Yes all 32,625 of you that in the past twelve months have come across this page, every 68.3 of you that each day return, every one of you who have anonymously elected to send me some sort of correspondence to which I may yet most likely have not responded previous:
I do not want to go out on a date with you.
Dear single white male I have never met before – the green twenty-something that you are – interested in whether I prefer Italian or Thai, action films or romantic comedies; I do not want to meet you for dinner and a movie.
Dear optimistic thirty-something – you syrupy idealist, you! – I do not want to join you for a cup of coffee and a game of chess.
Dear lonesome forty-something propositioning me to be your escort at the PGA tournament this weekend – you who have barely crossed the T's and dotted the I's on your divorce papers – should know that you are old enough to have crossed the T's and dotted the I's on my birth certificate. And no, I do not want to meet you for tennis and brunch.
Dear aspiring photographer, I do not want to be photographed for your calendar. Or for your company. Or as a favor for you – dear besieged college art major of the community persuasion – that wishes to shoot me at various angles in order to complete your final project. I do not wish to meet you, he whom it may concern, at the Four Points Sheraton this Thursday to audition for your modeling agency. You must know, dear up-and-coming prospective talent scout, while I recognize that you are searching for models of all ages, races, heights, colors, and creeds, that I am not interested, not even if given my attendance, I will be provided FREE! hair and makeup services; not even, if given my attendance, I will be provided a complimentary digital portfolio of all of my headshots. Because quite honestly Mr. "you've got what I'm looking for" Modeling Big Wig, a collection of headshots is as useful to me as a box of plastic knives at a pudding eating contest.
Dear adult website moderator – you who's default picture showcases your cheap-suited self flanked on either side by a couple of K Street's finest bottled-blonde imminent DUI-threats, I do not want to pose for your dot com. I am not disarmed by your recurrent use of various derivations of the word "tasteful" or your offers to make me – MEEEEEE! (adolescent squeals!) – one of your top twenty-four should I assist you in your pornographic endeavors. Because no, adult website moderator, I do not wish to join the ranks of the women representing your top friends: not the Johnson & Johnson-oiled, large-assed thong wearer posed in a permanent squat in your first slot, nor the muffin-topped brunette whose gut is eating her two-sizes-too-small jeans in the second. Not the bed-sprawled redhead sporting nothing but a strategically placed sheet and low budget camera work in the third or the high-budgeted open-mouthed Asian in the fourth – you know, the one that's trademarked her username even though she's gained less celebrity status than the first-round boots off of this season's American Idol and members of The Big Brother reunion tour combined? Yes well I'd really prefer to not join ranks with her. Oh I mean (pardon me!) Her™. No, not even the Botox bunny in the Venus swimwear string one-piece in the fifth or the Mystic-overdosed undergrad in the sixth, contorted predictably into what I so lovingly refer to as the peace-and-pucker pose.
NOTE: peace-and-pucker pose (n.) is the term given to the culturally-influenced reflex of many adolescent and college-aged females to, in the presence of a camera and usually under the influence of alcohol, display a peace sign (typically held so that the palm is facing towards the body and at a angle) and purse the lips as if one were kissing or puckering.
No, silly Mystic-overdosed college co-ed, I do not wish to join your sorority of peacers and puckerers. I know all to well to leave my stance on international relations at home on a Saturday night and that the "pucker" is preferred by the vain and narcissistic merely because its performance when photographed slenderizes the facial line, exaggerating the cheek bones and casting a forgiving light on the newly temporary indentations. Consider it an instant face lift. Consider it preemptive airbrushing. Or consider, my sweet malleable comrade, commencing upon a serious eating disorder to achieve naturally that skeletal loveliness you crave. Either way honey, you've got to learn that buffalo wings and sexily gaunt cheeks just simply do not mix, so whatever you do: STOP EATING NOW! DON'T FEED THE MODELS!
Oh and closing credits to you adult website moderator: I simply just am not a Girl Gone Wild!
Dear heterosexual transvestite from Bethesda interested in showing me around the underground aspects of DC (to which you have added a wink and a nudge), I am skeptically mortified by your suggestion, and while nothing intrigues me more than the possibility of fulfilling my Invisible Monsters-mused fantasy of tramping around town with a two hundred and fifty pound drag queen and a pocket full of weathered red-shaded lipsticks, the heterosexual nature of your transvestite self causes me to fear for at most my life… and at least my pootie. So no, heterosexual transvestite from Bethesda, I will not be indulging in the underground aspects of metropolitan areas with you.
Dear Ethan, you who are in a relationship and will be visiting the area with your band soon, you who despite your awaiting girlfriend would subsequently like to partake in some "extracurricular activities" while in town and you who feel I am just the girl to do that with; you who have ostensibly been caught cutting and pasting this identical request only to send it also to a friend of one of my best friend's, you sir can snack hard on it. And by it of course I do mean my proverbial cookie; not the biblical one you will not, would not, and could not ever have the pleasure of snacking on. I do hope sir, when you and your band arrive in the area and your unfaithful intentions envelop you, that your itching, burning aspirations towards infidelity manifest themselves two to four weeks later into a little itching and burning of the crotch variety, leaving you dear Ethan - the newly crowned master of antibiotics and preventative ointment - a little less inclined to proposition innocent, unresponsive, and/or happily-taken women online and a little more inclined to be sitting alone in the darkness of your bedroom, sipping Natty Bo through your own tears, frantically punching your venereal symptoms into the browser box at WebMD.
Dear recently and soon-to-be physically uprooted men of MySpace, I do so recognize that you will soon be coming to my area – "my area" according to your definitions, apparently representing a ninty-mile radius from where I in reality live (in a tranquil rural region 120-miles south of Washington) – and I do in fact recognize that you, like many other random males utilizing this site, would like to ultimately meet up. Unfortunately, my dear recently and soon-to-be physically uprooted men of MySpace, there are greater chances of the Pope blessing my snatch than of you and I arranging a date in which I will show up unguarded at some midway all-hours diner holding a neon-colored puff-penned poster board reading WELCOME TO MARYLAND, BOB! No, you possibly homicidal or criminally intentioned, recently and soon-to-be physically uprooted men of MySpace, you simply cannot be pulling such imprudent stunts in today's society.
And please, recently and soon-to-be physically uprooted men of MySpace, when I decline the invite to meet, please do not litter my inbox with one hundred and one questions on the part times, pastimes, night lives, recreational activities, housing options, school systems, legal systems, or local economies available and present in "my area" because seriously sweetheart, I am not the Census (Senseless) Bureau. No, you poor geographically challenged creatures that you are, I am not the Goodwill Ambassador of the Maryland, Virginia, and DC metropolitan region. My name is not synonymous with Frommers, Lonely Planet, or DK eyewitness travel guides. It is not synonymous with Craig's List, Google, Yahoo! Maps, Ask.com, or Map Quest. My name is not tantamount with any number of networking sites, local classified ads, locating services, or famous-maker GPS systems.
But if you really must know my advice on finding the best a city has to offer, you impending new kids on the block you, I'd suggest the ridiculously obsolete ancient art of signing out of your computer, getting off of your ass, picking up a couple of local papers and city maps, getting in your car (or setting out on foot dependent upon the region), and seeing for your damn self what's out there to be had. You too, recently and soon-to-be physically uprooted men of MySpace, will find that new opportunities are waiting to present themselves at any moment – in coffee shops, libraries, universities, dance clubs, places of employment, etc. – but better you than me to figure out what you're into, because honey I'm the last to know, and we needn't keep the mayor at her desk for hours telling you about you're options for a social existence in the tri-state area.
Q: But you ARE the mayor – aren't you?
Of course I'm the mayor!
Yet being the mayor doesn't mean I need to exert an ounce of effort on you, you recently and soon-to-be physically uprooted men of MySpace! Being the mayor means that when I'm not laboring diligently for the salvation of the masses – for the charity of the oppressed and ailing – I am doing what I want, when I want, to whomever I want, as pompously and unapologetically as possible. Being the mayor means that by day I am wearing my hot new Juicy Couture specs, researching advances in behavioral therapy, penning out fundraising proposals and event schematics, and – by night – drinking for free at any number of our local watering holes, signing autographs, and posing for photo ops with my fans, particularly outside of bustling restaurants and on the hood of my car. Yes, being the mayor means that I have a carefully selected group of best friends consisting of urban dance-off winners and equine extraordinaires, and that I respond with gracious waves and air kisses when collective cheers arise as I enter a room, but being the mayor does NOT mean that I have to tell you where there is to go in [enter inane city I know nothing about] because the only answers I'm going to give you are either to a) hell or b) communion.
[points to crotch]
Dear ~*CASH MONEY GANGSTA*~ you whose default picture showcases you in all of your cash money gangster glory, throwing up a gang sign with your right hand and holding a wad of bills in your left, you who finds it necessary to photograph yourself wearing a fur-trimmed North Face down jacket even though it's mid–Augus, this one's for you.
Dear DA DOPEST FRESH AKA THE ORIGINAL NYC GOTTI™ AKA DA REAL PIMP JUICE, you whose default picture is a near-birds eye shot of your lubricated abdominals – yes you, oh great tanned headless torso! – I would have thought you to have been armless had it not been for the sliver of forearm holding your flashing camera phone, positioned ever so perfectly towards the bathroom mirror in your row house. A row house that is – my DOPEST FRESH, my ORIGINAL NYC GOTTI™ – thirty miles out from the city in a Jersey suburb. And well, this one's for you. My dear import addict who wRiT3S lIkE Di$ N Th!nkS d@TS C00L and dear various gentlemen referring to me as mama, mommy, mami, and mamacita, to all of you: grab a Webster's, lay off of the symbols keys, notice I am not (papi!) anywhere in your family tree, put your shirts back on, and remember for god's sake, your upstairs bathroom is not your portrait studio. To all of you cash money gangsters out there, all of you identity-perplexed culturally-defined something or others, lose the money rolls, put it in the bank, go back to college (you are NOT Kanye West), drop the façade, and whatever you do, if nothing else, please don't confuse winter-wear for status symbols. Here let's fair-trade it: you don't wear jackets off-season and I won't tape my degrees and trust fund records to the windows of my Acura. Deal?
Dear randomly-allocated unrelenting men of MySpace, you who hail from all fifty states and major cities of the nation, you who add-request me regardless of how many times I deny you from my friend requests, no number of picture changes or username adjustments are going to better your chances of being added as my friend. Dear randomly-allocated unrelenting men of MySpace, you who will send me the same cut-and-paste message every time I change my user picture, who write me incessantly within minutes of seeing that your sent message has been READ but not responded to, your restraint would be greatly appreciated. Dear randomly-allocated unrelenting men of MySpace, you who claim to see me out around town at various establishments and never approach me, yet write me at two in the morning nonetheless detailing where I was and who I was with; dear creepy guy with the professional modeling shots who utilized my book club as a springboard for inviting me out to drinks, dear Average Joe who insists he attends the same gym as my high school friend but when asked about you, she doesn't know who you are: no thank you times three; SPAN: " yes? mso-spacerun: Please, randomly-allocated unrelenting men of MySpace, do not use ice-breaking tactics such as asking me if I'm Michelle's sister's brother-in-law's cousin, because chances are I'm not. Please know, randomly-allocated unrelenting men of MySpace, you who overcompensate in eagerness what you lack in tact, when you say I probably get this message a lot and I probably won't write you back, you're right. So please, randomly-allocated unrelenting men of MySpace, you who I will not write back, you who I will continue to delete from my friend requests time and time again, you who will fail miserably in your attempts at having a cyber friendship with me, if you do nothing else – nothing else at all – please do not, and I mean EVER send me a giant glitter graphic. The next one of you that does that – cash money gangster, this includes you! – will have his soul eaten by Jesus.
