• Openings: Michael Huynh's OBAO opens tonight. Rye House, a Flatiron gastropub just opened; and a roundup of other spots opening shortly.
• Cafe Gitane's second location opens at the Jane Hotel tomorrow. [GS]
• Taavo Somer of Freemans and the Rusty Knot is looking to expand. [Eater]
• Add Boston to the list of locations where Shake Shack is expanding. [GS]
• If you turn up at the NYC outpost of Le Caprice and you're not famous or important enough, expect to be turned away. Even if it's empty. [NYP]
• Take the wine ratings and reviews you read with a grain of salt. [WSJ]
• A Q&A with Nick Anderer, the chef at the newly opened Maialino. [Zagat]
• The Four Seasons is going to war with a caterer by the same name. [NYDN]
• The life of a Michelin inspector doesn't sound like much fun. [NYer]

When the young dreamers out there conjure images of Manhattan they think of beauty, art, fashion, socialites, the skyline, and all-around general fabulousness. Well, most New Yorkers don't get that on a daily basis, but this video has them all.

• Oprah's interview with Sarah Palin aired today, as you know by now. [AP]
• The deal between GE and Comcast to give the cable giant control of NBC Universal could be finalized in the next few days/weeks, although approval from Washington could take some time. [DF, THR, WSJ]
• Lou Dobbs didn't walk away from $9 million when he departed CNN. He reportedly got paid $8 million in severance to walk out the door. [NYP]
• The largest gay newspaper publisher in the U.S. has shuttered. [NYT]
• Budget Travel may be the magazine to die. [Daily Intel]
• The cost-cutting McKinsey consultants have landed at Dow Jones. [Forbes]
• 2012 destroyed the box office this weekend, reeling in $65 million. [THR]

Not everyone is looking to get out of jury duty. Thanks to the recession and the $40-a-day stipend provided to people who take part, people are now calling up and requesting to serve, apparently. [NYP]

Because every living celebrity has already launched a perfume line of his or her own in recent years, a company is now offering scents using the DNA of dead ones. [The Phoenix via Style.com]

Ivanka TrumpKushner is very upset about a profile of her and her new husband Jared that Crain's ran yesterday. Thanks for bringing that story to our attention, Ivanka! Also: The KushnerTrump brand is the future of the New York Observer.

The Freedom Tower at Ground Zero has been in the works for years and years now—and it still won't be finished until 2018—but just so it isn't delayed by any errant workers who might slip off for ten minutes to go fetch a sandwich, the geniuses at the Port Authority have decided to install a Subway on-site.

Now that the city is planning to move forward with a ban on smoking in public parks, a new battleground has opened up in the war on tobacco. Several NYC landlords are now planning to ban smoking in their buildings and are informing tenants that if they smoke inside their apartments, they may be subject to eviction. If you happen to live in one of those buildings and you're a smoker, perhaps you could try and work out an exemption by pretending you have chronic back pain? Hey, you never know. [NYT]

So much for those TV commercials that Gov. David Paterson was hoping would boost his popularity (and which he spent half a million dollars on): According to a new poll, Paterson now trails Andrew Cuomo by a staggering 59 points in a potential primary next year. [NYP]

Saturday's auction of assorted jewelry, clothing, and housewares that once belonged to Bernie and Ruth Madoff was far more successful than anyone suspected. The sale brought in just under a million dollars, or nearly double what had been anticipated in advance. (That satin Mets jacket with "Madoff" on it? It sold for $14,500, although the pre-bid estimate had only been $500.) But if you missed Saturday's proceedings, there's still time to grab a piece of the Ponzi king's spoils: Three of his boats go up for sale tomorrow. [NYT, NYP]

Meg Ryan and Nora Ephron leaving Esca after having lunch on Friday ... Marc Jacobs and Lorenzo Martone walking in the West Village ... Celine Dion and Rene Angelil leaving their hotel en route to lunch at Da Tommaso on Eighth Avenue ... Alex Rodriguez walking in Midtown ... Jessica Stam hanging with boyfriend Austin Cregg and friends downtown ... Shia LaBeouf listening to music on the set of Wall Street 2 ... Nicole Kidman getting out of a car with daughter ... Taylor Momsen walking to the set of Gossip Girl ... James Gandolfini signing autographs outside the Bernard Jacobs Theatre ... Ruben Studdard arriving at JFK ... Liev Schreiber and Naomi Watts pushing son Samuel in a stroller ... and Sienna Miller getting out of a cab.

• Todd Morley, founding partner of the asset management firm Guggenheim Capital and the Duchess of York's former business adviser, has put his two apartments on the 10th and 11th floors of 563 Park Avenue on the market. A longtime resident of the building, Morley bought the 11th floor co-op from Spamalot producer Arielle Tepper for $3.45 million in 2006 but never combined the apartments. He now has both places on the market together for $7.999 million. [Cityfile, Rutenberg Realty]
• Iris Cantor, the philanthropist and widow of Cantor Fitzgerald founder Bernie Cantor, has sold off her penthouse at 110 Central Park South. The four-bedroom apartment, which Cantor bought for $15 million in 2006, was listed for $11.9 million when it went into contract in August. It sold for just $10.5 million to wine importer Leonardo LoCascio. [Cityfile]
• Former Xerox CEO Anne Mulcahy has paid $7.4 million for a three-bedroom condo in the Superior Ink building on West 12th Street. Mulcahy and her husband also own a home in Fairfield, Conn. [NYT]

Maggie Gyllenhaal turns 32 today. CSI star Marg Helgenberger is turning 51. Singer Diana Krall is 45. Actress Martha Plimpton is 39. Retired pitcher Dwight Gooden turns 45. Olympic figure skater Oksana Baiul is turning 32. Actress Lisa Bonet is 42. Dean McDermott, the husband of Tori Spelling and co-star of the couple's reality TV show, is 43. Nobel prize-winning novelist José Saramago is 87. And the New York Post is celebrating its 208th birthday today, apparently.

• Did David Letterman's wife boot him out of the house because he "balked at telling her the complete truth about the female staffers he bedded"? That's what the National Enquirer has been claiming, although his spokesman says it isn't true. So maybe he's just still sleeping on the couch. [NYDN]
• Amy Winehouse is back in the hospital for the 143rd time. It was due to an "adverse reaction" she had to cold medicine. Naturally. [Mirror]
• A brawl at a club in Queens over the weekend led cops to shoot a man who once worked as a bodyguard for Jay-Z, Mariah Carey and Diddy. [NYP]
• Paris Hilton is "declaring war" on the Kardashian sisters because they're more famous than she is these days and they're earning more money, too. Paris has "hatched a plan" to return to her former perch as tabloid queen, however. It entails launching a new hair and beauty line and playing up her "more stable relationship with Doug Reinhardt." [P6]

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• Just in time for the cold wave, a list of bars with heated outdoor spaces. [GS]
• Great Jones Cafe is the latest restaurant to sustain fire damage. [Eater]
• A report from last night's preview of OBAO, Michael Huynh's latest spot. [SE]
• Trader Joe's has signed a lease at Sixth Avenue and 22nd Street. [NYO]
• Artichoke has the go-ahead to open a meatpacking district outpost. [CN]
• Ten dirty restaurant tricks to make you queasy. [Slashfood]
• Mayor Bloomberg says he's psyched about the food scene in Brooklyn. [NYP]

• George Stephanopoulos will probably replace Diane Sawyer on GMA. [TDB]
• Now that Bloomberg LP is talking over BusinessWeek, columnists Maria Bartiromo and Jack Welch are both parting ways with the mag. [NYP]
• CNN is laying off four of its web anchors since it no longer plans to produce live video on CNN.com. The good news? With Lou Dobbs no longer on the payroll, it should save $9 million over the next few years. [NYT, [NYP]
• Euna Lee, one of the two CurrentTV reporters who was imprisoned in North Korea earlier this year, has scored herself a six-figure book deal. [NYT]
• Shares of Playboy jumped yesterday after it was reported the apparel conglomerate Iconix was in talks to acquire the (struggling) company. [NYP]
• Another senior Observer editor is bidding goodbye to the paper. [Politico]
• Fashion mags are expecting their fortunes to improve in 2010. [WWD]
• Is the Fox Business Channel a lost cause at this point? [VF]
• Television is more getting more and more obscene, supposedly. [NYT]

Artist Sam Bassett wanted to attract some attention. So he headed over to Sotheby's on Tuesday to show off his work, the day when the auction house was holding one of its biggest sales of the year and many of the world's most important collectors would be on hand. The only glitch: Bassett's medium is "tape sculpture," and it involves him stringing up colored masking tape across buildings, lamp posts and streets. It wasn't long before he was carted off to jail. But he did leave with a few new fans. "The cops liked the concept, one cop called me the new Cristo," he says. [NYP]

Ordinary People: Socialite and heiress Daphne Guinness and transsexual superstar Amanda Lepore at last night's launch for NARS 15X15, a new book by makeup mogul François Nars.

Have you heard that some whiny men are now asking/demanding that their wives-to-be give them a "man-gagement" ring before getting married? According to a poll conducted by Brides.com (which may or may not have been funded by the jewelry industry), 45 percent of women said they'd consider buying their fiancé an engagement band. Really? Well, at least they'll both have something to take to the pawn shop when they split up! [NYDN, ABC News]