an open letter to Trader Joe's

Dear Trader Joe's,

It pains to write this, but I feel spurned and neglected by your corporation. Not because it's taken you so long to come to Olympia--I, too, will celebrate your store's opening next month--but because I had to learn the good news fourthhand.

Seriously: I heard about it on Twitter from someone who posted on Facebook a conversation they'd had with an employee at another store in the region. Heard that the Olympia location will open its doors to an adoring public on August 22nd, 2009.

But I can't vouch for the accuracy of the date. Believe me, I'd love to, but heard-it-from-a-friend is trouble enough, journalistically speaking, never mind heard-it-from-a-multilayered-social-network-of-acquaintances-and-strangers.

What's my beef, specifically? Well, take a look at this sirloin. A week ago I posted on this very blog an update to the news from February that a store would be opening this year. Seeking more specific information, I dutifully filled out the email form on your website, and got the automatic repsonse saying hey, we're busy, but we check all our emails, and yours is in the queue.

A week later, nothing.

I could have mailed a letter and gotten a faster response. I could have resurrected the Pony Express and gotten a faster response. Heck, I could have built a time machine, gone back in time to snatch a Pony Express driver from the Old West, sent him galloping to your headquarters, and still gotten a faster response.

And it's not just me: my wife reports that when she tried to email a concern about a faulty product, she never heard back.

Your email system is broken, Trader Joe's.

And now, so is my heart.

Love,

Me

an open letter to Ken Griffey, Jr.

Dear Ken Griffey "Junior" Jr.,

I promise in advance not to leak any future "Ichiro and The Kid" karaoke videos to YouTube.

Sincerely,

Me





Update: See? See?!

Sutton Place Hotel, Vancouver: you stink

Dear Sutton Place Hotel:

Why, why, why do you charge customers nearly $15 for 24 hours of internet connectivity?

Even Scharf's Motor Inn in Deer Lodge, Montana has free wireless.

Still steamed,

Jim

an open letter to Netflix

Dear Netflix,

Thanks for providing unlimited access to select movies via my subscription. Netflix is already cool, and this just makes it that much cooler.

Now, how about some Mac support?

Cheers,

Jim Anderson
Olympia, WA

an open letter to the John Edwards campaign

Dear Machinations of Democracy Who Need Blogging Talent,

I am available.

Also, I don't swear much.

Cheers,

Me

an open letter to the Juneau School Board

Dear Alaskan Friends,

I recently read that you're considering two names for your new high school, and have parsed the arguments for both choices: "Thunder Mountain" is strong and cheer-worthy, while "Capital" sounds "regal and hopeful." As an outsider, I salute your commitment to respectful, reasoned debate, and will shelve my linguistic and analytic critiques, content to offer another perspective.

There are already way, way too many Capital High Schools in this country. Four, if Wikipedia is to be trusted. Choosing "Capital" will only augment confusion.

Consider my recurring experience. When I travel within Washington, and tell acquaintances that I teach English at Capital High School, they immediately ask, "Where's that?"

"In the capital city," I say, shrugging and sighing. "Olympia."

"Oh," they say, embarrassed.

I don't blame them. Capital High School is a generic name, about as generic as my own. Preserve your uniqueness, Juneaueans. Choose "Thunder Mountain." We don't need another CHS.

Really.

Regards,

Jim Anderson
Capital High School
Olympia, Washington

yet another quixotic candidate

This time it's Bruce Guthrie, who has discovered a terrible way to spend $1.2 million.

an open letter to Aaron Dixon

Dear Mr. Long-Shot,

I'm guessing that your fuzzy, infrared image on your campaign signs is a shout-out to Che. Thing is, your beefy 'stache makes you look like Dzhugashvili: robust, manly, Communist.

Oh well. Cantwell's gonna win it in a walk anyway.

Sincerely,

Jim

Wolfmother: the new Jet

Dear 107.7 The End,

Rattle this around in your skull for a few minutes, until you hear the sound of maracas.

Woman
You know that you're a woman
You got to be a woman
I got the feeling of love

When you're talking to me
You see right through me
I got the feeling of love

She's a woman
You know what I mean
You better listen
Listen to me
She's gonna set you free

"You got to be a woman." Why does this have the ring of desperation? Is her femininity in doubt?

"I got the feeling of love." Not love, mind you, but the feeling of love. Like the bloating of gas.

"She's a woman / You know what I mean." What else could he possibly mean?

"She's gonna set you free." Ah, she's an appeals attorney. A powerful woman is mannish. This is all some kind of veiled antifeminism.

Granted, this hackneyed tripe very nearly rhymes, and the accompanying guitar work reminds one of sloppy Queens of the Stone Age. But please, for the love of music, stop playing Wolfmother.

Oh, and Keane, too, while you're at it.

Sincerely,

Me

catching literature fresh and alive, daily

Dear Folks at The Threepenny Review,

Please take a moment to review my blog, decorabilia, and sample the excellent range of writing I offer here.

Then, if you'd like to subscribe, you can take advantage of my special offer to new readers: twelve months for free, the usual cost of six!

This is an unbeatable price to pay for an internationally respected daily like mine, and I guarantee you'll love the witty, wide-ranging, cosmopolitan writing that decorabilia will bring you nearly every single day.

But don't take my word for it -- check out the website first. If you like what you see, you can offer me a chance to publish my grade-A material in your quarterly, thus launching me on a voyage to literary fame, and, maybe someday, blurb-worthiness.

Or, if you prefer more oldfashioned methods, I'll send you some unpublished manuscripts which you can accept with bioluminescent praise. Either way, I'll provide you my pecks of prose absolutely free.

All best,

Jim Anderson


P.S. How did you know I'm cosmopolitan? Is it my Harper's subscription?

an open letter to the chap who sent me the mail race letter

Dear Student,

Thank you for your kind interest in a random English class halfway across the country. I hope by now you've received a stack of letters from other students whose teachers haven't yet discovered the brave new world of electronic communication. (It's an allusion!)

Even so, I might at least consider your proposition if it weren't for your missive's angrifying features.

1. The "%" symbol certainly looks like c/o, but there's a subtle difference.

2. Your naked appeal to my generosity is the worst possible strategy. I have minimal desire for your class to win a pizza party, no matter how grandiose and opulent said party may be. There's no satisfaction in vicarious gustation. None.

3. Paragraphs were invented for a reason.

4. Typing your name in italics does not substitute for a signature. If you're going to beg for help, at least go to the trouble of finding a ball point, never mind a gel pen.

I'm probably extra peeved because my name is first in the English department, alphabetically, so I get all these damned letters and gleefully throw them out after only a cursory inspection. Sorry. Not really.

Regards,

Me

P.S. Asking "all the girls in the class to send their pictures back!" makes me happier to send your letter air mail to the trash can.

an open letter to the random people who stumble upon my blog

Dear Searchers,

I honestly don't get it. How do you end up here?

Since I've started keeping track, it's become clear that my content has nothing--nothing!--to do with your putative search terms. More than eighty percent of the time, you click through to the link in which the terms are only miraculously found on the same page. This can't be helpful, can it?

Some of you are interested in Italian furniture. Sorry, wrong Decorabilia. Some of you want help with your homework. I can imagine the term papers you're writing about Artemio Cruz and Citizen Kane and Achilles the Hero. Don't crib anything from this site, though; it's useless, and you'll get caught. (If I know how, so does your teacher.) Some of you are Googling yourselves--don't be shy, it's obvious. I've done it, too.

Or do you find that my writing is so zesty, even in Googly bits, that you're irresistibly drawn to the genius that is decorabilia? Nah, that can't be it.

Now that you're here, though, thanks for stopping by. I hope this five minute detour doesn't lead you astray from enlightenment.

Oh, one more thing. How and where are they offering a cookie to join the Dark Side? 'Cause it sounds like a pretty lame deal.

Regards,

Me

joshua golding

Or, an open letter to Google

Dear Google,

I do not deserve to be ranked fifth on a search for Joshua Golding, an upstanding scholar and chair of Bellarmine's department of philosophy. My addition to the library of knowledge on his work is a mere link to this review of a Richard Swinburne tome.

And really, the credit goes to Brian Weatherson, whose tireless efforts to catalogue philosophical papers available online is a labor of love and genius that too often goes unpraised.

So do what you must, Google, and move my piddling entry to the bottom of the link pile where it belongs.

Regards,

Jim Anderson



[eleventh in a series]

open letter to Manzi Singata

Dear Other Son of God,

Thank you for sharing your pain with me. I am an "empath," which means I not only feel your pain in a metaphorical sense, but literally take on your pain. Your brain cancer hurts, but not in the places I expected. I have nearly torn off my elbow because of its constant jolts of electric torture.

I'm glad that you've chosen to trust me, a complete stranger, with your million dollar fortune. After all, I'm a blogger, and if you can't trust a blogger--well, you know the rest. I wish your lawyer would help you out, but that's why they write lawyer jokes, right?

I'll be certain to donate all the money you send me to the proper organizations, and I won't even keep the 15% commission. Okay, maybe I'll keep 5%; that would be fair.

All the best,

Jim Anderson

an open letter from spam to you

Apologies, Mr. Barthelme. Enjoy.





Dear you,

I thought I'd be a good time.

I just found out that now that Cyrus is working, I've still got to move over both Pookadook and Neshel to my first real engineering project. With a *really* nasty virus that's been "pressing" since the weekend, I'm going to kick them out of the door later (also because Allison is working a lot). This isn't a slam against Americans, just the dumbasses who produce crap like this.

The UN is not a terrorist organization, despite my best efforts. Since Allison got into teacher's college yesterday, I got her a nice shiny iBook with DVD burning and everything. It's kind of weird being approved to buy a house. Allison is off to do the last (hopefully trivial) things; I think both of us are looking forward to finding a place to live. It's just the dumbasses who produce crap like this.

Try and break the beard-eating habit. Stop procrastinating instead of doing. Eat better. Spend money more wisely. In short, only in Canada can you get rid of some crud and still be a ball of flames.

I think I've finally crossed the part in my life where I've beaten panic, rush, hurry. The real moral of all this: who cares if they're bad? Work in the last few days has been insane.

As an aside, I was sleeping for a while.

I've still got to see him right now, but it's best not to tempt fate. Watch more movies. Who cares if they're bad?

Love,

Spam

an open letter to Michael Jackson

Dear Michael,

No you didn't.

Miffed,

God

open letter to Brian Weatherson

Dear Brian,

Did you stop linking, or did we stop thinking?

(Frankly, the latter is more likely.)

Puzzled,

Jim

open letter to Christine Gregoire

Dearest Chris,

Tie goes to the Republican.

Your pal,

Jim

paging Autumn Conwell

Spam generates the weirdest random strings. You've seen them, so I won't bother dredging up examples. But recently, I've noticed that scores of the ads littering my Junk Mail folder (where your email lands, if you're not on the right list) are addressed to a certain Autumn Conwell.

A quick Google (and alltheweb) search reveals that there is not one single web page in the world that contains that precise phrase. No American phone listing, either. Autumn Conwell, as far as the Internet is concerned, just doesn't exist.

Until now.

So, Autumn Conwell, whoever you are, I'll be hoarding your spam, waiting for you to come forward and claim it, at least until the fourteen days are up and Hotmail banishes it to oblivion.

Yours truly,

Not Autumn Conwell.

an open letter to John Kerry

Dear Mr. Kerry,

Thank you for the campaign update that your friends over at the Democratic National Committee were so generous to mail my way. It's a fine complement to the speeches I hear through the thin walls of my apartment (my neighbor, Mrs. Oaktree, can't hear the television so well). Your enthusiasm has infected me in the form of a slight cough, but no matter.

John--if I may be so familiar--I'll be frank. I don't give a fig's pit for "carrying our values to victory." I'm voting for you because you're the humane alternative, even though I'm mighty impressed by your choice of vice president's haircut. The man I really want to vote for is Barack Obama, but he's not eligible.

What I do give a pig's foot for is banality-free prose. I know you don't write your own speeches, and I hope the same is true of your campaign epistle-stops. They have enough cliches to sink a frigate. If you don't believe me, I've compiled this handy list:

work side-by-side
carry the day
pales in comparison
counting on you
work hand-in-hand
no-holds-barred
courage of our convictions

See? They're limp, flabby, stale. And there are more, far more in the letter the DNC sent, the one with your stamped signature, printed on both sides (the trees thank you!) on recycled paper (the trees thank you again!).

So, John, I don't have $25 to donate, but I'll offer you my talents as a writer of shimmering prose, if you'll have me.

Your devoted semi-fan,


Jim