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slash culture fest. I'm Stephen Metcalfe, and this is the Slate Culture Gab Fest, Money in the

Envelope edition. It's Wednesday, March 28, 2012. On today's program, the new season of Mad Men

with Slate's own John Swansberg, Jungleland,

the fate of New Orleans lower ninth ward in the aftermath of Katrina with the journalist Nathaniel Rich,

and finally, the Cashless Society, again with one of Slate's favorite son, Seth Stevenson.

Joining me today is Slate's deputy editor, Julia Turner. Hey, Julia.

Hi, Steve.

How have you recovered from the debacle in Los Angeles? It's nice seeing you on this side of the Mississippi.

Yeah.

You know, I'm acclimated.

Yeah.

I'm re-deaclimated, I think, is what I am.

And we're joined by not Dana Steve.

We have no Dana Stevens today, but we're going for three fill-ins instead. John Swansberg. Hey, John. Hey, Steve. Welcome to the show. John is, of course, Slate's culture editor. I am. But I'm no Dana Stevens. There's a famous story in the 1970s, a huge amount of gold because gold

is mostly traded in futures contracts, was actually the future contracts came up.

People wanted to possess the physical gold because currencies were thought of as inherently

risky because of inflation.

They delivered so much physical gold to the center of the London trading floor that it imploded, it caved in.

...