John Mulaney
Dear Friends And Family, Comedy Did Not Work Out
It's so nice to see all my friends in Chicago, too. I never, uh, I never keep in touch with them unless my Yahoo account gets hacked and I spam everybody. That happened recently. That was really fun because I don't keep in touch with people. So when I spam everyone, that's like my Christmas card for the year.
One buddy of mine emailed me, though, after this happened. And he said, "Hey, I clicked on that link you sent. I don't want to buy any herbal viagra." And he's not, like, a funny person. He's an idiot. I've known him for twenty years. So what I liked about that was a couple of things. One: he clicked on the link. Who the hell still clicks on the spam link when you get it? And he had no excuse. This was the ugliest internet link I'd ever seen in my life. It had, like, dollar signs and swastikas in it. Like, it looked like a virus. I don't mean an internet virus. It looked like if HPV was a website. He got that alone in a blank email and he thought to himself, "okay," and he clicked on it. He was intrigued. And then he's taken to a website that sells something called 'herbal viagra.' And his first thought is that I am now selling herbal viagra.
But you know what kind of offended me is he thinks that that's how I would sell it. Like I'm that shitty of a salesman that I would just paste a link in a blank email with the subject line, "Check this out," which I've never said before in my life. And then in the "To" column, I'd write 'everybody.' And I'd go "ahhhh, this speaks for itself."
No, Chicago. If I was going to email everyone in my life about a very shaky new business, I would write a long introduction letter before I got to that link. I would be like, "Dear friends and family, comedy did not work out. Also, have you ever wanted to try viagra, but you feared the harmful side effects of the non-herbal variety? Well, me and my Cayman-Island business-partners have the solution for you. Just click on the swastika below and, in seconds, you'll be taken to the world's ugliest website. I hope you can read pink on purple, as that is the layout we have chosen."