Monday, December 13, 2010

Survival of the Fittest: Renewal Letter from Men's Health Magazine


Dude, it has recently come to our attention that your subscription to “Men’s Health” has lapsed and a suspicious glossy with a certain charismatic, middle-aged African-American woman on the cover has been showing up in your mailbox instead. Now if this is what you really want, we will be the first to wish you a hearty “bon voyage” and leave you to your quality time with Dr. Phil.

But first, bonehead, there are some points you might want to consider:

1. We were on the verge of revealing our best sex tip ever. (Hint: it involves peanut butter, several boxes of Kleenex, and a large tuning fork.)

2. We were about to send you an advance copy of our Christmas CD, “Hark! (And Stop Procrastinating)”, where our very own “Abs of Titanium” chorus joins forces with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir to sing yuletide favorites.

3. You will no longer be eligible to compete in the 30-mile, rough-terrain “fun run” we have scheduled for next Saturday. It is for guys as chiseled and cut as the faces on Mount Rushmore, guys who can calculate their BMI index in their sleep but wouldn’t be caught dead reading about their own mother’s “Aha! Moment.” Does this sound like you anymore? We didn’t think so.

Now here’s what we would like to think. We would like to think that this magazine is not really coming to you at all but to the live-in, supermodel girlfriend we helped you land with our series of articles on “better personal grooming.” No, don’t thank us. We were just doing our job.

But don’t think it is over yet – no , not by a long shot. From what we have seen, you still have a lot to learn about the opposite sex, and we have a lot more to teach you. Dude, the answer to the question, "Does this dress make me look fat?", isn't “I can't tell." You would know this if you had more carefully read our spring feature on “Things to say and not to say if you don’t Want to Blow it with Her.” Not to toot our own horn, but we were proud of this article and are only sorry some of our readers seem to have been paying more attention to the ad for potency vitamins on the opposite page.

If the magazine in question is not hers, we are going to assume that you dropped a free weight on your head and that ordering this magazine instead of “Men’s Health” isn’t the only sign of some major screws being knocked loose up there. Have you noticed yourself slipping up at work lately, making the sort of rookie mistakes that even the lowliest intern wouldn’t make? We thought so. If you don’t watch out, the Fortune 500 company we helped you build with our article, ”Jump Start your Career Today!”, will be gone and so, along with it, will your supermodel girlfriend. Then who are you going to turn to for advice? Dr. Phil?

Ok, we would be the first to admit that some of Dr. Phil’s relationship advice makes sense. He may not have the credentials of our “sex professor” – if he is a professor, at what university does he teach? – but we can connect with all that stuff about how each one of us should “love smart” and open up to intimacy. Haven’t we been pretty much telling you the same thing all these months? We would just like to see more emphasis on surefire ways to make guys like you totally irresistible to women they meet in bars. Even the smartest love has to start somewhere, and that somewhere can’t always be a MENSA convention.

Speaking of which, did you know we're even now working on an article about how stomach crunches can improve your IQ?

In the end, though, this one's a no-brainer. On the one side is the chance not only to achieve your best triathlon time ever but also to gain all the self-confidence you will ever need in life. That’s right. You heard us: if you had any more self-confidence than we’re prepared to give you, you’d be unbearable. On the other side are knitting patterns and a lot of “ho-hum moments.”

Of course, we're not really worried, just a bit concerned. In fact to show you just how concerned-but-not-worried we are, we have enclosed a convenient renewal form for you to fill out and return to us in the attached envelope. Or if you lack the stamps but think you might have the cojones, try doing it online. Either way we'll see you on the other side.

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