Schadenfreude Alert: Mrs. Madoff Apartment Hunting

If there was any doubt that we have entered the age of schadenfreude -- I-bankers carrying boxes down Wall Street, real estate brokers begging for buyers, A-Rod getting stuck with Kate Hudson the way he deserves -- doubt no more. Ruth Madoff is looking for a crash pad.

Just yesterday she checked out a one-bedroom on E. 90th, according to the Post, which gleefully points out that Ms. Madoff's prospective digs are 3,529 square feet less than the four-bedroom manse Feds evicted her from last week after seizing her $3-million Montauk beach house. And the paper does not stop there, it lovingly relays every utterly and deliciously mundane detail of the apartment, calling it a "fixer-upper":

"The hardwood floors are crying out to be refinished and repaired, the ceiling is missing large chunks of plaster, the walls are scuffed, the paint is peeling paint, and the cramped kitchen features orange linoleum on the floor and yellow Formica counters."

When you fall from such great heights, you fall hard. So it is, that Mrs. Madoff faces a future of living like, well, just about any new arrival to the City with a secretarial job. This all begs the question, though: why on earth does she not leave New York. People loathe and despise her here. Many would spit on her if they were close enough. She is stalked by photographers and mocked in the supermarket. She must really like living in New York. That or she is just one hard-bitten battle ax.