even more quiddities and agonies of the ruling class - a new rolling new york times thread

dcurbanmom.com
wtop.com

drain the swamp

liberation.fr on this list!? jeez

expats presumably?

Mookieproof OTM

My wife hatereads dc urban mom so we are presumably part of that 23%

I was momentarily sympathetic to Mackenzie because I thought it said the music played from 7:45AM to 9PM. That might drive me to murder.

tbh the mister softee jingle *is* pretty annoying (and must send the drivers completely insane) but . . . maybe mackenzie wasn't meant for city living

wonder how she'd do with a retro-kitsch infinite blaring loop of some guy with an old-timey new yawk accent proclaiming ICE CREAM! GET YER ICE CREAM! ... ICE CREAM! GET YER etc

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/28/realestate/what-to-do-when-youve-picked-the-wrong-suburb.html

thing is, I can imagine a similar article being written like this every decade or so going back to the 50s

https://www.google.com/amp/s/mobile.nytimes.com/2017/07/27/science/study-happy-save-money-time.amp.html

Sorry for the Amp link. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/27/science/study-happy-save-money-time.html

I feel that one though - I felt like a horrible yuppie asshole when we hired a housekeeper to come in every other week as it was such a direct violation of my life-long scandinavian midwestern "how dare you think you're better than anyone else" ethos. But not having to spend 2-3 hours every weekend doing cleaning shit was so, so worth the $50 or whatever we paid each time, especially after having a baby.

it's weird isn't it. if you think about it, going to a restaurant is way more decadent, but it's hard to picture anyone feeling guilty about it.

Tracer, totally.

There are things that would just go undone if I didn't outsource them. Especially shirt ironing.

And house cleaning to the point where things are actually really clean and tidy. Do you know how good that feels? And after 20 years as an adult I know myself enough to know that I'm not going to achieve that myself.

Wash and fold laundry service is also a source of joy for me.

I am way more meticulous than our housekeeper about the bathrooms.

We get a maid service to come in every now and then and I'm grateful, not firstworld-guilty, about it.

HOWEVER, you need to tidy before the maids come. Like, they can't clean surfaces that are covered with toys and books and shoes and dishes, so you do a Big Tidy beforehand.

I sometimes wonder how much of the "Aaaah, things are CLEAN" comes from the actual maid activity and how much is from "Thank the gods that there aren't fifty-seven Matchbox cars on the stairs for once."

I tend to DIY a lot of house/yard/stuff. That said, there are lots of services that I will probably never use, but I won't judge others for using. With some exceptions.

http://www.artisanalpencilsharpening.com/

Wowee.

The need to have keep things clean enough for the cleaners is a huge benefit for me. It keeps me from letting things slide.

Isnt it a bit whats the point of the cleaner, then tho?

(basically: I want to hire a cleaner. but I want one who will also do all that stuff y'all j ust said. Put toys away. Throw rubbish out thats been left under couches/beds by kids. Tidy up shelves. Etc. )

IDK. I know that "cleaning for the cleaners" is a thing. I'd bet untold stand-up comedians and sitcom writers have relied on that concept.

I guess to me it's like how, in a hotel room, before housekeeping comes, I put cans, food wrappers, receipts, etc. in the trash can, and put away my dirty clothes. They still have plenty to do -- actual CLEANING, as in washing stuff, vacuuming floors and furniture, mopping, dusting, and more detailed tidying.

A previous cleaner I had was very into tidying, which seemed great, but turned out to be a problem b/c she and her helper would put things away in places I couldn't find them. I appreciated the effort, but it made every evening after her visit like an Easter egg hunt. Like, fingernail clipper doesn't go in the drawer with the batteries, IMO.

Exactly. I also prefer to hide my own drugs and sex toys, thanks.

I cleaned houses one summer during college and we had one client, who we were pretty sure was straight, who sometimes left his suction cup dildo stuck to the wall in his shower.

booooooyeah

urk

xxxxpost
you stay in HOTELs? well la dee da, mr ruling class moneybags!

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DJDlW23UQAA6YoW.jpg:large

obv

I like the ad libs look of that. keep it on file and update the names as needed.

mad libs sorry

What the Rich Won't Tell You

"There's nobody who knows how much we spend. You're the only person I ever said those numbers to out loud."

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/08/opinion/sunday/what-the-rich-wont-tell-you.html?smid=tw-nytopinion&smtyp=cur&_r=0

That's a really good one, because it drops in a few grafs that try to make the article about something bigger, the meaning of inequality in America or something, but then it goes right back to being quid-aggy.

what the rich won't tell you: their flesh is so exquisitely tender, with such a complex and delicate flavour, even when eaten raw

christ that article should have a trigger warning

Another woman, speaking of her wealth of over $50 million, which she and her husband generated through work in finance skimmed off the interest charged to home owners and students

fixed that for you, nytimes

Instead, we should talk not about the moral worth of individuals but about the moral worth of particular social arrangements.

don't hate the playa, hate the particular social arrangement

When I used the word “affluent” in an email to a stay-at-home mom with a $2.5 million household income, a house in the Hamptons and a child in private school, she almost canceled the interview, she told me later. Real affluence, she said, belonged to her friends who traveled on a private plane.

Few things enrage me as much about rich people as this kind of attitude.

No kidding! How many articles have I read where the subject itemizes their decadent lifestyle (each with a little fig-leaf letting us know they feel it is 'essential'), then concludes by claiming that they are not rich because they don't "feel rich" because they still, somewhere in their mind, have some kind of niggling worry associated with money. bitch so does bill gates

Wow, rich people don't want their servants to envy them? Wealth has like so many more complexities than I realized!

is this already somewhere else on ILE? i don't even know where to put it. memorably sad though. for all the wrong reasons. this made me think of this thread though. ugh. "And Chicago is an incredible city to do just that: find a way of life that’s comfortable (provided you’re white, of course)."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/goodbye-chicago-what-its-like-to-live-in-a-city-you_us_59ac5f1de4b0bef3378cd9ba

When I used the word “affluent” in an email to a stay-at-home mom with a $2.5 million household income, a house in the Hamptons and a child in private school, she almost canceled the interview, she told me later. Real affluence, she said, belonged to her friends who traveled on a private plane.

Few things enrage me as much about rich people as this kind of attitude.

― silverfish, Friday, September 8, 2017 2:51 PM (three days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it is super common too ime

god that chicago huffpo thing is so bad. i keep seeing it linked elsewhere and it is trash

Xp that attitude is very typical of corporate lawyers who feel they are not the "real" rich because they serve even richer clients.

The Chicago HuffPo guy has been adequately dispatched: http://www.avclub.com/goodbye-huffpost-guy-who-hates-chicago-and-please-sto-1802762287.

When I used the word “affluent” in an email to a stay-at-home mom with a $2.5 million household income, a house in the Hamptons and a child in private school, she almost canceled the interview, she told me later. Real affluence, she said, belonged to her friends who traveled on a private plane.

Few things enrage me as much about rich people as this kind of attitude.

― silverfish, Friday, September 8, 2017 11:51 AM (three days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

super otm, though its particularly galling with literal multimillionaires. I mean, it annoys me enough when it's people who make 250K+ protesting that they're middle class; it takes a particular obliviousness to be in the 99.9% and insist one isn't affluent.

it's the equivalent of being 6'7" and denying you're tall because of Manute Bol

And yet more on HuffPo bro: https://medium.com/@allyssabujdoso/i-happened-by-chance-on-the-goodbye-chicago-blah-blah-blah-article-b85b08bf7e11.

Now everyone in NYC will be like, oh yeah you're that douche who hated Chicago.

But being new to the midwest and making friends here can be a struggle. It’s a big city, and more importantly a very spread out one. Its population density is low for a major city.

?????????

New York City, Chicago, and Philadelphia are the only incorporated places in the United States that have a population over 1,000,000 and a population density over 10,000 people per square mile. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by_population_density

who needs editors eh

metropolitan diary always a real treasure trove of this shit

Dear Diary:
I had the opportunity to attend the Tony Awards and arrived home at midnight, happy but also ready to get out of my gown.
I was able to unzip it about three inches by pulling the zipper from above, but when I twisted my arm around to complete the job, I couldn’t reach the zipper.
After struggling for a few minutes, I put my shoes back on, walked to the building next door and asked the doorman if he could please unzip me. He kindly assisted me.
I thought about how, in their acceptance speeches, a number of the Tony winners had acknowledged their dressers. I returned to my building with a smile.
“I have one now, too,” I thought.

i just puked so much that an entirely new me assembled itself in puke on the carpet right next to where i had been standing

my new thing is to imagine all of these being voiced by Lucille Bluth