An Open Letter to Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade

So... look. We gotta talk.

You've had a nice little run - 82 years, to be precise. But i think it's time you took a good, long look in the mirror and asked yourself a few hard questions.

Why am I still doing this?

What drives me to grasp so desperately at affection, adulation, and acceptance from a shivering throng of frostbitten, angry New Yorkers?

What's in it for me?

Can you honestly say you know the answer to any of those questions, Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade? Can you? I certainly can't.

This morning, 3.5 million people flooded the streets of Manhattan for a chance to see a giant, inflatable smurf drift past them while children and/or vagrants blew snot at one another. Does that sound festive to you? How many people in attendance even knew what a smurf was?! A SMURF, Macy's?! Are you kidding me? You've got to give these families something to work with if they're going to brave the elements to join the huddled mass of humanity in transmitting airborne diseases to one another while your overblown Shrek careens around Times Square. These poor kids wouldn't know a smurf if it showed up on their doorstep with a shopping cart full of video games and hard-core pornography, which, if my information (read: assumption) is correct, is what the kids are into these days. Try and keep your finger somewhere near the pulse, Macy's. I shouldn't have to spell it out for you.

And hey, I don't know if you've noticed, but we're smack-dab in the middle of a nationally crippling financial shitstorm here. Just out of curiosity, what's the overhead on your little operation? I can't imagine hundreds of alcoholic clowns, ten marching bands, and every member of Cirque de Soleil and the Blue Man Group come cheap. And 28 floats? Really? You couldn't trim the fat just a bit? We needed Papa Smurf and Buzz Lightyear?

Miley Cyrus made an appearance; that's good. The kids seem to enjoy her and any opportunity to trot out old footage of her father's award-winning mullet and painted-on denim one-piece is a bonus in my book.

Of course, Santa Clause made his way down the parade route. This is also good, or so it would seem, until one realizes jolly old St. Nick was sitting atop the most hideously terrifying monster anyone has ever laid eyes upon. Behold:



Don't turn around, Santa! It's right behind you! Just stay still! Its cloudy eyes see nothing, but it can sense motion and fear!

Look at that fucking thing! What IS that, Macy's?! The demonic survivor of the world's first and only attempted turkey abortion? That motherfucker will haunt my dreams and visions for years to come, Macy's. Years! I can't imagine the psychological trauma endured by the countless children who bore witness to the central figure in their holiday season (sorry, Jesus, you'll continue to take the back seat until you get flying reindeer and a big ol' bag o' gifts; them's the breaks) perched mere feet away from the salivating, bloodthirsty maw of what looks for all the world to be one of the Skeksis from The Dark Crystal. (See below)



Are you trying to delight these children or sentence them to a lifetime of fitful, sleepless nights, the result of which will most certainly be an epidemic of sedative addiction and sexual deviance? You disgust me, Macy's. Just a few quick suggestions for next year: ten floats, three marching bands, AND NO FUCKING SKEKSIS!

You're a time-honored holiday tradition, Macy's, but guess what? So is my uncle, who shows up an hour late for dinner every Thanksgiving with a box of wine and a plate of half-eaten nachos. Within an hour, the drunkle has worn out his welcome and everyone's silently hoping he'll just pass out and choke to death on his own gravyvomit. That could be you, Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Time is running out and our patience is wearing thin. Get your shit together.

An Open Letter to the Couple Kissing in Front of My Apartment Building

Dear Young Couple:

I understand it’s been a while since you’ve seen each other, and I’m sure it’s been excruciating. I bet at first you talked on the phone every night before you went to bed, and that you were the first person the other talked to when they woke up in the morning. And I bet you sent each other ridiculous, flirty text-messages every two minutes, and I’m sure there was a dirty cell phone picture or two thrown in the mix, and I’m sure you had to switch to the unlimited messaging plan from Cingular after you got your first cell phone bill.

I know you promised you’d only be apart for a few weeks, that this was a great opportunity that couldn’t be passed up, and that your relationship was strong enough to survive long-distance. And we all understand how things happen, and weeks turn into months, and months into years, but you saw each at least once a month and on holidays, and that it was tough but you were both making it work.

And I know you promised not to take your relationship for granted, but hey you’re both young and life’s short and we could all die any day so I understand how you might have stuck your hand down that girls pants at the club that one night last October. And I get that you only kissed that guy from the payroll department because you had one too many strawberry daiquiris at Chili’s celebrating Celeste’s promotion, and that daiquiris remind you of your first date at Chili’s, and I know how lonely that must have made you feel. But things happen, right? That’s life.

And I’m sure you both felt terrible about keeping secrets from the person you claimed to love. I get that the conversations were awkward, and were happening less and less and that neither of you were ready to tell the other why.

And I know after weeks of stilted telephone conversations you finally screwed up the courage to talk about what happened, and things got ugly and you decided it might be best if you didn’t talk to each other for a while so you could both sort out your feelings. And I know you both tried to date other people, but every time you did you couldn’t help but think about how the other person was doing, and that just wasn’t fair to anyone so you didn’t date at all for a long time.

And I know the whole thing started back up again after he sent that letter to you apologizing about the way he’d acted, and he said some really sweet things about how you’d changed him into a better person and how he felt like he couldn’t give that up over a stupid mistake. And I know how after watching Say Anything for the twentieth time you decided to emulate Ione Skye and “take a chance on England” even though the outcome was far from certain so you quit your job and told him you were coming home.

And I bet you’d been looking forward to this reunion for years. Imagining what it would be like to see each other in person after such a long time apart, and what it would feel like to finally hold each other again, and I’m sure that first kiss after so many missed kisses was especially sweet. But for my benefit, COULD YOU PLEASE NOT KISS IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FUCKING ROAD!?!?!

Sincerely,

A Concerned Citizen

An Open Letter to Women Who Breast-Feed in Public

He sat silently in the dimly lit diner, contemplating the nature of his own aimless, transient existence, as well as the consistency of the tepid omelette that lie before him, listless and without any discernible shape or color. It was a metaphor, no doubt. For years he had wandered his way through failed relationships and endeavors, like a lonely hobo hopping one runaway train after the other. His fork would pierce the thin, filmy skin of the embryonic pile of slop that sat, a shuddering mound of disappointment, on his plate; he would first conquer the omelette, then his own failures. He would - wait! What was this? In his periphery he spied a dark and mysterious beauty unveiling her heaving breasts, in what appeared to be an ancient, tribal mating ritual. The dance began. He fixed his gaze upon her as she bore her voluptuous bosom..."

Sexy, right? Steamy as a Polish bath house. I know what you're asking yourself. "What happened next, for God's sake?! What! Happened! Next!" Well, my friends, let me tell you what happened next. The dark, mysterious beauty unleashed her heaving tit and... and... and... crammed it into the tiny mouth of her unsuspecting child, nearly smothering the helpless infant and thoroughly disgusting everyone who had the gross misfortune of looking directly at the fleshy feedbag the woman was so shamelessly flaunting. Not so sexy anymore, is it? IS IT?

I know, I know. I'm a colossal, misogynist windbag from a bygone era, clinging desperately to antiquated notions of societal conventions and an appropriate code of public conduct. Here's what I have to say to that: go fuck yourself. Seriously. Go and have sex with yourself. In the privacy of your own home. The exact same place, in fact, WHERE YOU SHOULD BE BREAST-FEEDING YOUR CHILD. I can hear your condescending rebuttals already.

"It's perfectly natural."
You got me there, doctor. Breast-feeding is a perfectly natural and healthy act. Hey, guess what else is perfectly natural and healthy? A 100% cotton blanket which could easily be draped over yourself and your child during chowtime. I suppose those might be hard to come by, though, what with cotton being in such short supply and all.

"You're just a closed-minded sexist."
Probably true, but that's immaterial. If you want to argue the merits of public breast-feeding, I'm all ears. In no way am I suggesting you deprive your child of much-needed nourishment. Quite the contrary. You feed that whiny little shitfactory to your heart's content. But maybe, just maybe, you ought to consider a little discretion? Don't paint me as some sort of neanderthal because I'd prefer not to be subjected to the sights and sounds of Suppertime in Tit City.

"And you call yourself liberal..."
This might be my favorite. Newsflash gals, if you want to play "Freak Out the Square," you're going to come up with something a little bit better than whipping out your lactose taps and telling junior to belly up to the bar. In fact, odds are you're going to have to reach pretty far to your left to slap me for being such an ignorant Neo-Neo-Con. Breast-feeding is not a matter of public policy or civil rights. Let me repeat that: breast-feeding is not a matter of public policy or civil rights. Nobody is denying you the right to feed your child. But, by doing so brazenly and without any regard for your fellow citizens, you're infringing on my right to a delicious breakfast.

"You're not a mother, you can't possibly understand."
Again, true. I am not a mother. Barring some sort of unforeseen change in genetic makeup, I will never be a mother. So, let's put the shoe on the other foot - or mouth on the other tit, as it were. Let's say I adopt a child. Furthermore, let's say this adorable child has endured such trauma in its brief and tumultuous life that the only way it can bring itself to eat a hearty meal is to do so directly from my belly button. So there you are, enjoying a delicious breakfast of free-range, farm-fresh, organically-grown eggs (with a little tofu and brewer's yeast on the side, of course), when all of a sudden you see and hear my little rugrat, we'll call him Thor Jr., slurping chocolate pudding out of my umbilicus. How's that sound? Pretty damn delightful, right? I FUCKING THOUGHT NOT!

If, after reading through the airtight case I've just presented, you find yourself unconvinced, I have a little experiment for your further consideration. The next time your li'l guy gets a hankerin' for some of mom's famous colostrum smoothie, take him on down to your nearest fratboy hangout (R.P. Billygan's? McGillicutty's? McFadden's? Just find a bar with a subversively bigoted, faux-Irish name and you're in business.) and turn that bad boy loose. You are guaranteed to be met with a bevy of leers, insults, and borderline assaults. Now ask yourself this, if you're whipping out a tit in the middle of a room full of douchebags and not being ogled and groped, you're probably doing something wrong, right? Right.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to fill my belly button with sardines. Little Thor Jr. has a salt craving.