it's a bit more in London

It's difficult to avoid- this financial panic. Although we are certainly feeling it in NYC- neighbors and friends losing their jobs, "How do you sign up for unemployment? Do they make you go to workshops and stuff?" (They do). Bars offering state-of-the-economy drink specials. Vogue, Vanity Fair...W...New York- have designed their features on buying items as investments, or economic facts and figures.

And yet this masochistic system is pushing staple item prices to rise. A slice is $3.00 at the go-to joint in my neighborhood, up from $2.25. My Chinese launder recently raised his rate from $0.60/per pound to $0.80/per pound for drop-off wash and fold service. And to be honest, I still won't do my own laundry, in fact the raise has made me reconsider the $0.90/per pound for pick up and delivery.

Curiously, we are asked to celebrate the shortcomings of our neighbors to the East: beyond the consideration of the US economy, is the situation pushing its way to the surface in the UK. As the UK is much less transparent than that of the US, it is only recently becoming clear to the general public that they are sitting on a sweltering mess of bad loans. Financial historian Niall Ferguson confirmed, "The good news is that London seems to be handling this crisis slightly worse than New York. My sense is that the great financial crisis we're living in will fundamentally tilt the balance of the world."

Despite the talk of redundancies in the UK, I do not think the credit crunch has fully gripped them yet. Their economy is heavily reliant on housing and although this is one of the biggest hit sectors, I suspect that the UK will most likely not slip into recession until Christmas, perhaps a little later, and with that- the associated job losses that recessions entail.

--With all this expressed, I come to the crowning moment of my day (which was not the homeless guy chasing me down the street screaming obscenities after I corrected that I did not have a cig or a quarter...)

---I glanced up from the calendar and numbers to take in a trader:

Hunched forward. The blue glow of Bloomberg on his face, he put his hands into his hair and squeezed, "This is the least amount of fun I've had in a while."

Image: bbc.com/uk
Facts: CNBC, NY Mag, W Mag, BBC