Via Ed Driscoll, this fine rant from 2000 against those who insist that urban life is the best there is:

The book frowns on gated communities, of course, because they’re exclusionary. Conversely, they praise urban developments with dense housing – which include, I presume, apartment buildings with doormen and security systems. Driving past a guard booth or getting buzzed up via intercom – what’s the difference?

“The unity of society is threatened not by the use of gates, but by the uniformity and exclusivity of the people behind them.” Oh, blow it out your ass. Doctors will never live next to janitors. The streets of New York are full of people from all walks, races, creeds, colors; they are the antithesis of a gated sprawling suburban development. Does this mean that doctors invite their housekeepers to their parties? Or that racist morons cannot be forged in a big city?

“A child growing up in such a homogeneous environment is less likely to develop a sense of empathy for people from other walks of life, and is ill prepared to live in a diverse society.” Boolsheet! If this is the case, then we’d best forcibly integrate North Dakota, right now. And Cabrini Green, as long as we’re at it. Make them more like Brooklyn. Why, everyone who was ever raised in Brooklyn is perfectly prepared to live in a diverse society; naught but harmony reigns in the boroughs.

This sort of fatuous moralizing can be found at the heart of most anti-suburban tracts, and it’s why I distrust the general idea. There are millions of Americans living happy lives in affluent comfort,never troubled by the aroma of cabbage wafting in from a neighbor’s window, never knowing the communal experience of being awakened at 4 AM by a siren and knowing that everyone else in the building is up as well, and this fact just galls some people.

All that space . . . all that room . . . all those things! It just can’t be right.

From, of course, Lileks.

As it is a holiday today in the UK, set aside a few hours to peruse James Lileks’ beyond awesome site: "trust me, you can waste a lot of time here".

Starting here.

And moving on to the extraordinary case of L’il Jerry:

Jerry wasn’t cute. With his empty eyes, his trollish body and oversized feet, there was something wrong about Jerry – especially since he didn’t grow as the years passed. He didn’t appear to have any parents, although he had “aunts” – perhaps a code word for the women who hung around the train station where he worked. He had no skills, no endearing qualities.

But he had one superhuman skill – the ability to deliver the Violently Ordinary Rejoinder which blew people off their feet (usually backwards) with stunning force:

That and the myriad other masterpieces on display will keep you happy for hours.

Maybe days.