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16 things NYC will make a mess of—no matter how hard you try

Written by
Sophie Harris
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By Time Out contributors, edited by Sophie Harris

We truly do love our city, from the tippy-top of the Empire State Building right down to its subterranean secret events. But do you ever get the feeling your I Heart NY T-shirt is looking a little faded? And come to think of it, don't most things in New York start out cute then get really sloppy? Things like...

1. Your apartment
Looks perfectly renovated when you move in, within a week everything breaks.


2. Your timeliness
Prided yourself on punctuality back home? Welcome to the New York 15 minutes.


3. Your outfit
Nice leather skirt, party girl! Wanna give us a twirl once you get home and it's ruined? (Sob.)


4. Snow
Gaze at the magical first flurry of snow! Try to ignore the apocalyptic black slush that follows in the weeks thereafter.


5. Hair blowouts in summer
Au revoir, sleek shiny straight hair! You've got a subway train to catch, and you intend to arrive looking as disheveled as possible!


6. Your bike
NYC will kill its tires, gears and brakes (if it doesn't get stolen).


7. Your shoes
Are New Yorkers' shoes more shittily made than in any other part of the country? Or do we just walk way, way further than anyone else? Either way, your sweet new kicks will be ground to leathery pulp within weeks.


8. Your commute
The train arrives and miraculously isn’t packed! But then it stops without reason for 15 minutes and a man pees on the floor near you and someone shouts "It's showtime!" Super.


9. Delightful routines
Wanna have brunch every single Saturday with your fabulous group of gal pals just like in Sex and the City? Because you have copious amounts of time and always get along? Good luck with that. You’ll do it once, maybe twice, then this one has to work, the other feels guilty leaving her boyfriend all the time, and the third gets a better offer and ditches you.


10. Tinder
At first: Wow, look how many eligible singles are out there! And then: What a total wasteland, and why is everyone posing with tigers or on boats?


11. The East Village on a Friday night
Around dinnertime the restaurants all look bright and full, and everyone's meeting up with friends. But by 2am it's full of drunk NYU students eating dollar slices and stumbling around.


12. Apartment hunting
Looking for a new place is kind of exciting for a second, until you realize you have to increase your budget by $250 and settle for a windowless living room.


13. Your nerves
The constant threat of random violence/streams of piss/speeding taxis and a permanent rocket-launch noise level makes the fraying of your once-perky nerves inevitable.


14. Your air conditioner
A gleaming piece of modern machinery out of the box; a filthy, rusted relic after two months of freezing rain and snow.


15. New Yorkers' complexions
Between the heat, the grime and the stress, you'll have zits well into middle age.


16. Your floors
No matter how often you keep your windows closed and how obsessively you Swiffer, dust bunnies breed like rabbits here.

RECOMMENDED: The New York guide to life

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