Urban Studies

Every year the Economist Intelligence Unit looks at all the cities in the world and ranks their livability based on stability, health care, culture and environment, education, and infrastructure. Which city came out on top?

For the fourth straight year, it's Vancouver, with its nice climate, crime-free streets, and universal healthcare. Most of the cities in the top 10 were Canadian or Australian, actually. Melbourne, Australia, knocked Vienna, Austria, from the No. 2 spot. Vienna is now No. 3, followed by Canada's Toronto and Calgary. Furthering the reign of the land down under, Sydney came in seventh and Perth and Adelaide tied for eighth. This should kick off an impossibly bloody feud between the two bellicose nations that will culminate in a devastating curling match or swim meet or something completely innocuous like that.

Because of the way the study is set up, mid-sized cities in larger countries tend to do the best. That's why the top American city was Pittsburgh. Well, that and because it's one of the gayest in the country, too. (I disagree with both of these findings, by the way.) As for Los Angeles and New York, they came in 44th and 56th, respectively, just like last year. And Harare, Zimbabwe, held on to the lowest position in the rankings. Maybe we should send some Canadians there to clean the place up.

Paul Mason, formerly the World's fattest man, says he is suing

The British National Health Service because he was sent to a dietitian and not an eating disorder specialist.

Bloomie just told people to pipe down he was doing all he could do....

Ahem Bullchit....Yesterday, Mayor Bloomberg was fairly nonchalant about Sunday's blizzard, which has left New York City caked in twenty inches of snow: "The world has not come to an end," he said. "A lot of snow everyplace. It was a very heavy snowfall. We're cleaning it up." But now that he's realized the roads are littered with snowed-in vehicles, buses still aren't running, and everyone's sinking in muddy slush as they walk around, he's changed his tune: “This storm is not like any other we’ve had to deal with,” he said at a news conference Tuesday afternoon.“We are doing everything we possibly can. It is a bad situation, but the city’s response is the biggest effort to clear snow our city has ever seen.

A Sanitation Department spokesman said 95 percent of what are known as primary roads, 62 percent of secondary roads and 18 percent of tertiary roads have been plowed at least once so far.

Bloomberg is suddenly tweeting up a storm, warning New Yorkers about icy conditions and asking for their (uncharacteristic) patience, he hasn't respond to any individual Twitter users asking him questions. Of course, Bloomberg's block has been plowed already. Apparently that's a primary road.

Functional art on the cheap- Cute!

Hang Half Chairs For Cool Clothes Storage  .

 IKEA got the hook up.

The hardships of Life as well as its joys...

To grow old means merely to age. To grow up means to become better, wiser, and more intelligent in dealing with the same or similar problems. You can grow old, or you can grow up. It is really up to you. Physically, every one of us in the course of time reaches his limit, but mentally and emotionally and spiritually no one can tell where the bounds are. There are some who pray nightly, “Oh God, keep life’s difficulties from my door. Lead me not into temptation.” It is very doubtful if you can ever attain any secure happiness ‘by running away from temptation, pain, disappointment, disillusionment, or hardship. These things must be faced in each of our lives. What we need is not freedom from difficulties or temptation, but a serene fortitude in the face of disappointment and hardship. If you evade all unpleasantness in your life, your happiness is placed in a very unstable equilibrium by the constant dread that some disappointment is just around the corner. If you have faced pain and disappointment, then not only will you value your happiness more highly, but you are better prepared to meet and handle the next stumbling block in the road of life. There may be human vegetables that have succeeded in avoiding unhappiness and pain, but they cannot be called mature personalities. A mature personality expects and is ready for the hardships of life, as well as its joys. This type of person may become depress when things don’t go right, but they don’t lose there sense of values.