old cat and repeatedly bashed it against the floor on November 29 and......

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a ceiling collapse at Franklin Ave. and Union St. in Brooklyn, a pedestrian was fatally struck on Queens Blvd. in Woodhaven, Queens, and an unusual rescue on the south bound tower of the Throgs Neck Bridge in Queens. An undercover cop forgot to turn off the wire he was wearing while discussing 11 bags of cocaine he seized in a Brooklyn bust that were never turned in. He was......

...and a thousand Photoshop files were launched! Diane Sawyer may be a veteran journalist and may seem totally unflappable, but even she has totally embarrassing moments. This morning, during a segment unveiling Good Morning America's new holiday windows from the New York Botanical Gardens, she called Mayor Bloomberg a "munchkin." Really: “As a little munchkin, did you come to New York?” To be fair, she was asking Bloomberg whether he visited New York during......

The holiday-time movie releases are starting to pile up with their usual feverish frequency. Some have Christmas themes, like the widely reviled Vince Vaughn vehicle Fred Claus that’s already roadkill on the lost highway of cinema history; others, like Ridley Scott’s American Gangster, are timed to make an impression as close to Academy Award-voting season as possible. Here are some of the biggest gorillas set to dominate New York’s screens in the next six......

This week in the Times, Bruni one-stars Sam Mason’s Tailor. Loves the design of the place, and—along with everyone else—the pork belly, the arctic char and the drinks. Overall? “[Mason’s] infatuation with his own imagination doesn’t leave room enough for a self-appraisal of the results… a duck-and-eel terrine in a chocolate consommé tastes like cat food splashed with Yoo-hoo.” Hee. In Dining Briefs, Bruni goes to Toloache. Calls the upscale Mexican restaurant a “welcome addition”......

City officials are warning drivers that they should expect to spend more time sitting in traffic than waiting in line while holiday shopping. Today is the first of nine designated holiday gridlock days, when the city tries to head off street-clogging traffic that can frustrate even a seasoned city driver. NY1 quotes some professional drivers and visitors on how bad traffic can be around Thanksgiving and the holidays in New York. “Oh man, traffic is......

A woman who used to volunteer at the BARC cat loft has a great tale of a kitten she met on the Queensboro Bridge one morning while running. His name is Jeff Bridges.Jeff Bridges is the kitten I found while I was running over the Queensboro Bridge Thursday morning. How the hell he got on the pedestrian walkway of the bridge–a long, long fall on the right, eight lanes of traffic on the left......

The Mermaid Inn, that inviting East Village bistro beloved for its rich seafood entrees, has moved on up to the west side with a mostly new menu. Their second Manhattan outpost is appointed with old nautical maps, dark wainscoting and roll-up doors that will surely suck in the crowds during warmer months. (Alec Baldwin must be pleased about the eatery boosting Amsterdam Avenue’s cachet.) The Inn’s famous lobster sandwich survived the move, but there’s now......

Bacaro: Frank DeCarlo of Peasant and his wife Dulcinea Benson transport you to Venice in their 80-seat wine bar/restaurant on the Lower East Side. Northern Italian menu offerings include cicchetti, (think Venetian bar snacks) like crostini, sardines, artichokes, and more, cheeses selected by Lou DiPalo, and pastas, quail, and duck for those seeking heartier fare. 136 Division Street, between Orchard and Ludlow Streets, 212-941-5060. Blue Ribbon Sushi Bar and Grill: The Blue Ribbon team is......

If you’ve got a sweet tooth and a couple hundred bucks to blow, you’ll want to mark your calendar for Friday November 16th, when the Food Network throws New York’s “largest dessert party ever.” Called Sweet, the event will unleash a massive tsunami of temptations from some of NewYork’s top pastry chefs, confectioners, cheese makers, bakers and chocolatiers. To wash it all down there’ll be a wide selection of champagne and wine, including samples from......

For those not wanting to hit the big Halloween parade (led by today's interviewee) there are other options: Park Slope's Halloween Parade (info here), Clinton Hill's Halloween Walk (info here) Prospect Park South's Halloween Parade (info here) and Williamsburg's Witches Walk (info here). EVENT: Hallowe'en is Happening Downtown at Trinty Church where both both kids and adults will find spooky spectacles tonight. For the little ones there will be an early evening filled with games,......

Today at noon, animal advocates will be holding a rally outside the Port Authority's headquarters at 225 Park Avenue South (between 18th and 19th Streets) to protest the PA's decision to round up feral cats at JFK Airport. The rally is organized by Neighborhood Cats and In Defense of Animals, two of many rescue groups who question the agency's reasoning that cats pose a danger to air traffic safety. In fact, Neighborhood Cats offers......

Mayor David Dinkins, who preceded Mayor Giuliani in office from 1990 to 1993, had his appendix removed in an emergency surgery Friday when it was determined that he was suffering from appendicitis. Dinkins was actually visiting his doctor for a routine flu shot, when he complained that he had a sharp pain in his side. A CAT scan revealed the inflamed and infected appendix--a condition that can be lethal if the vestigial organ bursts. Dinkins......

The Mayor's Alliance for NYC's Animals thinks the Port Authority is a liar when it comes to how the agency will handle the the tens to possibly hundreds of cats it hopes to trap from the grounds of JFK Airport. The Port Authority ramped up its cat trapping efforts, claiming that cats were a danger to air safety and passengers, since leftover food (much of it given by airport and airline workers) would attract rodents......