Lukas Degutis

Also: Eastern European supers, $17 ice cream and Texan immigrants who put Elon on the money Credit: NASA Windows open on the Upper West Side New York’s Upper West Side has been home for almost two months now. It is the first place in the city I have slept, almost every night, with my bedroom windows wide open. It’s not silent — New York never is — and I am only on the second floor. Traffic still passes, sirens still perform their solos.

UConn’s Braylon Mullins, 19 This week, Pope Leo XIV took to X to lament what he called a world of “disproportionate wealth,” where vast riches sit in the hands of a few while hundreds of millions remain in poverty. Hundreds of millions of people throughout the world are immersed in extreme poverty. Yet, disproportionate wealth remains in the hands of a few. It is an unjust scenario, in the face of which we cannot fail to question ourselves and commit to change things.

I seem to be encountering things at a slightly inconvenient rate. The everyday New York-ery — small, often very odd, revealing quirks — don’t quite warrant a full write-up, but feel worth noting before they’re replaced by the next set. It’s also seven weeks since move-in. So while the observations have continued, so has a slow, steady avalanche of admin. And occasionally, something more personal slips through. All of it seems worth keeping — and sharing. Thus, a new format: fragments.