Fan Mail

Please enjoy the below email exchange I had with an avid fan recently:

From: Larry
To: It Just Gets Stranger
Subject: Pathetic

Eli I wanted to let you know that I think your writing is really terrible and I wish you the best I really do but you are obviusley trying to confiscate for something the way you lie and tell things that arent true and I think you are doing a lot of harm to people by your liberal ways. I wish you the best I really do but I just hope that you get hurt and you cant use your hands anymore because then we wont have to read your lies anymore. Larry


To: Larry
From: It Just Gets Stranger
Subject: Re: Pathetic

Hippie School Emails

Recently I met someone who works at something called a "Montessori" school. He gave me a very long explanation for what this is but basically it's just a place for rich hippies to send their children. So naturally the Snapples had to start emailing a bunch of these schools about the education of their child.

Our victim here sent an email to the Stranger account after the end of this explaining that as the emails became more ridiculous, she googled "June Snapple" and found Stranger. I may have to start a new cover.


From: June Snapple
To: Private School
Subject: Connections

To whom it may concern,

I have recently moved into the area and my gifted child and I are exploring education options. My gifted child has very specific needs and demands the highest caliber of education. Your institution boasts of out-of-the-box new-age progressive approaches. I may be interested in encouraging my gifted child to choose your institution as well as making sizable donations. Can you please help me understand your institution's views on free love?

June Snapple

Emails with a Tickler

Last week one Stranger named Kate sent me the below Craigslist ad:

To: Craigslist Tickler
From: June Snapple
Subject: **Seeking ticklish women!! Pays cash!!**

Dear Craigslist Tickler,

Are you still looking for someone who enjoys being tickled for cash money? I'm in a pickle. A tickle pickle, if you will. And I need some work. Please respond at your earliest convenience.

June Snapple
Herder of Hogs

Disneyland Emails II

Last week I posted Disneyland Emails. I had sent emails to a few different places in the massive Disneyland network. The response I got from Aimee happened first, but I also got a response from another person. I wasn't going to post this because it didn't got on for very long, but then I thought that Michelle needed to be shared with the world.


To: Disneyland
From: June Snapple
Subject: My Special Fairy-Tale Wedding

Dear Disneyland,

I am looking to have a magical fairy-tale wedding, but due to some circumstances entirely outside of my control, it is necessary that I request a few special accommodations. With whom should I speak regarding these accommodations?

June Snapple
Flicks for Trix, Founder

Disneyland Emails

Did you guys know you can email Disneyland on pretty much any topic and they will respond to you right away?


To: Disneyland
From: June Snapple
Subject: Fairy-tale Wedding

Dear Disneyland,

I am very interested in the magical fairy-tale wedding you offer but due to circumstances entirely outside of my control, I must have some special accommodations. Who should I speak with about these accommodations? I've got a thousand dollars cash money and even more dreams!

June Snapple
PTA President, 2001 - Present

Ten Weeks Is Not Very Long

I looked at the calendar the other day and YOU GUYS. The Ironman is ten weeks away. How did this happen? Remember when I did the half Ironman in May and when it was over you guys were like, "you have PLENTY of time, Eli! Rest for a little while! Take a break! Your hair looks amazing and we all heard that NASA is planning on naming its next project after you because your hair has become the poster child for consistency in the world."

You guys. I remember you reassuring me that the full Ironman was so far away and that I had nothing to worry about.

Well now it's ten weeks away. I knew it was coming up because I was starting to get daily reminder emails from Bob and Cathie.

From: Bob and Cathie
To: Eli
Subject: ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING TO US?!?!

Son. Have you booked a hotel room in Tahoe yet for the weekend of the Ironman? Your father and I booked ours WEEKS ago and we had a hard time finding a place. We have been bugging you about this and you haven't been responding to us. It's making us very nervous. Why haven't you given us grandchildren yet? Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo.

College Admissions Emails

Recently I started emailing several college admissions offices as "June Snapple." This one really tried to help a girl out.

I used multiple email accounts under different names, so pay attention to the email headers.


From: June Snapple
To: Admissions Office
Subject: Help a gurl out?!

Hey-o,

Mi name is June Snapple and Im redy for collage pleeese! can you tell me how to get in to collage and tel me lik wher my locker is and wat i need 4 the 1st day?

June Snapple

Dear Marsha

I know that this month I haven't been the most consistent blogger of all time. My life has been a roller coaster in January and it's been difficult to keep up with a lot of things, including Stranger. And now you guys are all mad at me and I hate it when you're mad at me because then nobody stops me in the street and gives me back massages.

But it's not like I've abandoned you entirely. Even when I'm blogging inconsistently, I still post something three or four times a week. LET'S EVERYONE CALM DOWN. The back massages from Strangers may now resume!

It's already almost 8:00 AM on a Thursday and I haven't posted anything for the day and it's giving me some anxiety. So I thought I would finally tell you something I've been meaning to tell you for a while.

I'M PREGNANT!

Funniest Thanksgiving

This might be the new laziest post of all time. I'M TIRED. It's been sort of a rough week around here, to tell you the truth.

You know how on TV when the writers get lazy so they just do an episode that is made up of flashbacks of other episodes. THAT.

Except this is not nearly as good as TV. Because on TV you don't have to read. On the other hand, when you pull up Stranger there is no chance that you'll accidentally see an episode of Glee and watch the entire thing. And then spend the rest of the evening watching a marathon of The Glee Project, which is a reality show where they find the worst people who have ever been born on planet Earth and get them to compete against each other for a chance to win a guest spot on an episode of Glee. And then you won't be tempted to spend a good amount of time reading online forums about the contestants, and actually leave comments and engage in the debate about the worst reality show that is based on the worst show that has ever existed.

NOT THAT I'VE EVER DONE THAT. TWICE.

Wedding Planner Emails

A Stranger (David) emailed me a while back suggesting that I mess with a wedding planner. In the middle of my attempts, another Stranger (Jess) requested the same, directing me to a pretentious wedding planner with whom she had recently been in contact. I scouted out a few others online and attempted some different things. Most of them wouldn't take the bait. But a couple turned out nicely. Here's one of them:


To: Wedding Planner
From: June Snapple
Subject: Most Beautiful Wedding EVS!

I'm looking to plan a wedding but need SO much help because the bride is being BRIDEZILLA to the extreme and she won't listen to me anymore and I'm like just trying to do whatever I can to make it so that she has the wedding of my dreams because I probably won't ever have the wedding of my dreams and I don't even know where to start anymore. Do you do real weddings or just weddings in movies and birthday parties and stuff?

PTA Emails

One Stranger, Cheryl, recently asked me to help inflict some pranking revenge against her sister, Tami. Apparently Tami spent the better part of her teen years convincing Cheryl that she had a secret admirer, writing notes to her and leaving Valentine cards. Cheryl found Stranger and the mommy blog a while back and asked me to email Tami, who, as luck would have it, is currently the PTA president in their hometown. I felt a little guilty throughout this one, but Tami was a good sport.

Names and other identifiers have been changed.

To: Tami
From: June Snapple
Subject: PTA

Hi Tami,

Your contact info was passed to me recently. I understand you are the current PTA president. I'm new in town and my children go to Q of C Elementary. I am very interested in becoming as involved in the PTA as possible. I have several ideas I would like to run by you at your earliest convenience.

June Snapple
Former PTA President

Emails With A Polygamist

One Stranger, Sarah, started getting spammed via email by an obnoxious man looking for extra wives. A google search of this guy revealed that he has gone to great lengths across the Internet to find new wives to claim as his property. Sarah gloriously messed with him for a bit and then passed his contact info on to me. Below is the polygamist's (AKA "Genius") email communication with one J. Snapple, in its entirety.

And for the record, while I tend to try to be merely annoying and not mean-spirited in these things, I don't feel bad for crossing the line slightly with this one.


To: Genius
From: J. Snapple
Subject: POLYGAMY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey Big Spender!

My friend Sarah contacted me and let me know that you may be in the market for some good ol' fashioned polygamy. I would be interested in negotiations for marrying. Are you guys still looking?

Please get back to me as soon as humanly possible.

J.

Couchsurfer Emails II

My good friend and life coach Shea saw a new TMZ article asking readers to help identify a man in a blurry image with Britney Spears on Valentine's Day and suggested that we all let TMZ know that it might be me. Many of you have been leaving hysterical comments on the article. TMZ is going to know our Stranger community before too long as a force to be reckoned with.

Last week I posted some of my responses to the couchsurfer requests of late. I had a bad couchsurfing experience recently so we are taking a break from hosting travelers for a little while. Rather than simply reject couchsurfer requests, I have been getting creative with my responses. Below are a few new ones. Enjoy. As always, I welcome you to share this post and others with the world.

*Note: many of the request emails I get are very long and detailed. I have condensed or paraphrased several of the initial emails below for your convenience.


From: Tyler
To: Eli
Subject: Trip to Palau

Hi Eli, I'm coming to Palau next month and need a place to crash. I see you live in Palau. I'm assuming you live in Palau the country in the Pacific? If so, I need a host for 3 days.

Couchsurfer Emails

Before we get started, two quick things. First, the somewhat neglected mommy blog has a tacky craft competition going this week, so please head over there and send in your submission.

Second, I want to thank everyone again for all you've done to share Stranger with your friends through your blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, going door-to-door, smearing the blog address with blood onto mirrors in public bathrooms, etc. Thanks to you, we have over 12,000 likes on the Facebook page AND like 12 very disappointed people are following me on Twitter. A couple of friends have been telling me for a while that I need to do a better job of asking people to share Stranger. So that's what I'm doing now: please share this or other posts, recent or otherwise that you enjoy. I'll keep writing if you keep reading and spreading the word. Deal?

Oh my gosh. I just asked you to do 2 things. Being a virtual friend with me is basically like a part-time job. I'll pay you $6.50 an hour and not a penny more!

Because of the German couchsurfer experience last week, we are taking a small break from couchsurfing. This is mostly because of something Daniel said to me 12 seconds after we dropped the couchsurfers off at the airport:

"You will NOT accept another couchsurfer if you want me to still be in your life."

I'm now in the process of declining the 20 or so requests I currently have pending. Because it would be a shame if Daniel exited my life. Who would reach the stuff on the top shelf?

The standard rejection was getting boring. Plus I hate saying no to people. So instead I started accepting them in ways that would make them retract their requests. Below, I include some of my favorites so far:

Cat Owner Emails

I emailed some cat owner advice blogs as "June Snapple" to get advice on a serious problem. Below is the best of the exchanges. Pay attention to the "from" and "to" on each email header. There are multiple people corresponding here. Also, I'm not sure who "Tom" is in her last email, but I get the feeling he and I would be good friends.


From: June Snapple
To: Cat Owner Blog
Subject: NEGLECT?!?!?!

Hey guys! Or should I say "meow!?" ;-P.

So I've got a really serious problem and I have no idea what to do. I recently took in some new cats and now my original cat, Trixy, seems really sad and I think it's because I can't spend all the time on her that I used to. I'm just wondering whether it is ethical for me to keep the new cats or whether I should just release them.

FAQs

Good morning, dear strangers. A while back I decided it was time to stick an FAQs section on Stranger. So I'm finally doing that. You can find the tab above. I know. It's like I'm trying to set a world record on having the most tabs possible. I have also included the FAQs in this post, for the truly lazy. I receive quite a few emails and comments on blog posts (which I love reading) and many of them ask a lot of the same questions. Since I don't want you to spend all your time asking these kinds of things and not have enough time to write about your Queen of Colors sighting, I post the answers conveniently for you here.

Q: What the crap did I just read?

A: I started this blog in 2007 on a whim. I gave the title no thought, and probably would pick a different one if I could go back. Before I started blogging, I was writing about the strange experiences I was having and emailing them to members of my family almost daily. Then I heard about blogging (I'm always about 10 years behind on all things) and it seemed like a more practical way to share stories and archive them than through the hotmail account I had created when I was 16. So one Saturday morning I up and created this blog and it has largely remained what it was in the very beginning: an exaggerated account of my daily life. The good, the bad, and the Queen of Colors. Only, hopefully, now the spelling and grammar is a little better.

Grandma Georgia Emails

Today's edition of the Jolyn files is a very dramatic email chain she started under the Alias "Grandma Georgia" last December. I had received a number of very odd emails already (mostly from Jolyn) to the Stranger email account and was having a hard time knowing how to handle them. Jolyn didn't confess that she was Grandma Georgia all along until right before I moved to Palau in October. For about 9 months I felt anxiety over how this all turned out.

There are a few different people emailing back and forth in this chain, since I repeatedly asked Jolyn and Jen for advice on how to respond to Grandma Georgia. So pay attention to the "From" and "To" on the email headers.

From: Georgia

To: Eli (Stranger Account)
Subject: Granddaughter Alice

Hi Eli,

I'm writing on behalf of my lovely granddaughter, Alice. She has been on your fan band wagon for a few weeks and follows your blog and the comments religiously. She has been wanting to email and start a conversation with you but she's just too shy and usually only talks to me or her cat. But I say there's no time like the present! So I decided to go ahead and do it for her!

 

She's a sweet girl. She's 18, studying English at UCLA, loves literature and writing poetry. She has quite a good eye for good writing (take that as a compliment!). She's quiet, but definitely opinionated. And is a fantastic bowler! I know she would love to go out with you, maybe a friendly bowl and some ice cream. If you're interested you can call her at 801-372-0711. I'll tell her I sent you her number so she should be expecting your call!

Kindest Regards,

Georgia

Cat Birthday

I mentioned yesterday in the Snuggie Texts anniversary post that Jolyn, my friend who helps me with the blog, has frequently targeted me in some terribly mean pranks. Me. Innocent, little old me. Naturally, several of you demanded that I post the results of some of those pranks. Ok, you twisted my arm. I'll start with the most recent one.

Living in Palau, I am in a very different time zone than the vast majority of you. What this means is that by the time I get up in the morning, it's already the afternoon for most of you. Seizing this opportunity, one day last week Jolyn waited until it was late enough in Palau that I was probably in bed, signed into the Facebook "It Just Gets Stranger" account, and posted this on the Stranger page (as me):

Happy Birthday to me today! 87 years old--still feeling young. For presents, please send me pictures of your cats (in costumes preferably) or your feet to itjustgetsstranger@gmail.com. You, dear strangers, are the best.

By the time I got into work, I already had over 50 emails with pictures of cats and feet. I was so confused. And then I saw the post. I tried quickly to right the wrong by posting again on the Facebook wall that it was NOT my birthday. But the cat photos kept rolling in.

I have been working on returning them to you guys, since it wasn't really my birthday. And it's just unfair for me to accept gifts from you when it isn't even my birthday.

Enjoy some of my favorites from the birthday week. Sorry if I didn't post yours. It's not because I didn't like it. It's just because I'm super lazy and the Internet is very slow down here in coconut land.

Anna

Relationship Advice Emails

One stranger, Lauren, suggested that I email a relationship expert and seek some advice. I found one young guy with a blog in which he states that he is an expert on relationships. He provided his email for anyone who wanted to email him questions. I thought I would test the outer limits of his expertise. I'm sure I'll get what's coming to me one of these days. But until then, enjoy:


From: Peter Hansen
To: Jack
Subject: HELP!?! Relationship!?

I'm in a very unique relationship with someone who doesn't speak English (only understands it) and spends most of the day sleeping. Also, I don't think children will be possible for us and this bothers me. Could use some help if you would email me.


From: Jack
To: Peter Hansen
Subject: HELP!?! Relationship!?

Very interesting situation you have there. I am sure I can help. Can you give me some more information to aide in my advice?

Turkey Emails

Daniel had an idea for a Thanksgiving email prank. I shot off a bunch of emails to different cooking blogs and had a couple respond. The following turned out to be the best exchange. This lady is awesome. You can tell she doesn't really believe this is serious, but she wants to keep responding just in case.


From: June Snapple
To: Cooking Blog
Subject: Did someone say TURKEY!?!? :)

Hey there!

The last 2 years I have tried to do a turkey for my family and it was a total NIGHTMARE! I tried it in the oven one year and tried to deep fry it last year. Both years made a huge mess and the kids were practically traumatized. Am I missing something? Is there some way to ease the struggle a bit?

Thanks!

June Snapple
PTA President