The Awl

Natural Disasters are Great for a Recession

Choire Sicha — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 09:15:50 +0000

"According the model, a hurricane with wind speeds of about 100 miles per hour — making it a 'weak' Category 2 storm — might cause on the order of $35 billion in damage if it were to pass directly over Manhattan.... Although far from the most likely scenario, this may represent a reasonable-worst-case estimate of what could happen if Hurricane Irene took exactly the wrong turn at exactly the wrong time.... Keep in mind that New York’s annual gross domestic product is estimated to be about $1.4 trillion — about one-tenth of the nation’s gross domestic product — so if much of the city were to become dysfunctional for months or more, the damage to the global and domestic economies would be almost incalculable."
—Yes sure, but one thing that America's statistics boyfriend Nate Silver neglects to mention in his review of the costs of hurricanes is that... these are the kind of natural disasters that are good for America in a more fundamental way than the often a bit false economies perpetrated by cities like New York. They create thousands of jobs, put people back to work and drain the bloated coffers of the insurance companies. A good natural disaster has been shown to be, setting aside, you know, the people who die and/or lose everything of personal value, absolutely great for the country.

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Maybe Airplanes Weren't Such A Great Invention After All

Dave Bry — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 15:00:45 +0000

"On a street of brownstones in Park Slope, Brooklyn—a run-down neighborhood politely described at the time as being “in transition”—one plane, a state-of-the-art jetliner, gouged long-lasting scars. The tail slammed down in an intersection. White-hot engines, smoldering cargo and badly burned bodies fell nearby. A stream of jet fuel touched off a fire that grew to seven alarms and destroyed 10 buildings and a church. Two men selling Christmas trees on a corner and a man shoveling snow were killed."
—If you live in New York, and have, for the past nine years, watched every airplane that passes overhead with a bit of secret dread, waiting for a sudden change in direction, a violent dive, ready to sound the alarm (and why wouldn't you do this?), you might not want to read this account of when two planes crashed in mid-air over Park Slope. But I do/have/did. And I'm looking forward to the rest of the Times' weeklong series on the disaster that happened 50 years ago this Thursday.

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Run! The Great Twitter Mouseover Hack Is Eating Your Cheese! And Human Babies!

Choire Sicha — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 10:00:43 +0000

BREAKING NEWS. SIRENS. ETC. Twitter destroyed! America panics! My God, it's full of spam! So we hereby declare today to be National Go Read A Gosh-Darned Book Day. Stop your inane, virus-shedding Tweeting and go consume some paper!

The best part of today is everyone's urgent Tweets about how everyone should avoid Twitter. We urge you to go look for yourself. *Evil cackle* No but seriously, now how will we get our urgent recaps of America's fine television shows?

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Kidd Kidd, "From Here"

Dave Bry — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 09:40:26 +0000

While there's much that's different, the similarities between Hurricane Katrina and the earthquake in Haiti are as impossible to ignore as they are uncomfortable to consider. New Orleans rapper Kidd Kidd makes the connection himself at the end of his new video, "From Here."

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Things Not To Do This Weekend

Choire Sicha — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 16:25:45 +0000

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The 'Mine' Magazine Experiment: Kill All Magazines Now

Choire Sicha — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 12:31:54 +0000

I subscribed to that Mine magazine thing, a project of Time Inc. which unfortunately is not a trade publication about ore extraction. It is instead a magazine that assembles bits of other magazines to make a magazine that speaks to you, about your needs! I tried it out because Farhad Manjoo earnestly liked it. And here is what I got.

1. An article about red wine that is basically a FAQ that is like (literally) "What Makes Red Wine Red?" What magazine is this from, Beverages for Tweens? Oh it is from Food and Wine. Also? I don't drink. Also I am not STUPID. Are the readers of Food and Wine this stupid?

2. An article about how TV is changing in the iPod age. LOL. OMG LOL.

3. A story about kids with attention problems! Ha, is it from New York magazine circa 2002?

4. Some Lev Grossman thing about how FACEBOOK IS GREAT FOR OLD PEOPLE. I think this is a "humor piece."

5. An article that counsels you how to better network in this modern age!

6. Some advice on how to help your kids get through college without debt.

7. A travel piece about Mustique. That is like the last place in the world I would want to go, right after Michigan and Calcutta. As if my lifestyle were organized around places Mariah Carey liked to go three years ago?

8. Some pages from Real Simple that are inexplicable in their intent! Something about how I should buy a $300 outdoor "entertaining console" (ew!) from Pier One (EW!) and how planting vegetables should relieve stress, not cause it, which is pretty hilarious, because it is nearly JULY, PEOPLE, I PUT ALL MY VEGETABLES IN A MONTH AGO PRETTY MUCH. Also Pier One SUCKS.

9. NOTHING from In Style. So Time Inc. did not figure out that I am a homo.

Also? Farhad wrote his piece in late May, and he got at least THREE of the same pieces I did, in late June! One of which was published in FEBRUARY. This magazine of mine is the worst thing I have ever caused to be made. I am very angry with me.

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Horrifying Seattle PI Web Launch Party Astounds

Choire Sicha — Fri, 22 May 2009 10:30:46 +0000

This account of the launch party for SeattlePI.com, which is the website that used to be a newspaper in Seattle, is so horrifying. For just one thing, it's disturbing to find out that the editor of their site's most popular blog ("by a factor of 10") has a day job! What the fuck! They can't pay him a living wage? (Secondarily, his day job is installing software for a military contractor. Which means he works for Skynet.) Anyway, everything else about this party is so much worse!

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