On understanding

From: Laurence Shandy
To: Dr. Deborah King, health and wellness author
Re: Colorado shootings

Dear Dr. King,

Thank you for your Huffington Post column on the recent tragedies in Colorado--namely, the crazy fuck who shot all those people. As one who tends to shun those who would offer their exorbitantly priced health and wellness services, I normally wouldn't have come across your article. My animal fight or flight instincts would have chalked the shootings up to just another fuck with a gun and a head full of crazy. If I hadn't been trolling the Huffington Post for updates on how awful the Bush administration is (update: it's still awful), I never would have experienced your eye-opening words of wisdom.

As you kindly point out, your travels as a health and wellness lecturer have given you a unique look into the hearts and minds of the American people. You've shrewdly observed that the average upper middle class white people who come to your lectures in search of answers to life's overwhelming upper middle class white people problems are, in fact, stressed. Maybe you're right in your hypothesis that the crazy fuck shooter was simply a hormone-ravaged and over-stressed crazy fuck shooter. And can we blame him? After all, how can one be expected to face adolescence with any sort of non-murderous calm in the face of such urban spread? Until you reminded me, I'd forgotten that in the past I could simply take a walk through nature to unwind myself after a long, near-homicidal day of living. But since all forest land was destroyed via executive order and the techno-fascist megalopolis assimilated my local parks, there's nowhere for me to go--much less a young man trapped in the concrete jungle of Colorado.

And I'd almost forgotten about 9/11. You're right--no one feels safe anymore. We all awaken to the paranoid glow of our color-coded terror alarms. We're too busy being patted down by security to feel secure. If only we could enjoy the golden age of safety our parents enjoyed--ducking and covering under their flimsy wooden desks. All they had to worry about was the threat of global thermonuclear annihilation, while we run the risk each day of encountering a swarthy guy with a box cutter.

Thank God you're here to tell us how to stop these hormonally unbalanced, emotionally overloaded crazy fucks from shooting up our churches and schools ever again. I can't wait to take your advice and "unplug from the rat race", "re-connect with my humanity", and "weave a strand of peace" into my day-to-day life. Let's just hope all those crazy fucks out there do the same, or look out!

Best wishes,
Laurence Shandy, gentleman


RESPONSE
From: Dr. Deborah King
To: Laurence Shandy
Re: Colorado shootings

Laurence,

Thanks so much for your comments - really on point!

Best,
Deborah King

On making headway

From: Laurence Shandy
To: Reese Witherspoon, actress
Re: Salary

Dear Ms. Witherspoon,

Congratulations! No, I'm not talking about your recent split from husband Ryan Phillippe, although I suppose some kudos are in order there. I'm sure you'll sleep better at night without that droopy monotone buzzing in your cranium, and you'll make more successful morning trips to the bathroom without worrying about tripping over your ex-husband's perpetually pouty lower lip. How did you deal with that thing, by the way? Did it rest in a kind of bedpan on the floor? And what about the drool problem?

Anyway, as happy as I am that you've finally cut the dead weight, I'm even happier that you've been named the highest paid actress in our great nation! Now you can finally afford to fix your face. It warms my heart to know that even the pie-faced and butt-nosed among us kind climb the ladder of Hollywood success all the way to the top. Of course, it didn't hurt that you gave all the stepped-on masses below you quite a view. From the neck down, you're quite a looker!

However, you may want to hold off on the reconstructive surgery for a spell. Who knows whether you've risen to the top of the pay heap based on your talents and not your handicap? After all, it seems a little hard to justify a $20 million price tag for an actress who didn't even have the lead role in her most successful film in five years. In fact, your monetary value could be directly related to your appeal among America's dumpy. Soccer moms across this great land can peel their husbands away from the emotionally numbing television long enough to go see one of your romantic comedies, then come home and not feel so threatened when they look in the mirror. There's something to be said for such a talent. Maybe that's why Scarlett Johansson's movies never make any money. I take one look at her perfect proportions, and I almost want to kill myself. And I'm better looking than you!*

That said, you may want to go under the knife after all. The young Sissy Spacek had kind of a so-ugly-you-want-to-fuck her appeal, but now that she's hit middle age, it's more like a so-ugly-god-she's-so-ugly "appeal". If you don't want to waste away your golden years playing the mother of the girl who falls in love with her dog on the Hallmark Channel, a little nip and tuck might do you wonders. Just don't spend all your money in one place.

Unless, of course, that place is your face.

Best wishes,
Laurence Shandy, gentleman

*As judged by the readers of the July 14, 2003 issue of Teen People.

On clarification

From: Laurence Shandy
To: The Guy on Craigslist Who Used My Article to Make a Political Point
Re: The Use of My Article to Make a Political Point

Dear Guy on Craigslist Who Used My Article to Make a Political Point,

I'm not really sure what kind of political point you're trying to make by using my Vanity Fair article on the practical uses for dead Iraqi children. You were responding to a particularly anti-Muslim post on the San Diego Craigslist site, and you mention something about a photo of 9/11 and "Ameritards".

First of all, no photo of 9/11 accompanied my article. It is, instead, a photo of Muslim women and children running and screaming from an explosion in Iraq. As New York City is, in fact, a city--not some desert wasteland with a single lightpost--you should have been able to stave off this error using simple context clues.

Second, my article does not blame "all Muslims for the actions of GWB". I'm assuming here that by "GWB", you mean George W. Bush, though if you're actually talking about Geoffrey Winslow Bates, screen star Kathy Bates' less popular son, then I apologize. I don't blame all Muslims for the actions of George W. Bush. In fact, I don't blame all Muslims for anything. It's silly to go making blanket accusations against such a huge group of people. Unless, of course, one would like to blame all Muslims for practicing the Looney Tunes-esque absurdity that is Islam. Which I would, and I do.

Regardless, my article was not meant to be political in any way. With its helpful hints and do-it-yourself spirit, it's really no more controversial than an episode of Surprise by Design. But instead of telling you how you can make the most of your old drapes, I'm offering suggestions as to how to use all the adolescent body parts that would otherwise be thrown in Halliburton's collateral damage bins.

That said, the World Trade Center towers would still be standing in all their retro '70s glory if it weren't for the murderous Islamic doctrine so cynically and inhumanely fed into the fallow minds of Muslim youth born and bred to follow the arbitrary laws laid out by an illiterate, child-raping warlord from the 7th century.

Also, 9/11 had nothing to do with the war in Iraq. What are you, an Ameritard?

Best wishes,
Laurence Shandy, gentleman