Dear Amritsar,
My boyfriend Doug says dumb things sometimes. Like: "Hey, pork chop, bet you'd look great in batter!" Since I'm pretty sure he's not a cannibal, I have no idea what this could mean. Or, like: "You know what they say: "When life gives you Meadowlark Lemons, start a basketball team!" Anybody who knows Doug will know that this is dumb because the only sport he is remotely interested in is women's cross-country lacrosse. Or, like: "If we just keep lowering taxes on the wealthy, the economy will pick up. They are the world's job creators, you know." Seriously, I don't know where Doug comes up with this stuff!
A couple of months ago, I started posting some of Doug's choicer bons ohnos on the Shit My Boyfriend Says Web site. I was so thrilled by his statement comparing the Pope's stand on same-sex marriage to a bowl of tapioca pudding that I brought it to his attention after I posted it. Big mistake. Oh, sure, he said he was okay with it. Still, the way he whipped out his cell phone and started furiously thumbing in text should have tipped me off that something bad was going on.
A couple of weeks later, one of my BFfNs pointed out to me that things that sounded a lot like things I said were turning up on a Web site called Dumb Shit My Girlfriend Says. "Hey, Stanky! Wanna do some hanky panky with my piggy banky?" was one. Okay, that just could have been a coincidence, or one of those things in the air that several people say thinking that they cleverly made it up independent of each other. You know, like the hundredth marmoset experience. But, "I'd rather scoop out my eyeballs with a tablespoon. Okay, that's an exaggeration. I'd rather scoop out my eyeballs with a teaspoon!"? There's only one source that could have come from, and if you were standing in front of me, you'd be looking at it!
To get back at my boyfriend for posting to DSMGS, I started describing him on the Dumb Shit My Boyfriend Does Web site. Not the dumbest things, obviously. For instance, I didn't mention the time he read a manual on propane tanks and then tried to use a jaws of life to - ah, ha ha ha. Nice try. But, you get the idea. Even without that story, I had a seemingly endless supply of dumb shit to call upon.
Well! To get back at me for posting to DSMBD to get back at him for posting to DSMGS, Doug started writing posts on a Web site called Dumb Shit My Girlfriend Does...In Bed. OMG! Like, OMDG! I am not going to describe any of our most intimate secrets the way Doug did, except to say that the evening with the 20 watermelons, the sea monkeys and the full-metal scale model of the Batmobile was totally Doug's idea, not mine!
Obviously, I cannot allow this latest outrage to go without a response. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find a Web site that tops DSMGD...IB. Can you recommend a Web site that would allow me to get proper revenge on Doug for the mean things he has written about me online?
Freaky Fern Findlay
Hey, Babe,
What you are engaged in is what some people refer to as "Webscalation" (although Amritsar is never one of them). This involves an increasingly mean-spirited exchange of ever more personal information in public fora created specifically to highlight the mean-spirited exchange of personal information.
If you simply must continue this foolish invasion of your own privacy, you should look for Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Webscalation [not my word] But Were Afraid to Ask Jeeves. This Web site contains several excellent charts outlining various public humiliation sites and how they rank on a scale of one to kill yourself now because you'll never be able to live it down.
Still, Amritsar would highly recommend that you get your hands off your keyboard and slowly walk away from your computer. No good can come of this. Either you will break up with your boyfriend, or you'll end up in a bitter, loveless marriage that will make Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? look like Cheaper by the Dozen! Seriously! You could say a lot of things about Elizabeth Taylor, but being rated PG isn't one of them!
Send your relationship problems to the Alternate Reality News Service's sex, love and technology columnist at questions@lespagesauxfolles.ca. Amritsar Al-Falloudjianapour is not a trained therapist, but she does know a lot of stuff. AMRITSAR SAYS: just because Amritsar is willing to discuss the most intimate aspect of your private lives in public doesn't mean that she is willing to discuss the most intimate aspects of her private life with you. Specifically, she employs software that deletes all email that contains her name in close proximity to the words "divorce," "settlement" or "maladjusted libertinage" unread. The number of divorces she has been through, the jurisdictions in which they took place and the name of the detective agencies that may or may not have been involved is none of your business!