AP Photo

With the exception of the Black Death, nothing can ruin a city like the Olympics. So I hope my British friends will forgive me when I say: sorry, chaps, but better you than us.

For a while there, the Big Apple was nursing a bit of an inferiority complex about the Big Smoke. At the top of the boom, every artist and writer in New York seemed to be moving to London (myself included). Mike Bloomberg, our eternal mayor, started spending more time at his apartment in Cadogan Square, glumly enduring double-decker bus rides for photo ops and begging your highly professional banks to come do more business in our town.