In the average major American city, there are hundreds upon hundreds of teenage girls working as prostitutes.

In Los Angeles, two loan modification agents were lured to a house, tied up, and beaten for hours by several people. "The two allegedly sought loan modification assistance from the victims but believed that nothing was being done and wanted their money back," according to the district attorney's office.

In Iceland, you can no longer get McDonald's. The company is pulling out of the entire country after Iceland's currency collapse.

Any one of those facts could make you spend your last $1.37 on a piece of scrap metal that could be fashioned into a suicide implement using a little All-American gumption. But try to put things in perspective. You think teenage prostitutes, torture-charges soon-to-be-evictees, and McNuggetless Icelanders have it bad? It could be worse. You could get a job. Then you'd have to stop maxin and relaxin and going to the gym at noon and playing video games and all that good unemployed shit. People with jobs: the real victims.

When do we get our sympathy?
[Pic: Flickr]

One of the victims of the Conde Nast receptionist purge last week was Betty Wales, who started as a Conde receptionist in the 1940s, and put in more than 30 years total on the job. At her going-away party, "She smiled brightly, but stopped short of her usual giggle. 'I've got to think of something to replace it.'" Damn that's sad.

The editor of the Miami Herald argues that the paper's not going anywhere, so relax. His main arguments: the paper has a lot of readers, and it will turn a profit this year. Hmm, yes, these are just a few of the reasons you should buy the paper from McClatchy immediately, please!

Michael Kinsley: "Judging from Tribune Co., for which I once worked, the typical newspaper executive is a bear of little brain." Haha! Lee Abrams is a lovable panda.


Don't write magazine stories making jokes at Iceland's expense, or they'll call out the killer elves on you.

You may remember that when the country initially went into its economic cataclysm, an openly gay troubadour became the face of the people's revolution. Now they've placed out gay person Johanna Sigurdardottir, who had been the nation's social affairs minister (and a former Icelandair stewardess), into the highest office in the land. It's unlikely that Sigurdardottir will remain in office after the election, as her party isn't doing terribly well in the polls, but who knows! It's a long way til May. Maybe the small handful of voters—there are only like twelve people in Iceland, and three of them are adorable children dressed in Oilily—will decide to stick with her in the end.

During her tenure as the social affairs minister, Sigurdardottir was known and well-liked for allocating large amounts of government money to fund programs like aid for the disabled and domestic abuse prevention. She lives with her partner, a journalist, and has two children from a previous marriage.

Image via AP Photo/Brynjar Gauti

Torfason, a playwright/actor/folk musician who was the first Icelander to publicly come out about thirty years ago, says of the wayward parliament: "They don't have our trust and they are no longer legitimate." That the singer of charming little ditties could become the face of a nation of newly desperate and (for now) hopeless anti-government rioters kind of scares the hell out of us, because if it could happen in that seemingly idyllic country, what surreal end-of-days scenarios await us? Will John Waters take up the reins of the new American hobo class, rioting against police until our government is overthrown?

As for Iceland's demise, unemployment is estimated to reach 10% by next year. It's a microcosm of a much bigger disaster, that could "put [the country] back 40 or 50 years," according to Sarah Lyall of the New York Times. There is a silver lining though! Reykjavik, with its loungey up-all-night bar scene, used to be one of Europe's most tantalizing but prohibitively expensive nightlife cities. Not anymore! These days we can go there cheap and dance in the ashes of their once gloriously idyllic Norse city, ably forgetting our looming penury back here Stateside.

Then we'll come home and leave them to their own devices. The long forever-night will set in, and there they'll stay.

A frozen reminder of a wintry paradise, lost.