It's Blog Sitter Month!

Once again, it's November and once again, for the third year in a row, I'm going to take the month off. This has proven to be pretty popular with you as readers, with writers who contribute as Blog Sitters and mostly with me as someone who likes to slack off. While I think you still need Blog Sitters (if I leave you alone for a month without fresh material, I'm afraid you'll wander off and never come back), I do believe you're mature enough now to appreciate what goes into the process of selecting them. For that reason, I'm sharing with you the email I sent to writers. (NOTE: If you'd like to be a Blog Sitter, take this as your invitation. Send me a note indicating your interest with "Blog Sitter" in the subject line and we'll go from there).


Dear prospective Blog Sitter,

Last year around this time, I sent you an email asking if you'd like to participate as a guest author on my big dumb purple blog during the month of November.


Now I'm sending you another one, asking the same thing, only for THIS November (apparently, they have one every year).

This will be the third year of doing this, which qualifies as an annual tradition.

• The first year, I took the month off to participate in National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo for those who like contractions or have recently suffered massive head trauma.

• Last year, I don't remember, but I think I just sat around the house in my underwear for a month. Let's try not to talk or even think about that.

• This year, I could really use the time off to finish my first book project, "A Ridiculously Inconsistent Treasury", which will feature the "Best Of" from my big dumb purple blog (just stuff that I wrote, not what you wrote; while your stuff is very good, and I am a fan, sincerely, that would be stealing. And go write your own damn book). Seriously. I'm doing a book and I want it finished by ChristmasHannukahKwanzaa (or Cab Calloway's birthday, if you're not into the whole gift-giving/Jesus's birthday [observed, not actual]/peer pressure-enforced retail death march thing).

Anyway, if you don't want to participate, you can stop reading now and go back to Gawker or Reddit or 4chan or wherever all the cool kids are making with the LOLZ these days. Thanks.

If you do want to participate, GREAT!! The hell with those people who quit reading after that last sentence anyway, right? Eff them!! (Wrong! Don't be that way. They're nice people. Just severely flawed.) The deal is the same as previous years: Send me whatever you want published along with a short bio and a picture (optional). I'll publish it, unedited, with links back to whatever site(s) you want linked back to. There's a short FAQ in the old email below if you need more background, but that's really all there is to it.

Anyway, I hope you all decide to do it because I really do love you, more than you know and more than what may be legally tolerable in some states in a few weeks. Honestly.

Thanks,

Your buddy and pal,

Clark     FAQ

What can I submit?
Anything you want. I'd prefer something original, but I'm not choosy.

When will my piece run?
I'll publish everything in order of when I receive them. I'll give you advance notice in case you want to tell your friends, neighbors and parents who said you'd never be any good at anything.

Is there any money for doing this?
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!

What about...?
Excuse me, I wasn't done responding to the last question: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!