Paula's Interview: Question #2 & #3

What's the Best Thing About Living in New York?

I never thought I'd say this, but: Living in Brooklyn. This from a woman who lived in Hell's Kitchen from 1988 to 2001 and loved every minute of it. Okay, maybe getting mugged a half block from home wasn't so great. Or being burglarized. Not so great, as well.

Runner up to best things: Getting 30 rides out of a $24 unlimited ride metrocard. The bagels (trite, I know, but until you've eaten a "bagel" in Colorado, you just don't understand). Shopsin's. Coney Island Cyclone and the Brooklyn Cyclones. This year, the Mets (with their two players who are PUSHING 50!).

What's the Worst?

9/12 New Yorkers. I hate them all.

And the fact that Manhattan as the magnet for innovation and creative vitality is over. An overpriced, homogenous gated community for rich white people and their trust-funded kids. Plus the Staten Island/Bensonhurst/Bay Ridge wannabes who want to be their friends.

When you hear about artists leaving New York and taking up residence in Philadelphia, you know that something is seriously wrong -- sociologically, economically, and culturally. Foul, fetid, fuming, foggy, filthy Philadelphia as the place for artists on the East Coast -- it's just wrong.