Saturday, August 13, 2011

How I Grew My Horns


Hell, I should have known. And I should have known better, too. Of course, that means nothing to most of you, so let me explain how I recently morphed into the creature pictured on your left. My growing horns over the past few years is mostly due to my absolute exasperation with certain people who are contacting me because I'm an author who can do something for them or because they feel nasty and feel like targeting me.

First, a little background. I damned near killed myself to take care of my elderly mother for the past 15 years, helping her through the aging widow process, making sure that she's cared for by family and not strangers. Seeing her through the cane stage, then the walker stage and now the wheelchair stage. And, on top of that, I still found the time to take care of a four-bedroom house and a four-acre lawn, write eight books, ten blogs and an online monthly newsletter, and maintain three websites. No wonder I feel like I'm 80 instead of 59.

But that's nothing compared to the nightmare of having people from my past, in addition to perfect strangers, contacting me because they "accidentally stumbled' upon my website or ran across my website when they were actually looking for something else. And, now that they've found me, they want something from me. But it's not my books.

Do you people really think for one minute that telling me you ran across my website by accident is somehow going to make me feel better about myself? Are you so stupid and so self-centered that you would actually believe that I'm just tickled to death that you've contacted me for your own personal reasons and not because you found my books online or you liked my wesbite or that you actually read one of my books and want to tell me "good job"? Take a good hard look at yourself. Listen to yourself. Take a big step back and take a hard look at what you've just done.

That's right, people are now coming out of the woodwork to contact me and not because I'm a science fiction author but to ask for my help with something else. Not to talk about my writing. Not to express interest in reading what I've written since 2002. What they want from me has nothing to do with their interest in being a reader or part of a following or a fan of any kind. It's all about them.

One guy who heard about me emailed me and then called me up. Did he want to compliment me for being a local author? No. Did he want to buy my books? No. He wanted me to copy my ebooks onto a CD-R for him — for FREE — and send them to him at my expense so he could study my writing style and then write science fiction of his own, based on my writing style. And what did Mike the Fool do? I helped him by directing him to places on the web where he could get set up for writing, networking and publishing. I'd bet a C-note that he's never read a single thing I've written to this day because he was too cheap to buy one of my books. And, Jesus no, I didn't send him any free CD-Rs with my books on them. I told him to never contact me again.

Then there's the woman from my past who emailed me to tell me that she "stumbled upon my website" one day and was surprised as hell to find out that I was a science fiction author. Did she say anthing nice about that, anything interesting about me or my books? No. All she wanted to say was that she guessed she didn't know me as well as she thought she did. And that was that.

There was the couple from France who emailed me just to tell me two things and one of them was that they didn't like science fiction. Hmmm. That's pretty low. They could have just ignored me altogether. But then a lot of us Americans know that most French people want us dead. I'd bet a million bucks that France's reputation with most Americans is not so great, either, and that any straw poll would show that we'd let them be occupied again by just abut anybody instead of saving their asses for the third time, just to be despised. And they think we're the bad guys.

I always wanted to visit France before I died. But not now. I'd rather go to Las Vegas and lose my shirt. And I fucking loathe Vegas. The second thing this French couple wanted to tell me was that they were delighted by the way I made fun of myself in my now-defunct online newsletter, The Pluto Observer. They found it hard to believe that an American would do such a thing. Well, hell, making fun of myself is part of who I am as a humorist but what I couldn't understand is where in the hell have these people been? I guess they never heard our stand-up comics or watched The Three Stooges or Bugs Bunny or read Mark Twain. Well, that sin of omission is on them.

And now another woman from my past, who was using the search engines to find out about gas drilling in this area and who "ran across your website by accident" in the process, emailed me to ask me if I "was involved" in the 11:11 phenomenon. Did she say something complimentary about my being an author or suggest shock or surprise? Nope. She's one of those countless neurotics who are are caught up in the 11:11 phenomenon and all she wanted was for me to make her feel better somehow about being "freaked out" by the 11:11 thing. But I'd never even heard of 11:11 until I read her email.

Did I help her? You bet I did. Sure thing. Because I'm a nice guy who automatically helps people without even thinking about it. Did she thank me? No. Did she express an interest in my science fiction? Absolutely not. Her contacting me, just like all the other people, was all about her. After I basically told her to forget about 11:11 because it was probably nonsense and, if it wasn't, it was bad news that people can avoid by making a choice not to pay any attention to it. It's as simple as that. Then I used one of my fictitious online  characters, Fred Fortune, to poke fun at the 11:11 craze, to make people think and laugh about it. That's what I do best.

So, I got to thinking about what a sap I've been. What a fuckin' chump.

Mr. Nice Guy. You bet I was. Up until and including yesterday. But starting today and from now on, all you people are going to see from me is a bull you won't want to take by the horns if you even DARE to contact me about anything else except my writing. I've had it with you goddamn fucking selfish assholes.

The 11:11 phenomenon is probably just bullshit, just like Y2K was and just like 2012 will probably be. Who can say and who fucking cares? But I secretly hope that it's all very real. I hope alien hordes that look like armies of bugs and lizards come in droves and eat you bastards alive. I only wish I could hear your fucking, selfish, worthless screams when they do.

Now fuck off. Or take the bull by the horns at your own risk. But if you do, Jesus Christ All-Goddamn-Fucking-Mighty you'll wish you hadn't. Now, is this honest and personal enough for you nosy web surfers?