Would You Like To See An Example of the Best Type of Email in the World?

Well? Would you?

Okay, but first just the briefest bit of stage setting:

You know how you come home from the gym and your arm is hurting, and you walk in the door and see that because of your ill-conceived idea of unpacking all the boxes in the basement ("just to see what the hell's in there"), there is literally shit everywhere? And you're tired and you don't really want to deal with it, except that you are shooting Muffy on Monday (which sounds like one of those morning shows on Fox).

Quick timeout for the briefest of asides! That really isn't such a bad idea--a morning talk-show that slots a different host for each day. "Muffy on Monday" is followed by "Tristin on Tuesday," etc. This is a free idea that I am giving to you. It is not inconceivable that you could make millions from it.

(Word to the wise: consider making them strippers. Tristin is a stripper's name, if ever there was one.)

Me? I'd do it but I'm just a painter. But if I did do it, I'd make Muffy a sports expert; Tristin a health/medical/science person; Whitney a cook...

Do you see where I'm going with this? This is why they used to pay me what they called the big bucks, but which I always realized was only big bucks for normal people, not big bucks for Wall Street or Hollywood people.

I'm not even sure I'd use the word "big." "Goodish--for normal people" might serve better. As in: "This is why they used to pay me what they called goodish--for normal people--bucks."

Anyway, it's depressing to realize that you've got to get all this shit back together so that you can shoot Muffy on Monday without her being too freaked out.

Not depressing like the way, say, clinical depression is. Although sitting on the sofa, surveying the load of shit while sipping Jack Daniels does--alarmingly, a mental health care professional might add--make you feel a little better. And that's never a good sign.

But what REALLY makes you feel better is when, as just one more thing to do to waste time before facing the inevitable, you open your email and find the following:

Hi Geoffrey, hope you're well. Now that XX XXXX XX XXXX XXXXX, I was curious to know how much you would charge for a commissioned work similar in style and of the same size as XXX XXXXX. Would you be prepared to accept XXXXX*? I would love to be able to XXX XXXX XXXX XX XXXXXXX. Is it in the realm of possibility both in time and compensation?

Let me know your thoughts,

Kindest regards,

XXXXXXXX

In the interest of discretion I've didacted the missive--if that's the right word. "Didacted," by the way. Not "missive." I don't think it is, but you get the gist, yes?

Fuck Muffy. I'm going to pour myself a couple of fingers of expensive whiskey (I have to drink the whole thing so I can replace it with iced tea for the shoot), put my feet up, put some Leah Siegel (who Eric and I saw live the other night at Joe's Pub) on the stereo, and reflect that, in small increments, the Evil Empire is, in fact, growing.

This must be how Darth Vader's dad felt in the early days.

The Mammoth World Celebrity Bike Tour riders have a slogan we borrowed from Leonard Cohen. It goes:

First we take Manhattan...Then we take Berlin.

That's how I'm feeling. First I'm gonna take Manhattan. Then I'm gonna take something else--although possibly not Berlin. At least not right after Manhattan.

* indicates a colossal amount of money!