For some reason my email program will randomly pull up all the emails off the server. So when I check it I have like 700 “new” messages from like months ago. As this happened today it gave me a chance to see what kind of crap I really receive. Most of them make me long for the life I had when those services or that information was something useful.
- Expedia, Travelocity, American Airlines, Travelzoo and various other travel sites telling what great deals they have right now that I can’t take advantage of. I’d love to go to London for $400 with taxes included. When I went to Europe last year my tix was like $1100.
- Oprah- I actually found myself saying to my Wednesday on Oprah’s “Best Life Week: Finding Your Spiritual Path” – Suck it Oprah. Why don’t you help tell people to hire me for stupid commercials on your show, or better yet, make me sit at my computer and write for @ least 2h a day so I can turn these words into the kind of gold bullion you have in your HOUSES. And ya know I loves me some Oprah.
- Nordstrom, YOOX, Bluefly, Endless, Gotham City, eBay- shoes and clothes that I used to see on sale or say “oh, that’s cute” click on it and miraculously there would be these wonderful boxes of beautiful things that barely fit or I’d give away to my friends.
- Target, Crate & Barrel, Pottery Barn, Overstock- okay, I do have a lamp in my Target queue, but it’s replacing the Pottery Barn one that I’ve broken.
These are the ones that hurt. They hurt when I’ve put $1200 worth of clothes in my Nordstrom bag. Now, I totally did this before, but then I could get a little sumthin’ sumthin’. It hurts when Eco-Tulum, my favorite cheap Mexican getaway is giving away rooms for like $25 a person for our 4 person palatial cabana right on the beach (and tix to Cancun are $87 each way and everybody wants to go but nobody has any money or time).
But there are the ones I do use and relish more now than I did before:
- Jewel Diamond Taylor’s Success Gems Thought for the Day- for obvious reasons. I actually print them out and stick them all over my house so I don’t feel so alone.
- LiveStrong- any man who can win the Tour de France with one ball gets my attention.
- eDiets- new ways to make my beer belly go away because real spirits are out of my budget right now unless I buy a bottle of Jameson’s and drink it all alone in one day, which is bad. And painful. And not as cute when you’re almost 35 and unemployed and have apparently no transferrable skills and can’t even understand half of the job postings online.
- Astrology.com- they never ask me for money and since I’m a Leo, rarely give me bad news.
- Joanne Jimenez telling me when Francois K, Joe Claussell or Danny Krivit are spinning.
- Huffington Post, NYTimes, and NYPost because I have to have something to post on Facebook.
- Hope Clark, Writer’s Digest and the millions of other writery ones that don’t actually make me sit down and write, but make me feel like I’m taking writing seriously. Thanks guys.
And finally the ones I can do without that will never go away:
- Chase- “Funds transfer not processed” or “Overdraft protection alert”
- Juniper Visa- “You are approaching your credit limit” when I’m like $50 over my credit limit
- AT&T for a landline I don’t use but I need it for the Direct TV, or do I? It’s not on now. I just found a phone. Okay, that’s stupid; I’ll take care of that tomorrow.
- Citicards- “Thank you for your payment.” Whoa, Whoa, Whoa. What payment? Shit, now I’m gonna get another one from Chase.
So now that I’ve re-deleted them. I’m going to look on them with fond memories. I’ll still put some shoes in some baskets. I actually have tens of thousands of dollars in shopping carts all over cyberspace. It’s my virtual shopping that I pay for with all of my winnings from internet poker.