THE GREAT GADFLY:

Decency Now!

For the past few weeks, you've been leaving pre-recorded voice mails for me during the day, in an attempt to sell me satellite dish cable service. For the love of all that's decent, your unseemly hullaballoo must stop this instant.

I come home from work excited to see so many voice mails waiting for me, and I wonder - "who could be calling me? Is it my sister Cheryl and is she pregnant again? Is it Grandpapa calling to report on his hip after the thresher incident? Is it my neighbor friend inviting me to dine on croutons and lettuce?"

No. It is always only you. And not even you - it's a recording of you, asking me to buy your satellite dishing services. It is kind of scary sounding - I don't know if you have ever heard your own messages, but I find them disturbing. I would like to ask you to cease making these calls, not simply because I find them annoying, but also because I am Amish.

That's right, Amish.

You see, our people don't take much stock in your "television", so naturally I wouldn't have any want or desire to have more of something I don't use in the first place. Plus, cable television is for filthy heathens and I don't want to burn in the molten entrails of Hell like you.

NOT THAT I'M JUDGING. I'm sure you're good people! Lots of good people go to Hell. It's nothing personal, okay? I'm just not Hell-bound, is all.

Oh, and I know what you're thinking - you're thinking "Amish people don't have phones, so why do you have one, Mr. Christian Righteous Indignation?"

Listen. How do YOU know Amish people don't have phones? You think you can just watch the Han Solos dancing around with rakes and milkjugs in that "Witness" picture, and all of a sudden you're the Dutch Buddha?! Well, you'd be WRONG, Mister - DEAD WRONG.

You see, I was sort of excommunicated from my Brethren at an early age because I have a little bit of a, well, what the people at the university medical center call a little Tourette's problem and I don't want any stupid cracks about it because I've heard them already, thanks anyway, but let's suffice it to say that I scare the horses. Uncle Merlin says that the chickens are even less uptight now that I've left the farm and they now lay alarming quantities eggs like a bunch of clucking tommy guns, and Grandmama has even taken to breeding chinchillas in the basement - for hobby, not for furring. She said there could be no chinchillas in the house if I were still around ranting and ticking up a storm.

So the family shipped me off to the suburbs and enrolled me in a typing class and rented me a cozy little apartment and Mama hides a disposable cellphone from 7-11 behind the toasting cozy in the kitchen at home and calls me every Thursday from the farm to make sure I'm safe, well and regular, then I enjoy a few ears of corn fresh from the hotplate, throw off the suspenders, and call it a night. I enjoy typing. I would call it a passion.

My neighbor from across the hall sometimes brings me salads and discusses her hobbies and current events. She enjoys attending large conventions dressed in a pink bobcat costume, where other people dress like large animals too. When she wears the costume, her name is Jinxie McCoolio. One day, she arrived at my doorstep clad in her bobcat costume. I was tickled. She pawed at me with her big, fake, foam rubber claws and the costume smelled of musk. How her whimsical lifestyle makes me laugh and laugh! She prefers Catalina style dressing.

"Jinxie" has introduced me to the joy of canned Lysol. Scent in a can! I spray my furniture with canned Lysol daily, and on Tuesdays I spray myself. I have the yellow can, the pink can, the blue can - my canned Lysols bring me a lot of pleasure.

I will not tell you what I do for a living, because jobs bring shame and to openly speak of my labor is worldly and a sin. And don't take my picture because it will steal my soul. I enjoy those battery-operated little robot dogs with the light-up eyes, however. I have one that is actually a cat, and its eyes light up in the shapes of little pink hearts! Hearts as eyes! Hearts as eyes!

So as you can see, Telemarketer, my life is full aplenty without the need for your satellite dishery. And even if I DID want a satellite dish (which I can assure you I most certainly do NOT), I am Amish and cannot own one anyway. Sorry.

So please quit calling me and leave me alone before I get riled.

Thank you,

Disgruntled In The City