Every New Yorker has a series of cherished myths and hard-earned wisdom that he or she considers the Gospel truth about how to get by in this city. But are the stories we tell ourselves in order to live really on the level? We turn to the experts to help us figure it out.

There's the moment in every New Yorker's life (tourists, you get to play this round too!) where they experience the terrible feeling of a leg cramp during a Broadway show. Do you scream? Do you shuffle out of your aisle noisily and try your best not to faceplant? Why are those seats so small in [...]

Every New Yorker has a series of cherished myths and hard-earned wisdom that he or she considers the Gospel truth about how to get by in this city. But are the stories we tell ourselves in order to live really on the level? We turn to the experts to help us figure it out.

Living so close to bodies of water best known for the number of corpses retrieved from within, you can understand why New Yorkers are a bit cautious about the bounty of the sea. A longstanding rule of thumb holds that ordering fish from a restaurant on Mondays is never a good thing. But is [...]

The Internet, Preserver of Our Fleeting Shames, also resurrects the lovely (because distant) indignities of the past. Prominent among these is the Athenian Mercury, the semi-reputable 1690s London advice column—put out by a group of misfits who called themselves The Athenian Society—to which many a citizen turned when wondering why people swoon at the sight of cats or laugh in the presence of pork.

A column about familiar fears and off-kilter folklore, the stuff the embarrassed children of a generation decided to forget, is built on the backs of modern-day Bartlebys who scanned and transcribed reams of faded, brittle, near-illegible paper objects. Anyone [...]