Question for the NYistas:

My brother's partner just got a much-longed-for promotion (no more horrid network and database support; he's now a fully certified financial planner and investment counselor), and at the beginning of January he and my brother will be moving from Boston to NYC. I got his name in the family Secret Santa draw, and I'd like to get him some new-home/new-city essentials. Any suggestions? Personal items, newspaper and magazine subscriptions, maps and guides, a giant sack of subway tokens, gift certificates to particular groceries or delis or restaurants?

I'll be checking with my brother, too, but since he's never actually lived in NY and all y'all have, I wanted to check with the hivemind first.

Well, tokens are no more.

A nice fat metro card would be handy until he decides if he wants a weekly or monthly pass (and occasionally nice to have even after he starts using one). There are also little metro card holders (sorta like a hollow credit card you can slide the sucker into) and I love mine.

Subway and bus maps are easily obtained. In fact, I'll pick some up for you and pop them in the mail if you'd like so you can make a little packet of them.

A subscription to Time Out New York would certainly get him in the know about any number of forms of NYC entertainment.

A gift card to Zabars wouldn't suck -- it is arguably the new yorkiest of the new yorky markets.

I received a gift sub to Time Out New York when I first moved here and it was a great idea-- helped me acclimate to the ins and outs of local culture. Plus it's like $20. Maps and metrocard are also good ideas. More:

• TONY restaurant guide
• iPod headphones
• GC to Fresh Direct, if they've got them
• Duane Reade discount card

There are a few books about relocating to the city, though I don't recommend any specifically. There's the NYT book on various neighborhoods, based on their "So you want to live in..." feature.

Hot cup of more sleep!

I got one of those! yay me. I think I still have time to go get breakfast too.

I second the TONY subscription rec, and maybe a Not For Tourists guidebook.

ION, I finally got the facial recognition software working, and it told me that this picture looked like Hillary Clinton and Werner Herzog. Um.

There are various Gay New York guides they might find handy.

Okay, this picture gives me Grace Kelly. I can live with that.

No, indeedy. I suspect some of the Holocaust Deniers are an extreme version of putting fingers in the ears, closing the eyes and chanting "la la la". (The rest are just assholes.)

The grandfather of a former co-worker of mine was among the US troops that were sent in to help out after the camps were liberated in '45. Buchenwald, if I recall correctly. He would (rightfully) get apopleptic whenever he heard anyone suggest that the Holocaust was exaggerated or faked.

I just got a thank you note from a manager in an unrelated department whose employees I'm wrangling in a project that has nothing to do with my department, and will end up making him look good. It's the little things, and I damned well appreciate it.

On the down side, I think the no-sugar-added latte does have artificial sweetener in it, despite the barista (can you say that for a Coffee Bean employee) assuring me it was unsweetened. Which means extra headache. Damn, it tasted good around that noxious slickness.

Saw an e-mail that voiced a concern about looking like "a bunch of armatures." I wonder if anyone pointed this out to the author...I'm certainly not going to.

tommyrot, if you throw in some giant mutated fruit flies to your fruit stand movie, you could probably get the Sci Fi channel to go for it.