Escaping the Recession by Boat

In the midst of the Great Recession and its bleak job prospects, Alex and Nick Kleeman scraped together enough cash to buy a 32-foot sailboat and plunged into the Pacific for the adventure of their lives. So what if they didn’t know how to sail?

Author: Sarah Rose
Source: Outside
Published: Jul 23, 2013
Length: 22 minutes (5,630 words)

The Troll’s Lawyer

Tor Ekeland, unemployed and burned out from his job working at a corporate law firm, decided to defend Andrew Alan Escher Auernheimer, a Jew-hating hacktivist also known as weev, and challenge a sweeping computer crime law.

Source: Medium
Published: Jan 5, 2015
Length: 26 minutes (6,716 words)

The World’s Top Breast-Reconstruction Artist Runs a Tattoo Parlor in Maryland

Meet Vinnie Myers, known as the “Michelangelo of Nipple Tattoos.”

Source: Washingtonian
Published: Sep 8, 2014
Length: 14 minutes (3,700 words)

War Over Hollywood Sign Pits Wealthy Residents Against Urinating Tourists

Residents of Los Angeles’ tony Beachwood Canyon neighborhood are battling hordes of GPS-enabled tourists looking to make a pilgrimage to the city’s most popular and unregulated landmark.

Author: Gary Baum
Published: Jan 14, 2015
Length: 14 minutes (3,636 words)

The Talking Cure

In Providence, Rhode Island, the mayor hopes getting low-income parents to talk to their very young children more will help boost language skills and close the achievement gap.

Source: The New Yorker
Published: Jan 5, 2015
Length: 32 minutes (8,016 words)

Reservation Confirmed: A Reading List About Airbnb

It’s easy to get distracted while reading about Airbnb. First, the listings themselves range from luxurious to quaint, and if you have any sort of upcoming vacation planned … well, let’s say it’s a timesuck.

Source: Longreads
Published: Jan 4, 2015

Food Fight

Chefs in Dallas are unhappy with Leslie Brenner, the restaurant critic for The Dallas Morning News, and her newspaper’s star rating system. So they’ve stop cooperating with her.

Author: Zac Crain
Source: D Magazine
Published: Jan 1, 2015
Length: 12 minutes (3,015 words)

‘Chris Harrison Is One of the Smoothest Motherf—ers I’ve Ever Met’

A very funny, thoughtful profile of The Bachelor‘s longtime host, now divorced and pondering the meaning of relationships.

Source: GQ
Published: Jan 3, 2015
Length: 18 minutes (4,591 words)

Confessions of a College Athletics Fixer

How one former coach perpetuated a cheating scheme that benefited hundreds of college athletes.

Published: Dec 28, 2015
Length: 22 minutes (5,550 words)

Inside a Chinese Test-Prep Factory

Larmer visits Maotanchang High School in eastern China’s Anhui province, a “cram school” where 20,000 students train round the clock for the gaokao, the country’s college-entrance exam.

Published: Dec 31, 2014
Length: 22 minutes (5,547 words)