Reply #48: I absolutely love Manhattan and think it is one of the most fantastic places on the face of the earth

[Douglas Carpenter]

48. I absolutely love Manhattan and think it is one of the most fantastic places on the face of the eart...

but even if I was fabulously independently wealthy - I just don't think I could ever justify to myself spending that kind of money. I can't help but think that a big part of what makes a place like New York so fantastic is undermined by these kinds of exorbitant cost. New York is fantastic largely because of the way it can attract such a colorful, interesting and eclectic sampling of the human race. This kind of expense is going to limit who can and will live there and inevitably make that colorful, interesting and eclectic sampling less colorful, interesting and eclectic.

I will just have to settle for living in a colorful, serene multi-cultural tropical paradise with minimal crime where my well maintained furnished two-bedroom apartment cost $500 per month.