DIFFERENT ISLAND

As mentioned many times before, I am a misanthrope, and getting more so with each passing day. There are many people whom I do like not by category; one of such categories is snobbery.

As you know, Bronx is the only borough of New York that is attached to the mainland; the rest are on the islands, most exiting of which is, of course, Manhattan, even though it is the smallest. Staten Island is another island, and both Queens and Brooklyn, my borough, are part of a bigger island called Long Island. For whatever unfathomable reason, the area know as Five Towns is also know as Long Island, even though it occupies only part of that island.

Now, this area is supposed to be "fancier" than Brooklyn or Queens, and people who live there usually proudly say that the live "on the Island". Yea, whatever. It was actually one of my former friends' idea to point out every single time this proud exclamation is made in our faces that Brooklyn is actually also "on the Island".

Few weeks ago one such opportunity presented itself, and, unfortunately, I could not help myself. My boss asked me for a set of tax documents, which in our office consists of W-4 for federal government bloodletting, IT-2104 for New York State leeches, and IT-2104.1 for the NYC draculas. He politely told me that I have given him the wrong forms, since he lives "on the different island". As I told you, I couldn't help myself, party because my boss belongs to a community for which "living on the Island" is the ultimate goal, and with other members of which I have already had similar tasty encounters. "You know, I live on the same island", was my very respectful reply (to his very big credit, he just smiled and told me that he will take care of it himself).