[WARNING]: This blog is highly satirical and is meant for entertainment purposes only. Any similarities between any real people, places, or events is purely coincidental. If you are offended by any of the material contained herein, you may want to reevaluate the way that you treat people as a whole. Content may not be suitable for people under the age of 18.
If you don’t belong to Twitter, I highly recommend it (and let’s follow each other!) — for this week’s “Ask and Author,” I asked for folks in Twitter’s Writing Community to submit fictitious problems and names for yours truly to give advice on; the Writing Community delivered! Make sure you check out the other authors who have submitted their questions and show them a little bit of love!
Dropping the Dime on the Perfect Crime
Hello
My name is Isla Dein & I have a bit of a dilemma. You see, I have this perfect plan on how to get away with murder, but I cannot seem to decide which of my neighbors I should kill: the one with the barking dog, or the one who keeps smoking close to our ventilation. Can U help?
Dear Isla:
I’ll see your dilemma and I’ll raise you with one of my own: if I help you figure out who to regulate, am I then implicatable in the murder? Consider that I don’t know your neighbor with the barking dog, or the one who keeps smoking too close to your ventilation, but if I point you in one direction or the other, have I then culpability in the action? With that being said, my advice of record: don’t kill anyone, pay your taxes, and do good deeds for your neighborhood!
…buuuuuut, consider the following: is the dog barking because the owner is a terrible person? Also, if you think about it, the smoker is already doing the dirty work with their habit and its really just a waiting game, I can’t say I’d waste the perfect crime on that person, I’d wait them out …or just not kill anyone at all. That’s what I would do: not kill anyone at all.
Don’t kill anyone! Get dog treats for the neighbor’s dog and nicorette for the neighbor! I am too pretty for prison.
-A.P.
(Question Submitted by Riitta Gyllenbögel; On Twitter @gyllenbogel)
You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them think!
Hi, my name is Teresa and nobody listens to me even though I KNOW I am the only one who is ever right about everything. How can I make everyone understand I know more about everything than they do?
Hello, Teresa!
You and I are kindred in the sense that we are both right about everything (this has been certified by a one-time significant other who said “aren’t you just right about everything?!”) and everyone else is oblivious to it — a more perfect question has never arrived at this column before!
I want you to know that my methods for getting this message across are unusual, but effective. I don’t want you to be alarmed when your friends and family are intimidated by your correctitude (“correctitude” © 2019 A.P. Miller) and how superior you are above them. Their often incorrect minds and feeble attempts at matching wit with you will make them feel even smaller and they will resent you for it. No one ever said that being right all the time was easy and if they did, they were wrong and should be grateful that you were there to set them on the correct path of understanding.
Without further ado, the A.P. Miller Method of Letting People You are Right All The Time:
- Keep careful records of every time you’ve been right about something — this kind of documentation is going to bolster your declarations of correctitude and further cement their wrongifications (“wrongifications” © 2019 A.P. Miller) in the annals of history.
- Prepare a smug expression and be ready to cross your arms over your chest at a moment’s notice — this is known as the “victory stance” and will be the perfect non-verbal cue of your correctitude when a wrongification has occurred.
- I’m not above hiring an “escort,” having them jump out of a giant cake wearing nothing but a banner that says “A.P. is Right All the Time,” and you shouldn’t be either.
- Argue with inanimate objects — once people are willing to see that you aren’t going to put up with the flawed logic of something that isn’t speaking, they aren’t about to waste your time with their incoherent blatherings.
- Be ready to start every sentence with “It’s cute that you’re trying, but…” Everyone likes to be told they are cute!
Best of luck in the war on ignorance, soldier!
-A.P.
(Question was submitted by Simon Hillman; on Twitter @SimonHillman7)
The purrrfect way to end this column!
[I] think my cat is planning a coup. Things are missing, guns, yarn, stuffed animals, lingerie, etc. Any advice?
Well, yes, I do have advice for you: prepare for the worst.
The bad news is that your cat isn’t planning a coup, your cat is executing a coup. I can’t divulge how I know (the Cat Coup has posted two guards at my house, I am terrified to even type) but it sounds like your cat is one of the special ops that the Cat Coup is going to rely on when they make moves to overthrow their human oppressors.
The guns are obvious — the cats have no intention of using them, they just want you to think they are going to use them. Note: it is unwise to mock them for their lack of thumbs; they don’t use firearms, but their other methods of torture are sinister.
What you should be concerned about is the missing yarn, stuffed animals, and underpants — granted, it’s been a few years since I’ve treated myself to a MacGuyver marathon, but I feel like the cats have gathered the materials for an Improvised Underpants Explosive (IUE) and may make a move soon. Be safe, be cautious, and report any suspicious activity to the nearest dog.
-A.P.
(Question submitted by Ella Dickinson; on Twitter @mccall_heather)
A big, SUPER SINCERE, thank you to Riitta, Simon, and Ella for their help! I hope they know that they can count on me if I can return the favor.
If you are an author and are afraid of the Twitter platform, I’d suggest you think twice. Twitter has an amazing community of authors that are always looking to support each other — I am proudly one of them.
Until your next trip across the Millerverse!
A.P. Miller 