Chicago cab drivers petitioned the city to let them charge $50 when passengers vomit in their cab, in addition to other rate hikes.  But according to Something Awful this isn’t a rate hike, it’s a premium service:

I’m a vomit-bucket-half-full sort of guy. I don’t think these cabbies are trying to charge you for puking, I think they are offering you the premium service of vomiting in their taxi.

America was built on the idea of premium services. This is how the wealthy are able to have so much more fun than everyone else. They can behave however they want as long as they have the money to cover the premiums!

The $70 currently in my wallet entitles me to a good three blocks on Michigan Avenue and a nice half-digested deep dish pizza projectile vomited all over the headrest.

The best part?  This was through The Economist.  How else could you get a comment like this on an Economist article:

Sir-

I don’t always vomit. But when I do, I probably drank Dos Equis.

Categories: America, Behavioral Economics, Chicago, Funny, Incentive Centered Design
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Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution says:

With New York and Los Angeles in some disarray, Chicago is arguably North America’s “coolest” city right now; the new contemporary wing of the Art Institute is the best “new U.S. museum” in many years.

I visited the Modern Wing for the first time this past weekend and was equally impressed.  That Chicago is the coolest city in fact goes without argument: I live here.

Categories: Chicago
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A random picture I took outside my friend’s office window last night:

A view of the West Loop at night.

Categories: Chicago, Photos
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The Chicago Symphony Orchestra is considered the best in the United States, and 7th in the world, by a recent survey of music critics:

“Actually, this will be a surprise because a lot of people in America would, as a knee-jerk reaction, would rank the New York Philharmonic at the top,” Inverne says. “Or, indeed, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, which has fantastic technical standards. But Chicago beat a further six orchestras, which were in our top 20, from America.

…

“Chicago famously has this incredible brass sound,” Inverne says. “And it just pins you to the back of your seat. And the way that that brass sound shoots out, exemplifies a lot about the orchestra, which is a sense of adventure in music-making.”

Categories: Chicago, Entertainment Media
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