I can't believe I forgot about this until now. Susan Carey wrote the definitive travel horror story for the Wall Street Journal about Northwest Flight 1829 which trapped passengers in a plane on a frozen tarmac for hours in 1999. It is one of the best newspaper features I've ever read: Frozen Northwest: 'I'm opening a door!' 'No, no, don't do it!' 'How about a valium?' Tension on a crowded plane nears the breaking point as it festers, snowbound — A call to Mr. and Mrs. CEO By Susan Carey The 757's toilets overflowed. A hysterical passenger vowed to blow an emergency door and jump into the freezing darkness. A grown man wept and begged to be freed. The air stank. Babies screamed. Adults screamed, too. Anyone who flies regularly has an airline horror story. But short of a crash or a hijacking, few trips are likely to compare to the one taken by the 198 passengers and crew of Northwest Airlines Flight 1829 over the first weekend of the year. It arrived about 22 hours late, and was trapped on the tarmac at its destination for nearly seven hours more. The Wall Street Journal has pieced together what it was like aboard that plane, minute by minute. Fasten your seat belts. It's a bumpy ride. ... Now excuse me, I'm going to go re-read this treasure.

Ambitious, but stupid. Just click play to see how doomed this is from the start.

• Barbara Gutmacher Girard and her mother Rose are teaming up to sell their apartments at the Plaza. The two units on the building's 18th-floor, which Barbara and Rose bought last year for $4.74 million and $3.4 million, respectively, are listed separately for $8.995 million and $5.995 million. Or you can buy the matching apartments as a package deal. Don't expect any sort of bulk discount, however. The two apartments combined are priced at $14.990 million. [Cityfile, BHS, BHS]
• Vicki Rosen-Solomon, the widow of private equity executive Adam Solomon, has gone into contract to sell her co-op at 956 Fifth Avenue. The three-bedroom apartment, which the couple purchased in 2002, was first listed this past September for $14.575 million. [Cityfile, Stribling]

December 22, 1958 The Chipmunks Top the Charts. Way to go Alvin... Alvin? Alvin?! ALVIN!!!

Can you guess what movie this image comes from? Check back for the answer at 4pm today.

The 85-year-old will serve between one and three years on the Astor case, report the Daily News and New York Times. Elsewhere there's holiday travel news. And, of course, Brittany Murphy's past gets dredged up.

Steve A. Cohen is the billionaire hedge fund manager who almost never talks to the press, very rarely appears in public, and does his utmost to keep himself out of the public eye. But he wasn't always that way! Last week, Cohen's first wife slapped him with a $300 million lawsuit, claiming he'd set up an elaborate scheme to cheat her out of millions that she would have otherwise collected as part of a divorce settlement. Now the Post has unearthed an appearance that Cohen made on Cristina in 1992, the short-lived spin-off the Spanish talk show by the same name. The episode, entitled "He Acts Like Her Husband, Too," featured second wives complaining about husbands who continue to maintain relationships with their first wives. And Cohen and his second—and current—wife Alex were guests on the show. The clip that made every jaw on Wall Street drop this morning is below.

Carla Bruni has befriended a homeless man who lives near her Paris home. She gives him cash and even offered to put him up in a hotel for a month. Denis, 53, declined. He's not that kind of guy. [BBC]

Rudy Giuliani will not run for senator, or governor, in 2010, according to several reports. He will endorse Republican Rick Lazio for the statehouse. Which raises the question: just what is he planning to do?

• An autopsy was performed on Brittany Murphy yesterday and while no obvious cause of death was determined, more should be known when toxicology tests are completed in several weeks. Meanwhile, police sources say a huge stash of prescription pills (painkillers, antidepressants, anti-anxiety drugs, antibiotics, etc.) were found at her home. And several of Murphy's friends, colleagues, and acquaintances have told reporters that her death "wasn't a shock," and that substance abuse "had sadly become par for the course." [NYP, NYDN, TMZ]
• In an interview yesterday, Murphy's husband Simon Monjack defended himself against suggestions he was a bad influence on Murphy. Monjack's shady past isn't doing him too many favors, however. The British screenwriter was sued by a bank for close to half a million bucks in 2006 as well as evicted from his apartment the same year. A year before that, he was arrested in Virginia on credit card fraud and theft charges. [AH, NYP, Fox News]
• Back in 2001, Tom Cruise sued a magazine editor named Michael Davis Sapir for saying that Cruise had a "homosexual relationship" and Sapir had a tape to prove it. Now it's Sapir turn. He's suing Cruise, his attorney Bert Fields, and private detective Anthony Pellicano for $5 million, claiming they spied on him and illegally wiretapped his phone. [TMZ, Us]
• The German shepherd that Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony used to own wasn't the friendliest pooch. Not only did Floyd allegedly attack a flight attendant (who is now suing the couple), he supposedly also head-butted a housekeeper and bit one of their personal assistants. [NYDN]

Workers at Goldman Sachs' buildings across New York and New Jersey are grumbling about a conspiracy. A conspiracy by the company to squeeze profit even from its own staff.

As if he didn't make the point perfectly clear a few weeks ago by hinting that he was going to announce his candidacy any moment and then never actually doing so, Rudy Giuliani has no plans to run for Senate—or anything else—in 2010. He'll officially declare his non-candidacy at a press conference later today. [NYDN]

It's a big week for Diane Sawyer. Last night she made her debut on ABC's World News, and today just happens to be her 64th birthday. Others celebrating today: Ralph Fiennes turns 47. Ali Lohan, Lindsay's kid sister, is turning 16. Theater producer Daryl Roth is 65. Vanessa Paradis, the French singer/actress and Johnny Depp's significant other, turns 37. Neocon/Bush crony Paul Wolfowitz is 66. Robin Gibb of the Bee Gees turns 60. And Jordin Sparks, the winner of the sixth season of American Idol, is 19 today.

"Outrage at Grazia magazine after an intern sent out regularly to buy skinny lattes for the beauty desk announced at the end of her stint on the mag that she had in fact been buying them all full-fat ones." [MediaMonkey]

William Rast, the clothing collection conceived by Justin Timberlake, is coming to Gilt Man. The sale begins on December 23 and great denim and leather pieces will be available for up to 70% off retail. Click here to become a member of Gilt Man today.

The collective desire to find something to blame for Brittany Murphy's untimely death channels itself into autopsy results and prescription obsessing; Posh Spice does "the robot"; Lance Bass gay-boyfriends for Jamie-Lynn Sigler; porn star hates sex. Tuesday gossip anon.

Operation: Balloon Boy Rescue cost an estimated $43,000. There goes Falcon's college tuition.

Martha Stewart dropped by Late Night with Jimmy Fallon tonight for two segments. The first: an interview with Fallon, in which Stewart's intrinsic pretentiousness played out hilariously. Later, she and Fallon made croquembouche (and penis jokes). The videos, ahead.

Every year they add a new level to the Dantean inferno that is artistic living in Brooklyn. Now that the youth hostel of infinite microphone feedback, McKibbin flats, is so 00's, they're building an ironic trailer park for 2010.

Too young to play Superwoman, too female to play Superman, Taylor Swift is being eyed to play Supergirl in an upcoming remake of the 1984 flop Supergirl! The Love Story.