Week Around the Ists

Photo of an illuminated stairway during Toronto's Nuit Blanche by Electric Feel.

• Torontoist featured a set of photos of Nuit Blanche, the one night each year when the streets and public and private spaces of Toronto are transformed into one huge contemporary art gallery, Rickrolls, zombies, mascots, unhappy patrons all included.
• Seattlest spotted man's best friend stumping for Obama, talked to Sarah Vowell about the Puritans next door, and then disappeared under a tidal wave of indie-rock plaid.
• Phillyist would just like to remind everyone that its baseball team rules. Go Phils!
• DCist talked to a storeowner who had to move artwork that satirizes Sarah Palin after receiving threats.
• Shanghaiist fell off the chair watching this vlog by a gay expat teen in Shanghai who recently came out to his mom over Skype—only to have her come out to him in return!
• Bostonist interviewed comedians Frank Caliendo and Mike Birbiglia, and named a new cheer for the Fenway faithful: The Papi Pound.
• Gothamist watched the stock market slide thousands of points—which is probably why low-brow humor like this was so welcome.
• Chicagoist was disappointed by both the Cubs and the Sox, celebrated not one but two Nobel Prizes, and explored McCain's claim about Obama's earmark for a planetarium projector.
• Londonist celebrated National Poetry Day with numerous commuting-themed haikus.
• LAist visited artist Shepard Fairey's latest window installation.
• SFist indulged in such political debating as clean energy vs. PG&E, ads for proposition 8 (the same-sex marriage ban), a disgraced city supervisor pleading guilty to extortion, and the death of John McCain.