why i hate clowns

I was at B’s house not too long ago and noticed she had put together a physical scrapbook of her trials and tribulations in Japan that included paper copies of all her blog entries. This of course was quite a novelty to me, having long since done away with printing out anything or putting photos in albums or practicing good handwriting.

Sometime in July, she was momentarily diverted from her writings about Hello Kitty and high-tech toilets when she received some junk e-mail inviting her to audition as a circus performer in Berkeley, specifically for “improvisors, singers, clowns, cirque, magic and dance.” After all of B’s readership duly scoffed at the mail, we forgot about it. Months later, as she was putting together her trip binder, she noticed that the woman who had sent the original e-mail had responded.

While the recruiter was very polite, I couldn’t help but notice that she seemed somewhat indignant about her e-mail being referred to as “spam.” She specifically told B that she had sent her the e-mail because she had heard B was “someone who might be interested in theater.” Well lady, I’m sorry to inform you, but “being interested in theater” is not the same as “I’m interested in quitting my job in aerospace to run off and join the circus and juggle knives and jump through flaming hoops and scare children and live in a trailer.” While I’m not saying B hasn’t thought about ditching aerospace, I’m pretty sure her backup plan didn’t have anything to do with carnie trash. Spam is unsolicited e-mail, whether it’s sent out to a million people or to one person who has no interest in or talent for trapezes and elephant husbandry.

Now I’m a little jealous those people whose online dating profiles I posted haven’t come forward to defend themselves, or at least to present a valid explanation for why they can’t spell.