Why aren’t you taking my advice?
Don’t be all, um, you never offered me any advice, and anyway I don’t need any advice right now, and if for some reason I did need advice why would I turn to you?
You’re coming across as a little petty. You see that, right?
So I’ll ask you again: Why aren’t you taking my advice? I’m chock full of useful information.
For example, here’s a hypothetical exchange with Cheryl Strayed, demonstrating the useful information I possess and my willingness to share it:
Carolyn: Cheryl Strayed, you’re super busy these days, what with your book tours for Wild and Tiny Beautiful Things and your pool parties with Oprah and your Vogue spreads and your backlog of unanswered emails from me. Why not let me take over your Dear Sugar column?
Cheryl: No.
Carolyn: I have lots of good advice to share on a wide range of subjects, such as Emperor penguins, bohemians, cheese, bamboo, Jane Austen, and the Pentagon.
Cheryl: No.
Carolyn: Don’t worry — I’ll give the column back to you. One day.
Cheryl: No.
Carolyn: Is that “no” as in “I’m mulling it over,” or “no” as in “maybe, but not just yet”?
[crickets]
Since Cheryl hasn’t yet decided if she’ll let me be Dear Sugar, I’ll have to set up my own gig. I might start a new quote acrostic website.
What’s a quote acrostic? It’s a puzzle where the first letter of each word in a set of crossword clues spells out a quote. It should take me only four or five months of full-time effort to design my own puzzle. Those ship in a bottle folks are whack, but this? This is a hobby that reinforces my commitment to staying hip and relevant. (Quote acrostics are hip and relevant, right?)
Back to the key question: Why aren’t you taking my advice? To that end, feel free to ask my advice regarding surefire ways to up your own hipness and relevancy ante (see “chock full of useful information” above).
