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date : 4:10 am - Monday,January 20, 2003
from : mrp
subject : PANTSMAIL 023: landlord anecdote and more
message:
Dear Everyone,
PANTSMAIL 023 INDEX
1. INTRO......................page 1
2. LANDLORD ANECDOTE..........page 1
3. NOT UPDATING...............page 1
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INTRO
Hello. I haven't sent out a Pantsmail since August of 2002. A long time. Too long. And a lot of folks have subscribed since that last one, so some of you reading these words have never ever received a Pantsmail in your inbox--until now, that is! That's why today is an exciting day. Because hey look what it is! It's a brand new Pantsmail comin' right atcha!
Although I've neglected this mailing list for 5 months, I haven't been neglecting it in the way that one might neglect a pet or a houseplant or personal hygiene. I did so more as one might be neglectful of their cellar stocked with bottles of vintage wine. This list, like wine, left on its own to age in a temperature-controlled environment develops a fuller and more-satisfying flavor.
Swirl it around in your glass vigorously and see if you aren't impressed. Such color! Now, as you put your nose to to it, notice the bouquet. Somewhat floral and fruity, but satisfyingly rich. The oakiness is not your imagination, although you may for a moment think that you are dreaming. Yes, through its smell, Pantsmail reveals many of its pleasures to you.
Now take a small amount in your mouth, and let it stroll across your tastebuds. Delight in its complex flavors. Keep it there briefly before spitting it out into the bucket that has been provided.
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LANDLORD ANECDOTE
This is a short anecdote about my landlord and a magazine called Bitch magazine.
My landlord is awesome by the way. He's in his 70s, healthy and in-shape to a degree that's disconcerting, and he works really hard to be hip; he'll say things like "aw man, that's where it all happens, y'know?" or "hey, you better believe it, man. It's all cool." Stuff like that. Also he's actually too eager to do work on the apartment. He wants stuff to go wrong so that he can turn it into a project where he has to fix something. Best landlord. Awesome.
So my landlord came over to fix some stuff (toilet, front light, lock) and I knew he'd be coming into the house so I gave the whole place a quick once-over to make sure that nothing was visible that might make me look like a less-than-ideal tenant.
And there wasn't anything really, but I do have a subscription to magazine called Bitch (feminist response to popular culture), which, by the way, is really good. And an issue of Bitch was sitting out on my coffee table, so I thought, "well, he's not going to be shocked and appalled by it or anything, but I may as well just flip the magazine face down so that the title doesn't distract him from his work or make him uncomfortable or whatever." (And he's seriously cool and working hard to seem even cooler than he is, so if anything he'd probably see it and make some comment like, "Radical magazine, man. Bitch. What's up with Bitch?" Or he'd tell me how it reminds him of some magazine that he used to subscribe to in his wild partyin' younger days.)
Anyway, so I flipped the magazine over. My landlord came in and did all his work. He was here for about an hour and a half. And then after he'd left, I noticed that the back cover of Bitch was actually more evocative than the front. It was an ad for some sex toy company that featured a big dildo. And not even a regular dildo, but some kind of fancy weird confusing dildo. So that's even worse than just a regular dildo because it makes you think way more about what is this thing and how exactly is it used. Plus it makes the face-down magazine look less like it's a feminist pop culture magazine and more like it's some raunchy sex magazine.
"Toys in Babeland: Make a Splash, Dive into G-spot pleasure with the artful Archer Wand. $45"
The moral of the story is either that you shouldn't hide things from your landlord or that you should hide things better from your landlord.
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NOT UPDATING
Some of you have subscribed to this email list in exchange for a lighter task assignment at work. They gave you a choice: either spend the rest of the day shoveling the dog food into barrels (so the raccoons don't get it) or sign up for Pantsmail and take the afternoon off. I think you made the right choice.
Others of you signed up for Pantsmail on accident. You slipped on a brown paper bag full of rotting crab apples, knocked your head against your replica of the liberty bell, and landed on your computer keyboard. When you awoke, you had been subscribed. I'm sorry for the error, but it sometimes happens.
Still a few others of you subscribed because you sometimes read the Misterpants.com website home page on the Internet's World Wide Web. (The World Wide Web truly is a Web of Wonder. That's what you should say next time someone mentions the Web. Look off into the distance and say it like you're really thinking about it.)
Those of you in that last category may have noticed the announcement on Misterpants.com that I'm not updating the site in the year 2003. And maybe you're wondering if it's just some kind of dumb stunt or yet another crappy ploy to get people to sign up for Pantsmail.
I'm certainly not above dumb stunts or crappy ploys, however the not updating thing is not one of those.
Here's a weird thing and sorry that it's kind of serious. When I realized that I wasn't going to be updating the site, it made me a little bit sad. And it seems to me really a dumb thing to be sad about: not updating a website. And certainly if I were reading someone else's website (or this email) and they wrote something about how they're sad not to be updating their site anymore, I would probably try to get a good vantage point to make fun of that person and maybe throw rocks at them when they pedaled by me on their wuss-bike.
So, yeah, that's weird, but is kind of sad to me, even though it's probably only for a year--although a few people have written to ask if it's really forever, and not just a year. Someone wrote and said, "oh, sure you'll be back; just like those people who take a year off from college and are never seen again."
Well, that's a good point, and I don't want to promise anything, but the plan really is for it to be a one-year hiatus. If, in 2004, I realize that the site is going to go another year or more without being updated, I will at the very least generate a new list of phony excuses.
(Okay. That is a super lame promise. Why even bother to promise anything if I'm just going to promise that?)
Anyway, I also wanted to add one last kind of serious thing and then after this I promise I will not be serious about anything else in any context ever for the entire rest of my life. I wanted to thank everyone who read the site and Pantsmail regularly or irregularly, and everyone who wrote to the site during the past 3.5 years while I was doing it. I got a lot of great email, great ideas, great links, from all of you. And that's awesome and thank you. Not to mention a great power pop mix tape that the Kramps sent me. Thank you for that too. That was super nice. And the great puffy stickers from Johnny. And the Louie Anderson headshot and tiny banjo from John. And basically anyone who ever sent me anything ever and the few of you whom I've met in person and who were all super nice and funny and normal and not psychotic murderers. Thank you all for not being psychotic murderers.
Later,
-mrp!
p.s. For news from the world of ants and other social insects: http://misterpants.com/01/
p.p.s. That's an old p.s. from before I stopped updating the website, but I kept it in because I kind of liked it.
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