The New Yorker's "Shouts & Murmurs" column nails the "NYC versus LA" debate
We've all been tempted to pack up our (tiny) NYC apartments and move to L.A. at some point or another. But in a Shouts & Murmurs column in the New Yorker earlier this week, writer Susanna Wolff explains why New York wins every time—well, sort of (like any good New Yorker, she peppers her piece with copious amount of sarcasm.)
The column, which had us laughing out loud repeatedly, really nailed some NYC specifics (paying $2,000 a month for a freight elevator, for example). Behold, some choice bits (though you really ought to give the entire piece a thorough read):
Our tolerance for less-than-ideal real estate is through the roof
"A two-bedroom house with a front yard and a back yard? Psh. What do you need all that space for? Yoga? I’m from New York. I once paid two thousand dollars a month to live in the freight elevator of the former Filene’s Basement, in Union Square. Then I paid five thousand dollars a month to live in the garbage chute of a postwar luxury condominium on First Avenue. It’s important to live in terrible places when you’re young. A postwar! On First Avenue! That’s how you build character. All of this “actual house” business makes you soft."
We're missing some basic life skills
"I’m from New York. I don’t drive. I don’t know how to drive. I don’t know how to do something that teen-agers can do, and I’m proud of it. That’s how much of a New Yorker I am."
Our commutes are almost always entertaining
"I once saw 'Much Ado About Nothing' performed entirely by rats and a pigeon on a G train that was being held by the dispatcher between stations. It was magnificent and repulsive."
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