Super Freaky

The life of an intern is neither profitable nor glamorous, but I can’t deny that there are perks when you least expect them. For example: the car service that picks you up at 5am. Your internship pays for it because they want to be sure you make it in on time for the 6am radio show. They don’t tell you its because they are worried you will oversleep. Instead, they make it sound like they are doing you a huge favor, and are concerned for your safety; they don’t want you to risk the dangerous subways and streets of New York at such an ungodly hour.
Better though, is when you show up at the internship, its 5:20am, and you find that instead of the boring morning of coffee making that you groaned about when you pressed snooze on your alarm, that someone exciting is going to be in the studio that morning.
For example, recently as I prepared to pinch myself awake for 4 straight hours, I found that my first job of the morning was to pick up Stephen Dubner.
Stephen Dubner? Yes, you are dumb. You should know who he is. But in case the symbol of a sliced open Apple/Orange doesn’t jog your memory, I will inform you. Stephen Dubner is one of the co-authors of Freakanomics.
I guess the reason that I in particular was super excited about this, is that for a class back in my freshman year of college, I had to write a letter (I forget the assignment exactly) to someone who had had an article published. And I decided to write to Stephen and Steven, the co-authors of Freakanomics. And now I got a chance to talk to the man himself. And he was exactly what one would expect. Flyaway hair, thick rimmed glasses, and forever concerned that his thermos full of coffee was going to spill on his MacBook.
I chatted with him for a bit, and mentioned what an honor it was to meet him, as I had actually once wrote him a letter. He looked at me concerned and said, “Did I not write you back!?” I explained how I had not actually sent the letter, but rather, I just wrote it for an assignment. To which he responded that I should of course send it to him.
At this point in my life I think the letter is a bit silly (especially being as their second book just came out, and they went with an exploding fruit for the cover art) but here goes:

Dear the guys who wrote Freakanomics,

I read your book. I like the way you think. Out of all the statements and all the theories, I like your conclusions on the correlations between legalizing abortion and the drop in crime. For those of you who haven’t read the book, forgive me Stephen Dubner and Steven Levitt, as I butcher your intelligence in a one-line explanation. In the 1970’s, abortion became legalized; and about 16 years later, when all of those unwanted fetuses would have reached the age to become criminals (potentially a reflection of poor parenting from the resentful people who raised them) the crime rate dropped. Coincidence? Maybe. But also- maybe not. I marveled at the gall of such a statement to a nameless friend of mine. His response? That is just a theory; there is no way to test it. Hmmm, am I stupid or something? It’s impossible to test a theory? I pointed this out and we established that the only way to test this theory would be as follows. Step 1: Find a country with a highish crime rate where abortion is illegal. Step 2: Legalize abortion. Step 3: Wait until that year of fetuses hits the age where they would become criminals. Step 4: Observe if the crime rate goes down.

So Stephen, Steven, keep yours ears peeled for a country that you could influence. Test this out. I promise to promote your next book. And I can guarantee that I will buy it. I can’t guarantee that other people will, but I have a theory that another book will do almost as well as the first. Oh, and one last thing! I’ve been thinking about what two fruits would work as your cover art. Besides for an orange, which you already used, there are not many other fruits that distinguishable on the inside. The one I came up with? A watermelon. If on your next book cover you had the shell of a pineapple, with the inner slice revealing watermelon, I think it would be a huge success. I’m going to copyright the image, but for you guys who did me such a favor by testing out the abortion theory in some third world country, I would let you guys use it for free.

Thanks.

I guess the cool thing about all of this, is that I actually got to meet someone that I wrote a hypothetical letter to in a class. How many interns luck out like that?