Bear Flag Blog

I read Brad DeLong's blog daily; although I enjoy his calling out of corporate media shills, and his economic analysis, and various other content, it's really the unexpected moments of perfect phrase-turning that keep me coming back:

One of the things that middle-aged white people do is that they gradually, room by room, pay someone to replace the 1980 wall-to-wall carpeting that came with the house with stained oak floors. And then they have to buy oriental carpets to put on top of the new oak floor to render the overwhelming bulk of it invisible.

"Why not just put oak down around the edge of the room?" I asked. "And leave plywood where the rugs are going to go?"

"You think you are funny," said one of our floor guys, "and I laugh because you are paying me. But if you ever buy new construction, check--especially it the rugs are tacked down, and especially always check if there are runners on the stairs."

Now, was it the floorer that was particularly witty in this instance, or Brad? The world may never know.