Nina In New York: Cupcakes, Non-Sexual Nudity & More Stories You May Have Missed This Week

A lighthearted look at news, events, culture and everyday life in New York. The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer.
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By Nina Pajak

This is a very special Friday edition of the weekly roundup, because it is my last before I go off and have a lil' baby. I have been pregnant for approximately 4,000 years, and it is finally time. I don't feel nervous. It's a brilliant scheme of Mother Nature to make sure women are pregnant for so very long and that they become so very uncomfortable by the end, that all fear associated with the birth process melts into an overwhelming, almost zen-like feeling of: GET THIS THING OUT OF ME.

Ah, the miracle of life.

Anyway, I am not going to go digging around for baby- and parenting-related stories from the week to continue the theme. That would be just too too, don't you think?

Cupcakes are so over. Word on The Street (Wall Street, duh) is that the cupcake market is tanked. Donezo. Jumped the shark. So 2011. People who have portfolios heavily overweight in cupcake futures are going to want to sell, sell, sell! Even those of us with no connection to the stock market or any genuine facts could have called this one. Magnolia is for tourists who still come to this city to drink cosmos in midtown bars. Crumbs seems to have expanded to the point where their product has suffered. Baked By Melissa's mini cupcakes are the only ones that still feel current and worthy of popularity. Anyone who is anyone in the pastry-eating game knows it's all about French macarons now. However, due to relatively minor medical complications, I have been forbidden to indulge in any carbs or sugar for the last two months of my pregnancy. So right now, I'm about ready to dive after the cupcake wrapper a tourist just littered in front of me and go at it with my front teeth. I forbid cupcakes to go away until I am allowed to eat at least . . . two more. Make that three. No more than five. Seven is great, then I'll be good.

If you think America is effed up, be glad you're not British. Women in the UK have been indulging (or enduring) with a new procedure to darken their nipples. That's right. Apparently on topless beaches, light nipples are less attractive than dark ones. But take heart! For £1,200, you can get your nipples tattooed (tittooing, they call it, har har) to appear darker. The pigment lasts up to 18 months, but the memories last a lifetime. A searing, cringe-worthy lifetime. There has never been a better time to live in a puritanical, body-shaming country in which public nudity isn't just frowned upon, it's a crime.

Rover drew a penis!  The NASA-launched Mars rovers have been tooling around the red planet for nine years, zooming from place to place in little circles. Little circles and paths that, totally by coincidence, have recently resulted in what looks like a drawing of a penis in the dirt. A total coincidence, and not at all the result of some scientists having a little fun with coordinates on the rover remote control. Obvi.