Dear Wendy,
First of all, I want to say that I picked your chain over the other fast-food restaurants simply because I think you are much better than them. The fact that you have silverware and baked potatoes makes me think you run the smartest of the fast-food chains, and are therefore the most appropriate recipient of my brilliant idea for a new ad campaign.
I am sure you are familiar with the Destiny’s Child song “Check on It.” Beyoncé and friends repeatedly ask their listeners to “check up on it.” Now, Wendy … are you thinking what I’m thinking?! Switch around the syllables of that catchy chorus and you get a song about ketchup!
So, here’s what I’m thinking for the commercial. Some kids will be eating their burgers and fries when the beat from “Check on It” rises in a slow...
Lifestyle
Dear James Randi,
I am writing to you in regard to your offer of $1 million to anyone who can demonstrate, under proper conditions of scientific trial, paranormal abilities. I deeply admire your policy of holding those who claim to possess supernatural powers to the rigorous standards of scientific inquiry and rational thought by working with these claimants to develop a preliminary, and then a formal, test of those abilities.
The warning, posted so ominously (and, dare I say, smugly) on your website, that “no one has ever passed the preliminary tests” only deepens my conviction to be the first.
Delightfully, I have not only a love for the scientific method but also a demonstrable paranormal skill! I have the ability to control men’s minds with my vagina.
To test the claim...
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Dear Birds,
While I am pleased that you have decided the air conditioner in my bedroom is the perfect place for you to reside, I feel obligated to voice a few concerns on behalf of the other inhabitants of our apartment. Please do not take this letter as a sign of ill will; I’m sure that if we can resolve these matters, peaceful cohabitation will be possible for many years to come.
Your habit of heralding each new day in song, while pleasant enough on weekdays, unfortunately becomes problematic on Saturdays and Sundays. We enjoy making the most of our weekends, but we don’t necessarily feel we need to be roused at 5:30 a.m. to do so. In addition, your melodic chirping arouses the curiosity of our cats. You may have noticed the sustained scratching noises coming, from time to time,...
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Dear Amazon Parrot I Have Been Supporting for Over 15 Years Who Still Tries to Bite Me for No Apparent Reason,
I am writing because I have a surprise for you. Ever since you’ve been living with me (rent-free, I might add), you have led me to believe you can’t understand a single word I say. Even a simple command like “Please stop pecking at my eyes” goes unheeded. You’ve also seemed completely unable to imitate human speech. For an embarrassing number of years, I carefully repeated the same simple words and phrases, always hoping that someday you might repeat them back to me. One morning I would be preparing your usual gigantic breakfast assortment of tropical fruits, whole-grain toast points, and pricey organic cereals, when a wee voice would issue from your little feathered head and...
2,598
Dear Abbie,
First of all, I’d like to assure you that, no matter what I might have ever said, you are in no danger of being asked to leave the apartment. I understand that this might not be the best news for you. I presume you miss the old house, where you could run outside and roll in the grass, nipping at flowers and chasing butterflies and mice. I presume that when I moved you into this apartment as my unwitting roommate it was a bit of a blow to be forced to make that kind of adjustment. I’ve seen you gazing out the window here, through which you only see buses and treetops and hardly any grass or fellow cats.
Don’t think I haven’t tried to make things better for you than they are. You know that wheat grass you occasionally nibble? I only got that in case you ever had an upset...
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Dear Girls who Live, Laugh, Love,
Tell me how it happened. I must know. Were you walking through the mall one day, and something in a home and furniture store caught your eye? It was a bronze picture frame, wasn’t it? It was classic, antique-y, very Martha Stewart; not something she’d feature in her magazine, but maybe something she would keep on the screen porch of her beach house in Maine. You saw it was embossed, and you took a closer look. LIVE LAUGH LOVE, it read. And you were like, oh, my God. OH, MY GOD.
Or were you looking through your friend’s photo album of her year in Nepal? It was a very life-changing experience for her, and you were very happy for her. You hoped to one day find meaning in your life, and you sighed discontentedly as you shut the album. And then, there...
2,298
Dear Friend,
For surely we are friends if you have received this invitation from me, let me be clear: this arrangement, which we are about to enter—that is, my hosting you in this house and your being my guest at same—is akin to walking into our magic box, where, although we will be present together in the same space/time, as we have surely done many times before, at our local coffee shop, say, or some similarly neutral urban territory, the rules of our relationship are now completely changed, because even though this may not be my house—I may be merely a renter, or housesitter, or even just a lucky friend of the house’s true owner—for the entire time you and I are here, we have a relationship that is not of two friends in one neutral urban territory. It is now the relationship of one...
2,983
Dear Guy Who Will Probably Never Call Me,
I’m not surprised, only disappointed. You showed such potential, such promise of not being that guy. You know what guy I mean: the typical 18-35 American male. The fan of Freddy Got Fingered. The drive-by-yeller of obscenities at women. The yeast-draped, mustard-caked assgoblin. The jerk.
You’re sweet. You’re funny. You’re intelligent and nice to your mother. Most of all, you’re a giant nerd. Giant nerds are supposed to call the girl. They’re supposed to remember that all girls are someone’s daughter, and then think about how they wouldn’t want their own daughter to be treated this way, and then start imagining that I am their daughter and then things gets weird. But giant nerds are supposed to be weird! So, when you think about it, you’re...
3,002
After being in a fairly long-term relationship my friends and I decided it would be good for me to attempt online dating and its other forms, namely Tinder. So over the past year I have spent my evenings scrutinising the profiles and photographs of all these apparent singletons in a bid to find Mr. Right.
But rather than finding Mr. Right I feel I have found all the things wrong with the Internet and relationships these days. Of course I am not blaming anyone for shamelessly promoting themselves but when you are unable to back it up in person it makes for a disappointing evening. This isn't to say that all the dates I've had over the past year have been bad! There have been some truly enjoyable ones, spent with individuals who I have made me laugh, had something going on between the...
3,982
Dear Havingsaidthat,
A certain tentativeness of opinion has become fashionable of late. By that I mean a little rhetorical polka that avoids asserting anything of consequence, a verbal watering down that would put your Miller Light to shame, an everyday, omnipresent flip-flop that has squashed direct communication everywhere.
I’m talking about you, Havingsaidthat. You have wriggled your way into the mouth of every Letterman, every shiny-tied anchorman, every political pundit who can now read one poll every way but sideways, every Fox News body language “expert,” and every reality talent show judge. Even the humble weathermen and subway station apocalypto (2013 end of times! Havingsaidthat maybe 2014!) have paid homage to your cutesy chicanery. You have transformed thousands of...
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