I love The New York Times in much the same way as some people love their children. When the Times does ridiculous things I inevitably excuse it. Jayson Blair? A bad deal, but they admitted it and moved forward. The Iraq travesty? They did a huge mea culpa piece– the self-flaggellation was enough.

I love the offbeat pieces, the educated opinion writing and even the old-fashioned use of honorifics.

But every now and then they do a piece so ridiculous that it’s indefensible. This piece on women going to New York for a Sex and the City lifestyle, is one such piece.

I get that the show is iconic, but must we really have an article about how women are struggling to afford Manhattan apartments and $500 shoes at the same time? Oh how shocking– their lives aren’t like the show. They can’t afford to eat at 4-star restaurants AND pay the rent.

What’s more tedious is that the article attempts to examine things that have happened, PC (Post-Carrie). One such “pithy” observation: Women today use cellphones and blogs, whereas in the show, Carrie merely has a column, and her cellphone is merely an accessory. In fact, men don’t want to date the heroines of the Times’ piece, because *gasp* these women blog about their love lives. Oh no–their lives are so different from Carrie’s! How sad.

Clearly someone thought that it would be timely to do this piece because the SATC movie comes out in a few weeks. Regardless, the article wastes our time with several pointless issues, such as the cost of shoes, the perils of big-city high-life dating, and the ignominy of living in Queens.

Frankly, I don’t give a crap about this.

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