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

Cool, tech bros invented the silent meditation retreat.

Some of them should try that thing where Buddhist monks mummified themselves while alive.

What is Tennessee Street referring to? Is it metonymical like Wall Street? Is it the name of a company?

it's a street that runs through Dogpatch in SF, maybe it's where the start-up is located

Cameron Sepah, the quack behind dopamine fasting, is currently throwing a hissy fit in the comments section here (he's "goactualize"): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21478759

Actually, that's putting it too strongly, sorry. I got my hackles up

he gets sonned a couple of times in there

that writer is bari weiss’ gf. speaking of being in on jokes

feel that rates a heyyooo but i'm on dopamine fast

kidding aside this is basically just Stupid Mindfulness right?
which given that Mindfulness is already Stupid Mindfulness just ugh wash them all into the sea...

this is surely of a piece with restrictive diets/fasting, no fap, and the like as well? there's a christopher lasch style book or something here to be written about the protestant ethic (asceticism) adapting to a culture of abundance. almost a desperate attempt to rescue a sense of ego or control in the fact of the mounting evidence that we are not in control of our everyday behaviors, let alone our lives in general.

disappointing results here
https://hairshirt.com/

great now you've got my dopamine on overdrive

https://hairshirt.com/images/webtuxedo2.jpg

Metropolitan Diary: Ticket Talk

Dear Diary:

I was trying to buy tickets to “Slave Play,” and there was a problem with completing my order online. I called an 800 number to resolve the issue.

The woman who answered was very helpful and we had a friendly, chatty exchange. Before completing the transaction she read me a warning: This play contains violence, sexual scenes, nudity, simulated sex, racism and violence.

There was a pause.

“Excellent,” I said quietly.

We both started to laugh.

— Bob Lohrmann

Your Life or Your Livelihood: Americans Wrestle With Impossible Choice

“your money or your life” was RIGHT THERE

not really house style though i guess

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/27/realestate/a-high-end-building-that-seemed-ideal-for-young-performers.html

Their photograph takes this over the top.

Are we talking like, "The Raid" or "Escape from Cell Block 99"?

oops. wrong thread.

maybe not

so uh how is the sound deadening in new buildings like this? A baby grand ain't quiet.

professional children

refers to being minnesotan twice in one article, that's so minnesotan

twin cities iirc

Correction: May 13, 2020
An earlier version of this article inaccurately rendered a quote attributed to Yannick de Jager. He said the North Sea is "a fickle bitch," not "a thicker beach."

well, there's one way it could have been worse

Mr. de Jager must have a hell of an accent.

wtf is wrong with bari weiss

heckuva job, bennet-y

he's now claiming he didn't read it before it was published lol

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/29/style/cecil-b-demille-liquor-dusty-hunters-whiskey.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage

Eventually, he and a business partner, Steve Livigni, were spending 10 hours a day, every day, searching for bottles throughout California and Mexico’s Baja Peninsula. On one road trip they visited nearly every single liquor store between Detroit and L.A. “We later learned we were apparently hitting liquor stores in neighborhoods that are essentially considered war zones,” Mr. Moix said.

Though they might be sheepish to admit it, dusty hunters have long believed that the more crime-riddled the neighborhood, the more liquor stores there are with cashiers standing behind bulletproof glass, the more likely they are to find great vintage scores. Mr. Ackerman has been nearly mugged a few times and once had a sawed-off shotgun held to his head when he peeked into the back room of a Koreatown liquor store and then started rifling through boxes without permission.

what does "nearly" being mugged mean?

Shocked that this guy had an owner flip out on him when he walked uninvited into a stockroom and started rifling through bottles of liquor

sounds like a real cool dude

A whole article about homebound CEOs learning to enjoy family dinner.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/11/business/family-dinner-returns.html

Astonishing

To keep her children engaged at dinner, Ms. Blakely said her family had started playing games — in one, they all strike a pose during dinner when her husband yells “Freeze!” Sometimes, they play old records and the meal turns into a spontaneous dance party around the table.

kill me

When you confuse the #mannequinchallenge with parenting

the photos will be handy for eventual guillotine recon

The Wonder Woman and RBG art, brought in for just this casual moment... perfect.

Spanx uses sweatshop labor in Southeast Asia IIRC.

the columns where bret stephens and gail collins chat about the issues of the day are awful

You can slice that sentence in so many ways and every one is true

the columns where bret stephens and gail collins chat about the issues of the day are awful
the columns where bret stephens and gail collins chat about the issues of the day are awful
the columns where bret stephens and gail collins chat about the issues of the day are awful

how about that, trump gail? what a maroon.

you said it, bret.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/24/nyregion/nyc-sidewalk-free-stuff-furniture-cabinets.html

yeah! i mean, um.... whatever!

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/11/opinion/unemployment-insurance-biden.html

lol at the NYT Columbusing stuff thrown on the sidewalk

"for some obscure reason, tens of thousands of homes in NYC have been suddenly emptied over the last year. you might find a west elm table!"

tbf other (admittedly smaller/less dense) cities i've lived in have alleys or dumpsters or some better system; only in nyc is there just trash constantly on the sidewalk all the time

I think we built nearly an entire wall of a popular brand of high-end modular shelving from trash-picked sets back in the day. We bought one kit used to fill it out.

for my first decade in the city, pretty much all my furniture but my bed was sourced from street shopping
I took a full-size couch home on the subway once

Totally classic NYC move.