Sugar and Spite

Time for a little behind the scenes look at some of the goings on at the mysterious Sugar and Spite HQ. Or more appropriately, some of the things that should be going on, and yet, are not.

You may be familiar with The Pie Project, in which we send letters to people we think are cool, and ask them to return a self-addressed, stamped postcard (which we have enclosed), letting us know their feelings about pie. And also getting their autograph.

Knowing that relatively famous people are probably kind of busy, and may not possibly even get their mail (much less respond to it) in what, for us normal not-as-much-mail-receiving people would refer to as a timely manner, we realize that it may be a while before said cool people respond. So we send out a lot of about 20 postcards every few months or so, just to keep them out in the world.

Once we’ve decided who our pie audience will be, our routine goes a little something like this:

Step 1: Ali comes over to my house. Because I am a good hostess, I offer her a Tasty Beverage that is probably not appropriate for those under 21. And we order something out, like fried clam strips or cheesesteaks or something trashy we wouldn’t normally eat. Because we are WORKING, and are therefore entitled.

Step 2: Gather the goods. This includes: Envelopes, Printed Pie Letters, Postcards, Stickers with the pie questions for the postcards, Regular stamps, postcard stamps, 2 pens, and a black Sharpie (remember the black Sharpie, because it’s important). Once materials are gathered, typically there is another Tasty Beverage.

Step 3: Completely ignore the materials that are now stacked neatly on my coffee table and continue to sip the Tasty Beverages while watching something ridiculous on tv. Or MTV Hits. Stare wistfully at the Playstation, but be adamant that there can be no Guitar Hero until postcards are done.

Step 4: Go look up Japanese music videos on YouTube, while enjoying another Tasty Beverage.

Step 5: Decide that you really want to play Guitar Hero now, so the postcards must be done. Prepare by ensuring that everyone has a Tasty Beverage. Put on music videos, Ninja Warrior, or equivalent.

Step 6: Actually do the letters. This means going down the prepared list of names and addresses, and personalizing each pie letter. (This is the part that no one ever sees, where we mostly tell people that they are rad/awesome/hot/etc., but occasionally say crazy things as well. How crazy is largely dependent on the intake of said Tasty Beverages.) An envelope is addressed and stamped. A pie postcard receives a sticker, a return address, and appropriate postage. It is at this point that the black Sharpie becomes important, as the name of the person who we are sending the postcard to should be written on the postcard. This is so, when it comes back, we know whose it is. Try reading my signature and identifying me. Its not a likely thing. Again, I repeat: THIS IS A VERY IMPORTANT STEP THAT SHOULD NOT BE SKIPPED, MISSED OR FORGOTTEN IN ANY WAY, REGARDLESS OF HOW MANY TASTY BEVERAGES ONE HAS CONSUMED. Lest you realize only after you have received the first postcard back from the last lot, that you have forgotten this very important step, and spend an hour on Google images researching the autographs of all 20 people on your list. And then realize that you will now need to do this for every postcard that you receive from this particular lot, so you had better just go ahead and bookmark the ones you are looking up. Double-check that you have followed this step before you stick the letters and postcards in an envelope, seal them, and mail them away. Possibly also have someone who has not partaken in Tasty Beverages come behind you and triple-check as well.

So this is a post for us as much as it is for you, a reminder that next time we send out postcards we should either a) Not be lushes (fat chance); b) Perhaps drink a Tasty Beverage of some other sort rather than the kind that contains vast quantities of Bourbon (such as a nice cold Yuengling); or c) Print this post as a reminder to double check that ALL VERY IMPORTANT STEPS have been followed.

~Mik

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 20th, 2007 at 7:18 pm and is filed under Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.