Maude and Fish

Golly, as my my Vermont neighbor Maude often says. I like Maude. She's a good hunter, and she's taught Anna how Not To Shoot people (a relief for the Vogue PR dept, let me tell you. How many more excuses could they come up with- "it was just a Government weather balloon that fell on the poor dear, so sorry!", "Terry Richardson's massive lack of talent and taste fell upon Mrs. Salome, she died instantly. There was no pain, but we do send our commiserations to her husband. Enclosed is a free DVD of Sex And The City 2: Uncut. We do hope you enjoy!")

Another phrase of Maude's: "I have fish to fry!" Well, I have fish to fry too, Maude. Slimy fish. The kind that sit on the bottom of the ocean feeding on their own filth (and the filth of others). The kind of fish who get fake tans. I am, of course (you hadn't guessed?), talking about "InStyle" magazine, who contacted me some months ago wanting to feature me in a "best blogs of all time"-type feature. I laughed about it with certain associates- "haw haw haw", we went, because this "InStyle" magazine is- how do you say- for the tanned ones and girls who watch that JuicyStar person on you-tube. It is not very chic. However, I thought about it some more and thought, well, maybe this could be charity work. After all, Bono is doing Africa and the Geldof person is doing Ethipopia and Neil Young is doing the farms. I thought: ah, I will help the needy, the unfortunates, the tanned-and-sprayed ones. I must admit though, I did this for selfish means. Sometimes I look outside Rue Cambon and I see these awful orange girls with terrible leggings that make them look like German sausages. They say things like (in a heavy American accent): "THIS IS WHERE COCO CHANEL LIVES!" "DO YOU THINK SHE'LL INVITE US IN FOR TEA AND CRUMPETS?", and then someone else, from behind a street lamp (they are very thin) says: "That's the queen of England, you superficial twats." And then the American girls say: "OH! IS THAT WHAT COCO CHANEL DOES?", to which the person behind the street lamp sighs and mopes off to a cafe.

Now, these "InStyle" people required a t-shirt. A demode shirt. I discussed this with the seamstresses who make these, thread by thread, and they said "verra well, if you must." I thanked them and emailed "InStyle" back with "If you return it by sundown." They replied with "Oh! But there is a boy in the office who says your t-shirt would be the jewel in his collection!" I was feeling a tad generous, and said "Mmmph" or something of the sort. I found it funny (as did the associates), because we were joking that this is all "InStyle" wanted from us- that it was an elaborate hoax rouse to obtain a t-shirt. (By the way, those hacks claimed they couldn't afford to spend the money on buying a shirt- apparently it costs too much to shoot Miley Cyrus or Rand Paul or whoever they have on their covers.)

Of course, a day later or so, I received an email from the assistant who was in charge of "picture finding" or something similarly ridiculous. She said the editor pulled the piece. The editor, who I looked up, is one of those demode and unfortunate tanned ones. More's the pity. My associates agreed with me that this was their plan from the start: to obtain a t-shirt, with no intention of doing the story (for this fabled "boy", whoever he is. I like my boys visable, and preferably naked.)

So to use another phrase of Maude's: "Nuts to them!"- she does have good phrases. I can think of more explicit ones, but I'd feel like I was making fun of those starving Africans, such is the plight of the tanned ones. I thought about this for a whole minute, and I thought- well, maybe I should help them even more. And this is my plan- I am going to start a trust. I call it the "SAVE THE TANNED DEMODE", or STD for short. Please donate generously (checks can be written to Mr Howard Ques, 56 Rue Saint Colette, Paris.) With your help we can give them a better life, and provide white makeup for them to cover up their tans.