Dear Sars:

I have a serious problem.I have the strong urge to throw the nearest heavy
object through my television when, trying to be an informed citizen, I turn
on CNN, MSNBC, or any other news channel with a scrolling ticker and see
awful mistakes.What is wrong with the people at these networks that they
can’t correct typos that go whizzing by every 10 minutes for HOURS?

I’ve seen the following in the last few days:

“NASA has Mars rover Opportunity is free from sand dune….” (should be
‘says’, not ‘has’, I’m guessing)

“… suspect plaid for information on terror targets….” (should be ‘paid’)

“… arrested a homeless grifter….” (should be ‘drifter’, which is kind of
redundant on it’s own)

I’ve spotted countless others over the years.I can’t seem to find the
phone number for Master Control at CNN, but if I had it I would be dialing
daily with my complaints.I can’t figure out how to get a message to these
people that they look like idiots.When someone sends me a resume with a
typo, I just throw it away — but I can’t ignore all sources of news
information.Short of putting masking tape on my TV, I’m helpless here, so
perhaps you can publicize this problem and get some attention focused on
this situation?

Thank you for your time,
Steve

Dear Steve,

Let me see if I understand this correctly.You describe yourself as an eagle-eyed grammarian who wouldn’t hesitate to harass CNN’s producers over usage errors.And yet, in this letter, you’ve punctuated quoted material incorrectly, and used a contraction instead of a possessive.So, you’re not just overly officious; you’re wrong as well.

Best of luck with that masking tape.

[Please, no more emails; I know “grifter” is also a word.Thanks.]

Dear Sars:

My wife encountered a gift dilemma at work.She had done some work that
helped out the marketing department, and in gratitude, one of the marketing
folks gave her an iPod that was left over from some corporate giveaway they
recently held.It’s a high-end iPod — worth about $399 at retail.

Here’s the thing — she doesn’t really want it.She doesn’t really listen
to music, and neither do I.Our entire CD collection would fill maybe one
percent of this thing.She tried to refuse it, but the marketing person
wouldn’t take no for an answer.So if we keep it, it’ll most likely sit in
a drawer, unused.

We thought about selling it on eBay, but that doesn’t seem like a polite
thing to do with a gift.What if the person who gave it to her asks how
she’s enjoying it?It seems foolish to let it go unused, though, since lots
of people would love to have one.So what should we do?Stick it in a
drawer?Sell it on eBay?Sell it and donate the money to charity?

Sincerely,
I can’t dance like those guys on the commercials

Dear Dance,

It was left over from a corporate giveaway?That’s not exactly a hand-picked, monogrammed gift; if you really feel bad about getting rid of it, give it to a children’s hospital or find a way to donate it to a hurricane-relief organization — that way someone can get some use out of it.Otherwise, just regift it to a friend whose iPod broke, or sell it on eBay, but…they probably had a pile of them in the closet.Don’t overthink this.

I have this stupid issue with one of my closest friends, and I don’t
know how to deal with it.We’re in our thirties, and have been
friends since high school.

Let’s-call-her-Kathy visited me for a weekend.On Sunday morning I
went for a run and when I came back she had obviously been crying, and
she hid out in the guest room for an hour on her phone, making us late
for brunch.I had no idea what was wrong, and she refused to admit
that anything was wrong at all.Since she left, we haven’t really
been in touch, which is odd, because normally we would speak two or
three times a week.

Last week I spoke to another friend of ours, who mentioned that she
hoped Kathy and I were speaking again.I took it as a reference to
high school spats and left it.Another friend, Sue, made a similar
comment a couple of days later, and this time I asked about it.She
assumed I already knew the details, which were that I had left my
computer on and Kathy had read an email I had sent to Sue, and the
email was sort of critical of Kathy.Actually it said, “We all know
how Kathy is, all ‘I’m so fat’ and ‘he’s not interested’ and ‘my job
sucks’ and ‘I have no life’ and ‘nothing can be fixed.’Someday
she’ll get it sorted out.If you’re finding it hard to cope with,
just tell her you’re too busy to talk.”I was responding to an email
from Sue telling me she was finding it hard to deal with Kathy’s
constant whining.

I was horrified that Kathy had read the email on two levels — first
that she had read something unpleasant about herself (nothing that I
hadn’t already said to her, though) and clearly it had affected her,
and secondly, SHE READ MY EMAIL.

Kathy still hasn’t brought this up with me, though she has been
tearfully calling all our mutual friends to ask them if they all hate
her (!).She must know the story will get back to me.

I’m torn about how to respond to this.On the one hand, I sort of
want to console Kathy a bit and explain the email.On the other, I
want to say, “I know what happened and as far as I am concerned what
you did was a complete breach of trust and I’m appalled.”

Sue suggested I apologise to Kathy.The email was honestly not meant
to be bitchy.Do you think I have anything to apologise for?

S

Dear S,

Apologize, no; confront her, yes, because…enough already, really.She snoops in your email; she reads something that you would have just said to her face; she sulks about it and then pretends nothing’s wrong; and then she’s all boo-hooing to all your friends all, “Do you hate me tell me the truth OH GOD I KNEW IT WAAAAAHHHH!”I mean, shut up, Kathy.

She’s being a baby.Call her up and tell her that you know what happened, and you’re sorry she’s hurt by what she read, but 1) she shouldn’t have read it to start with, and 2) you don’t appreciate having to hear about any of this via third parties.It’s not that I don’t sympathize with her a little bit, but she did this to herself, and she’s handling it in just about the most whiny and sucky-babyish way possible and putting other people in the middle.If she has something to say to you, she can say it when you bring it up, but I don’t think you can keep pretending that this behavior isn’t annoying bullshit.

Hi Sars,

How much sway should one’s significant other
reasonably expect to have over questions of personal
appearance?

Because…my girlfriend wants dreadlocks.White girl
dreadlocks.She’s had them before, and shown me
pictures to prove how awesome it looked; I don’t think
it did.Plus, once she gets rid of the dreadlocks,
her hair will be super-short, and I love her hair.
I’ve told her that if she really wants them and can
afford to get them done, she should, and that I will
love her no matter what her hair looks like…but
dreadlocks?Really?

I’m not asking for ways to passive-aggressive my
girlfriend out of getting dreads, really.We’ve come
to a resolution: she will one day get dreadlocks, and
I will dread (har!) that day.I guess I’m just
interested in what your opinion is about whether
significant others can ever have veto power over
hairdos.

Thanks,
Dreads Look Like Hair Poops

Dear I Agree,

I answered a similar question a couple of years ago about facial hair, and the phrase “veto power” is probably the wrong one here, unless you plan to make it a deal-breaker.It’s my feeling that, with any major changes in appearance after the two of you get together, the party proposing the change does need to realize that the other party did not necessarily sign on for white-girl dreads, or a beard, or super-short hair, or whatever.

I have had this discussion with boyfriends who grew goatees that I didn’t like, and I have had it with boyfriends who preferred that I not bob my hair short, and there isn’t really a solution; I think you just have to tell her, “You know, I don’t think it’s going to look good and I’d rather you didn’t get dreaded, but I guess we’ll see.”Because you can’t really boss people that way, but on the other hand, you shouldn’t have to pretend you like it if you don’t.The trick is to state your opinion, mildly, and then drop it, because if it becomes an ongoing battle, a whole bunch of other arguments start entering into that one that don’t really have anything to do with it, and then it just becomes this fraught thing that’s not about her hair anymore.

Hi Sars!

Sorry in advance for this being way too long. I’m not really sure where to begin, plus brevity’s not exactly my strong point.

About a month and a half ago, I went to see a concert with some friends. Afterwards, we went to the artists’ entrance hoping to get the singer’s autograph and a picture. One of his band musicians invited us to go to the nearby hotel bar to hang out; since the singer would probably be there and one friend really wanted to get an autograph, we went. The guy who initially invited us kept flirting with me, despite the fact that I wasn’t very interested or even terribly talkative, but he was willing to walk two of my girlfriends through a deserted parking lot if I promised to stay around a bit longer, so I (and a friend) did. He was cute and pretty charming, and a couple hours and a drink later I was flirting back. Things got a little awkward when we tried to leave, since he kept trying to get me to stay the night and I kept saying I had to go, but we did get out of there in the end.

Then we somehow bumped into each other the next morning, which was mortifying. He asked if I’d care to hang out. I said yes, mostly because I felt a little bad about how things had ended previously. Plus, my friend who was with me the night before would be there too (he saw me while I was waiting for her to buy food) and all three of us were leaving the town that night, so what could it hurt? Well, long story short, it was a fantastic afternoon. Unfortunately, I also screwed myself over by hitting it off much better with a total stranger than I ever thought possible. It was seemingly all right, though, because I really didn’t expect to hear from the guy again, and figured that those few lovely hours would just become a nifty story to tell.

But fast forward two days later, and there’s an email from him in my mailbox, saying that he’d like it if we could keep in touch. So since then, we’ve emailed and had the occasional phone call. It’s been really nice, but I’m paranoid about this, Sars. I’m eighteen and still in university, whereas he’s nearly a decade older than I am and long finished grad school. He’s had time (and opportunity, given his job) to experience so much, and it wouldn’t be hard for him to take advantage of me, I know.

…But we live fairly far apart in two different countries and won’t exactly be seeing each other anytime soon, so would it be worth his time if it was just about sex? Unless he just wants what he didn’t get the first time. Maybe he’s just a shameless flirt who likes talking to lots of girls or he might genuinely like our conversations, but the novelty will wear off fairly soon and that’ll be the end of it. And if that’s the case, the longer this goes on for, the more it’ll hurt when things end. As far as I know, right now we’re just two people who can have really nice, candid talks despite not exactly knowing each other.

I’ve no delusions that he hasn’t been picking up other people while we’ve been in touch, that I’m in love with him or vice versa, or that he’s perfect or anything like that, but with our bizarre comfort level, it’s been hard not to get attached more than I’d like, despite his flaws. And I tell him about my doubts and my hesitation with the age thing (I know plenty of gals would either be flattered or wouldn’t care, and that’s fine, but it bothers me), but he just says that he understands and is willing to try and convince me otherwise. How can you argue with that without sounding like a complete bitch?

Most of my friends think it’s neat and that I’ll regret not seeing where it leads to (which was surprising because I thought they’d tell me I’ve lost my mind), but sometimes I think this is just an emotional train wreck waiting to happen. Especially because I can’t understand why you’d keep talking to someone who blatantly tells you she thinks you’re either being completely insincere or just crazy when you’re an attractive guy who meets girls everywhere you go. I guess maybe I’m telling you all this in the hopes that your age and experience can make some sense of this mess, Sars. This whole situation leaves me baffled and stressed out; I can’t understand his motives, yet I can’t seem to stop myself from writing back. Or should I just stop stressing about this, like everyone’s been telling me, and see what happens? Any hints as to what to do would be appreciated beyond words.

Thanks again,
Wishing this name was actually witty

Dear Wit,

Okay, have you even kissed this guy yet?Because this is a pretty high level of melodrama for someone who, as far as I can tell, has not even touched you, so either you need to decide to stop obsessing over every little potential problem and just see where it goes — or you need to blow it off completely and forget it.

If it’s causing you this much agita before anything even happens?And you don’t live in the same country?I’d blow it off, honestly.It’s not an issue of the age difference; I don’t think he’s trying to “take advantage of” you — not that I know what you mean by that, really, since you’re of age and presumably fit to make your own decisions, but whatever, not the point.I just don’t think it’s worth it.You’re already all in a swivet about what if he’s just trying to get a leg over this, long-distance that, ten years old the other thing…I think you’d do better with someone who’s less challenging.

“But I like him!”Okay, but then — like him.Stop talking yourself into and out of it ten times a day.

[10/7/05]

Share!