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

every time i walk by that stoop on university place, i feel the ghost of his rancid, malodorous fingernail twitching within the not-wealthy flesh of my cheek, and my entire face burns with impotent shame.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/07/15/magazine/15lives_author/15lives_author-articleInline.jpg

He jabbed his index finger in my face — hard — burying his fingernail in my cheek. He swung around and headed back to his stoop. I had my hand over my cheek. Someone asked if I was O.K. I said I was, but then my fingers came away bloody. That whole side of my face felt tingly and infected. A fingernail. I wanted to throw up. I needed gauze, disinfectant, hydrogen peroxide — all of it, immediately. And my apartment was blocks away.

When I got there, my roommate helped me clean the wound — a crescent-shaped cut an inch below my eye. Just soap and water, she said, a little Neosporin. She congratulated me on getting into my first New York fight. I didn’t hold up my end, I said. Forget it, she said. She poured me a glass of wine to calm me down. Then she suggested we go back to University Place, find the guy and dole out some payback.

you must be anointed by the dirty fingernail to become a real new yorker. and have a letter of recommendation from martin amis. sounds about right.

I think something about the college application/essay-writing process has fucked up a whole generation. Like all these people are out looking for the slightest 'experience' to happen to them so they can blog about it.

It's less about the college application/essay-writing process and more about the existance of 7,500,000,000 humans, imo.

You'll probably share this insufferable anecdote with your sockless, boat-shoe wearing friends in fitted shirts and linen shorts, over some goat cheese profiteroles you warmed up in that fancy Viking range in your "loft" that once was a soap factory, or something.

classic shit right here

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/22/education/edlife/prepping-students-for-sorority-rush.html?_r=2&smid=tw-share&pagewanted=all

MARGARET KING of Birmingham, Ala., was at a loss about how to help her older daughter prepare to rush at the University of Virginia.

With the help of Ms. Foster and Ms. Grant, who wears a pink feather boa during workshops, Mrs. King asked alumnae of about 10 chapters, several from U.Va., to write her daughter’s recommendations. To guide their plaudits, she sent them packets with a professional photograph, transcript and résumé. To thank them, she dropped off a bottle of rosé in their mailboxes.

RUSHBIDDIES

getting a quote from someone with a "von" or "van" is a hallmark of all classic quiddites articles

Samantha von Sperling is an image consultant in New York, but lately her bread-and-butter Wall Street clients have asked her to help their daughters get ready for rush at schools like Harvard; the University of Wisconsin, Madison; and New York University, which has added three chapters since 2006 and more than doubled the number of sisters, to 570.

“It’s the same kind of coaching I do on Wall Street,” Ms. von Sperling says.

“If you’re a great active listener, they will remember you because you let them talk.” Her typical fee: $125 an hour.

Ms. von Sperling offers a Friday-to-Sunday intensive, for $8,000. One day is devoted to carrying yourself properly and the art of conversation.

Ms. von Sperling

Changing my name to Mr. von Aimless.

“I lost six pounds that week,” recalls Julie Baselice, whose daughter Christina is now a Chi Omega at the University of Texas. “It was the most stressful experience of my life.”

another classic name

Madeline D’Arcambal Braun, a Manhattan native entering her junior year at Indiana University Bloomington, says she had “absolutely no idea” why she wasn’t asked back.

Abigail Sullivan Moore is co-author of “The iConnected Parent: Staying Close to Your Kids in College (and Beyond) While Letting Them Grow Up.”

The iConnected Parent: Staying (REALLY) Close to Your (Mortified) Kids in College (and Forever) While Letting Them (Sorta Kinda) Grow Up (To Be Damaged Adults)

did the Times kill satire before Kissinger's Nobel Prize?

With the help of Ms. Foster and Ms. Grant,

Foster/Grant? Are you kidding me?

asked her to help their daughters get ready for rush at schools like Harvard

there are no sororities at Harvard fyi

there are no sororities/fraternities on the Harvard campus recognized by the school administration; that is not the same thing as there not being any sororities/fraternities (ps: there are)

And he should know. He went to...school in Boston.

... well, just outside of boston, actually.

otm

no, not Tufts...

(I spent most of my junior and senior year wondering if I should pledge Alpha Phi Alpha for the connections)

that must have cost you a fortune in consulting fees

lol

every time the thought crossed my mind, I remembered the dude whose leg was broken with a pledge paddle during rush and I decided "no"

http://i.imgur.com/6F42B.jpg

there are no sororities/fraternities on the Harvard campus recognized by the school administration; that is not the same thing as there not being any sororities/fraternities (ps: there are)

v. true, but unless things have changed a lot in recent years the self-declared sororities / fraternities play exactly zero role in harvard undergrad social life -- as in, i literally cannot name a single person who was a member of any greek society

Does that include finals clubs?

I saw those in that movie

no, I knew plenty of people in final clubs, they were a substantially bigger deal (though they played a far from dominant role)

Finals Club Destination

wtf is a final club?????

They're the not-so-secret clubs at Harvard that rich kids belong to. They play essentially the same role as frats.

Why are they called final clubs? Do not want to google for fear of. . . what I would find.

maybe they study for finals together

once you check in to a finals club... you don't check out.

(that's why they're called finals clubs - get it??)

I don't know exactly what's happening on campus now but during the early/mid 90s, there was definite frat/soro presence, particularly black fraternities and sororities (and, lol, Sigma Xi, who seemed to be a lot more about throwing parties than scientific research). There was a lot of partnering with MIT chapters as a result.

At least a quarter of the black students I knew in the Quad were in a frat.

my wife was asked to be in a finals club for GURLS but when she saw the financial commitment she basically laughed her ass off and said "um yeah, not happening"

The Bee! Does it still exist?

According to Wikipedia it does

A new store in Manhattan's trendy East Village neighborhood is selling New York City filtered tap water back to city residents. For a few extra dollars customers can add vitamins and herbal infusions to their filtered water.

Not just any tap water, insist the owners of Molecule. They say the water streams through a $25,000 filtering machine that uses ultraviolet rays, ozone treatments and reverse osmosis in a seven-stage processing treatment to create what they call pure H₂0.

<a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444330904577535100599492544.html?mod=WSJ_NY_MIDDLELEADNewsCollection";>Wall Stret Journal</a>

I meant

To counteract critics, Molecule is planning a weekly naming ceremony to imbue its water with personality and Sunday blessings involving religious figures from all faiths, including Tibetan monks and pagan worshipers.

bottled water is such a con job

no way that store sounds great