I’ve returned from Oklahoma just in time to discover that my home borough has New York City’s largest inferiority complex, though I could have told you that. Apparently the hot new term is “third borough syndrome,” as coined by the Queens Tribune, and surely this is the first time the Trib has ever come up with a phrase that garnered coverage in The New York Times. You know what my favorite thing about third borough syndrome is? The implicit disrespect to the Bronx and Staten Island, which have apparently dropped off the list — if they were ever on it in the first place — of boroughs even worth a moment of consideration. Doesn’t this sorta prove that Queens is now big time? The NYT deigns to mention it in the same breath as Manhattan — ritzy! – and Brooklyn — super hip! The buzzword for Queens is real, as “third borough syndrome” originator Tom Finkelpearl (great name) puts it.


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