Checking out, show shrinkage &?Etsy excuses
Dear Rachel,
I’m disappointed in people who don’t carry checkbooks anymore. I went down south o’ the state border recently for an arts festival, and everyone below a certain age was paying with cards. You gotta support artists by paying cash! But you can’t always carry cash, so carry checks! It got me pondering what the age cutoff for checks is. And why oh why did the young and foolish side of that line decide to stop being sensible?
– Check Yourself
Dear Checkpoint Charlie,
You know, I recently saw a woman in the 70-85 bracket whip out the ol’ checkbook at a vendor table. She then proceeded to ask everyone around if they had a pen she could borrow. What good is carrying a checkbook if you don’t got the ink to back it up? You might as well wear shoelaces on your feet, or season your empty plate with salt. I think the time has come for checks, unless of course you’re interested in paying me. I still accept them.
– Make it out to me, Rachel
Dear Rachel,
Netflix just got “Seinfeld,” and binge-watching it got me to realize something: you are basically a “Seinfeld” episode in print. Your column is a half a page that doesn’t matter, yet I keep coming back. Even on the rare occasions someone has a genuine problem, you laugh it away and give a nonsensical response. I can’t decide if this makes you a horrible person, or if you are the levity we need right now. What’s your take as the writer of whatever this is you do?
– Still Tuning In
Dear Biff,
I have never thought about aspect ratios in my life. But then I read how Netflix has taken the 4:3 ratio of the original show and ruined it – ruined it, Jerry! – by streaming it in 16:9. The internet tells me that this makes the show unwatchable. How you can truly destroy a sitcom by slicing out a quarter of the image area is beyond me. Less of nothing is still nothing, right? And the nothing left is now in HD, and I don’t understand how you take old footage and make it better, anyway.
– What’s the deal with me, Rachel
Dear Rachel,
I’m having frustrating website issues. My e-commerce page works on certain phones but not others, and certain computers but not others. It all works on mine, of course. But people are telling me they go to my craft shop page and none of the items show up. The internet is the internet, right? Why the heck do some things work some places and not others like this?
– Foiled Again
Dear Tin Foil,
It’s all a conspiracy. Not by the internet, of course. But by people who want credit for looking at your page without actually having to buy anything. I do this all the time when I don’t actually have money or desire for things my friends make. In the olde days, I’d just say I didn’t have a pen to write out the check. But now, in the age of flying cars, we have to create new excuses.
– Empty pockets, Rachel
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