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Magazine can be pest in N.Y. minute
| Monday, Aug 6 2007 5:25 PM
Last Updated: Monday, Aug 6 2007 5:30 PM
A few days ago, a man with the pest control company came by for his once-every-other-month service.
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I'm not sure what he is doing, but he is doing something right. Usually, when it gets warm, we have cockroaches so big that our cat pretends they're not there. We're not dirty people, so it may have to do with the house being 110 years old and full of nooks, crannies and crevices.
I use the phrase "doing something right" because this year, we have had no cockroaches. Not one.
No cockroaches, but we have had another pest which he has been unsuccessful at treating: We have an infestation of The New Yorker magazines. And, every day it gets worse.
The New Yorker is a humor magazine that started in 1925. It has cartoons, poems, stories, political pieces, profiles, movie reviews as well as a listing of everything that's happening in New York.
It's a snotty little publication that is not only entertaining, but looks good on your lap on a plane or on a coffee table. The New Yorker is as much a fashion accessory as it is a literary magazine, suggesting that the subscriber might be a person of sophistication and breeding.
There are five simple words that can banish any doubts about one's pedigree. Those are "I read The New Yorker." Case closed. Pour me a Boodles and tonic and open up my place at the Hamptons.
Given the magazine's many strengths, why would anybody use the words "pest" and "infestation" to describe it? This is why.
The New Yorker arrives once a week like clockwork. In fact, it comes so often and stacks up so quickly, sometimes it seems as if it's delivered every day.
There is not a room in the house that doesn't have a copy. Probably, somebody carries it there, but often it flies on its own like a moth.
Everybody has their own relationship with The New Yorker, preferring one feature over another, but readers have one thing in common: They are fighting a losing battle. Each week they fall behind. It's like being Charlie Chaplin in the pie factory.
In order to keep current with The New Yorker, you have to quit your job, pull down the shades and suspend all contact with the outside world.
Sometimes I'll get tough with the magazine and go on a nothing-but- The New Yorker kick. Read eight of them consecutively. It doesn't help.
The New Yorker has a homing device. If you read faster, it comes faster.
I'm not even sure I still subscribe. I can't remember writing the check or sending in the little card. However, once you're in, there's no getting out.
It's almost supernatural. Sometimes, I could swear that not only have I read a particular issue but that I have thrown it away. No matter. The next night it's back on my bedside table.
I've tried giving back issues of the magazine away to friends. That doesn't work either. They return when you're not looking.
It's like "Hotel California," the song by the Eagles. "You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave."
My pest control guy is good. He just needs to expand. Customers are desperate.