Dear Amritsar,
I desperately need help with my love life. I'm not sure who you are but your name sounds sorta Indian and I figure they invented the Kama Sutra with like eight different types of "mouth congress" including "sucking the mango fruit" which, let's be real, we know what THAT is! Wink wink, nudge nudge! Oh, I'm sorry, I don't actually need help with that part because it's not relevant to my question. I just thought I'd throw that out there, because Indians are supposed to be great in bed with everybody.
Well anyway, here's my problem. My lover is me and I don't think I love myself anymore. No, this isn't Gwyneth Paltrow, or some otherwise narcissistic whiner. I actually cloned myself because I'm the most gorgeous, most perfect creature I know - in fact, the only reason why that Paltrow dog got named "Most Beautiful Woman" by People Magazine is because I was out of town that week. Anyway, me and me have been madly in love for, like, ever - at least for a good three or four weeks now - and now I won't have anything to do with me. Me! ME!!! The only other creature on the planet who I'm not more beautiful than!
What am I going to do, Amritsar?!?! I think I will DIE without my love!!!
My Clone Sleeps AloneHey, Babe,
<icy tone>As a matter of fact, my family comes from Wabash, New Brunswick. They make the Yokums seem like Brideshead Revisited. The only book any of them were ever responsible for was the Larry Sutra, which focuses mostly on men's relationships with television remotes and refrigerators. Yes, we're all very proud of Larry, the family is. Thank you so much for prompting this trip down memory lane!</icy tone, but replace it with a dark glare that will continue throughout the remainder of the column>
If I had to guess, I of course would: your clone has run off to meet Gwyneth Paltrow. And, you have no one to blame but yourself: your constant references to the actress/wife of a famous, if overrated musician/semi-professional toothpick Taj Mahal creator must have made her sound much more interesting than she actually is. Hell, I want to meet her, now, and the only contact I've had with you is the letter you wrote to me!
If this is the case, I would suggest that you clone yourself again, only, this time, stop reading People Magazine. And, being obsessed with your looks. And, flossing so much. Really, you're destroying your gums, babe. Nobody likes a bleeder. Even clones.
If I didn't have to guess, I could imagine a scenario in which your clone decided that it was the real you and dumped you to make another clone of itself so that it could claim to be the real you with its clone. I know, I know - the thought of another you in the world sends shivers up my femoral artery, too.
But, it gets worse. Eventually the clone of your clone will get fed up with playing second fiddle to her and leave your clone to make a clone of its own. Before you know it, 127 different yous will be knocking on your front door asking for a cup of cocoa (sugar-free, because a girl has got to keep her figure - except for clone 43, who has decided that she just doesn't give a shit any more and is willing to let herself go to hell by gaining two, maybe even three poun...ces) and demanding that you take care of them. Okay, the possibilities for orgies are mind-boggling. Then, what?
In fact, how do I know that you're the original you and not the clone? Perhaps the real you got fed up with you mistaking yourself for the real you and left you to fend for yourself. Wow. Could that sentence have possibly fed your narcissism any more? You make reinstating the * Ego Alert * warning that I used to begin some of my columns with very appealing, even if Judge Judy makes good on her threats of a lawsuit!
I didn't just pull this theory out of my (shapely, thank you very much for not asking) butt. Studies have shown that clones use more exclamation marks than originals (see, for instance, Miata, Riata and Goncharov, "Personal Epiphanic Punctuation in Multiple Bodies Syndrome: The Multiplicity Effect," The Journal of General Genetic Nosiness). Combining multiple exclamation marks with question marks? You may as well have tattooed, "I was conceived in a Petri dish and I ain't afraid o' nothing!" on your forehead!
Clones! Just thinking about them makes me consider running away and joining the Amish!
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: </end dark glare, although expect it to be replaced by a foul, snippy mood for the remainder of the day. Let this be a lesson to anybody else who presumes to know who Amritsar really is>