February 8, 2002
From the desk of Jane Galt:An Open Letter to the
An Open Letter to the People Who Keep Sending me Email addressed to Jane Galt:
I want to first thank you for the warm regard you have shown me over the years. Not a morning goes by when I don't open my inbox to a flood of correspondance from well-wishers all over the globe, some in places, and at internet sites, of which I have never heard. In this dark period of my life, it is always good to know that one has dear friends striving to keep one abreast of all the latest developments in financial opportunities, nutritional supplements, and Barely Legal Teenage Girls.
Unfortunately, the flood tide of your kind, kind interest has rendered me unable to respond to each email as I would like, or even to devote sufficient time to assessing the many opportunities you have offered me. I believe that if we set a few simple ground rules for our correspondance, we will both get more out of it. I wish that I could email each of you separately, but since I am currently receiving between 50-100 of your thoughtful notes a day, I find myself unable to address each one individually. Instead I have summarized some of my key concerns:
1. I am not interested in Barely Legal Teenage Girls.
2. I do not have a penis. If I did, I would not risk it with quack remedies, even if those remedies promised to make it up to 30% larger without chemicals or vacuum pumps.
3. I do not have a home. I do not have a mortgage. In fact, I live with my parents. I am twenty-nine years old, and I'm living with Mom and Dad, complete with fights about whose turn it is to take out the garbage and Why I Haven't Given them Grandchildren. I want to thank you for providing the daily reminders of my plight which have, at each reading, re-fired my resolve to get a real job. However, until I do, I still do not have a house. You may direct any solicitations regarding mortgages, home equity lines, home repairs, or the many benefits of genuine Sears aluminum siding, to my parents, although I warn you that since they have an apartment, they will probably not be buying any aluminum siding.
4. I am not interested in Barely Legal Teenage Girls even if they have just procured their first webcam.
5. When you send me emails regarding my damaged credit, this makes me nervous. I wonder how you know about my credit, and indeed, who else has this information. I wonder if a few childish indiscretions will keep me from the home-ownership that might permit me to enjoy the home equity lines, repairs, and genuine Sears aluminum siding which you have discussed in such glowing terms. I brood. I realize you think of me as a soulless creature with little time for anything except home repairs and Barely Legal Teenage Girls, but this is not the case. I have dreams. Dreams which may never be realized if I don't shake the depression into which your repeated exhortations about my credit have plunged me. Please stop sending them until such time as I can afford a therapist and/or Prozac.
6. I understand that when you send me emails about surefire ways to make money from home, you are just trying to help me out of my current financial straits. However, as I mentioned before, home is not a place where I currently desire to spend the larger part of my day. If you have any ways to make money from, say, a comfortable hotel suite on the Riviera, I would like to get those emails instead.
7. I am 6'2 and within the normal weight range for that height. While I have heard that you can never be too rich or too thin, I fear that if I lost Up to 100 pounds in 3 months, the only job I would be able to maintain would be as an extra in an Oxfam commercial. If I have to choose between being rich and thin, I choose rich. You can always buy a better body.
8. I thank you for your attention to my education. I have read your missives with great interest. I admit to great curiosity as to how you can provide a University Diploma for $500, when mine took four years, $50,000 of student loans, and liver surgery. I regret that I am unable to utilize this service, but as you can see, I am already well supplied with both degrees, and the attendant debt. Reading about people who got their degrees for 1/100th of the price of mine fill me with a mindless rage that only lessens my predisposition to partake of either home repairs or Barely Legal Teenage Girls.
9. I'm a heterosexual woman. No matter how hot and horny they are, I just can't make myself care about the Barely Legal Teenage Girls, although they would probably make better company than my parents and my Aunt Margaret. Please do contact me if you come across any Independantly Wealthy Biathlete Physicists.
10. You may have noted in earlier items that I do not have a job. Thus, I do not pay taxes. I know that when you send me ideas on how to Pay Absolutely No Income Tax! you are just trying to get me to look on the bright side, but I find that it simply kicks off the no job. . . depression. . . no job cycle to which I referred earlier.
11. Of course, I wouldn't mind larger breasts, but I might want to use these later and frankly, I'm afraid of what your creams might do to my parents' grandchildren -- and consequently, what they might do to me. Thank you anyway.
I appreciate your taking the time to read this. As long as we keep these rules in mind, I believe we can look forward to a long, beautiful relationship.
Sincerely,
Megan McArdle
Posted by Jane Galt at February 8, 2002 10:05 PM | TrackBack | Technorati inbound links"); ?>