Emails I May Never Send #20

Dear Lara Bingle,

That's my loofah.

Best,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #19

Dear Miley Cyrus,

I went to high school with a couple of girls like you.
I don’t mean that they were absolute rubbish at lip-synching, or that they were photographed from behind by Annie Leibovitz, or that their fathers were famous for one song and one haircut, or that their penchant for semi-nudity and bitchiness belied their loudly-announced churchiness.

I just mean that they were brainless skanks who irritated the living crap out of me.

Achily, and also Breakily,
Jo.

PS: “Shah” is not a real word.

.

Emails I May Never Send #18

Dear Madge,

Your husband is a rich film producer.
He's British.
With stubble.
He has Jason Statham's phone number.

You, by comparison, wear leotards and have man-hands.

Find a way to make it work, for feck's sake.

Like a virgin,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #17

Dear Mrs Beckham,

Thank you for your recent application, however there are some issues which need to be raised with you before it can be processed:

- Our policy does not allow for nicknames to be used on application forms, hence your request to be registered as either "Posh Spice" or "Paris Hilton" has been denied.
- In the space next to "Sex", we can only accept one of two responses – either "Male" or "Female". Unfortunately we cannot accept "Innit".
- We require you to submit your measurements as they were pre-surgery, and preferably in numerical form. "Perfick" is unsuitable.
- In the "Comments" section, the board would like to thank you for your kind invitation, however we'll all be watching Foreign Correspondent instead. One of our members specifically requested that we relay his comment, that he would "rather watch It Takes Two than this day-old carpet-vomit" directly to you.

We invite you to re-submit your application before the deadline of five PM today (big hand on the twelve, little hand on the five).

Regards,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #16

Dear Matthew Newton,

Thanks for your lovely email.
Unfortunately I'm busy tonight at Karate class. Maybe some other time?

Osu,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #15

Dear Lindsay Lohan,

Herbie's the one who should be fully loaded, sweetheart – not you.
For goodness' sake, have a cup of tea and put a bra on.

Regards,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #14

Dear Anna-Nicole,

You still owe me ten dollars.

Regards,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #13

Dear Beyonce,

Yep.
We've seen 'em.
Now, put 'em away.

Regards,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #12

Dear National News Producers,

There seems to be some confusion regarding which stock footage clips should be shown with which news item. For the avoidance of doubt, please stick to the time-honoured formula below:

- Story about drugs: close-up of someone cooking up a hit on a spoon
- Story about paedophiles: close-up of children's legs walking to school
- Story about obesity: close-up of numerous fat arses walking up and down Pitt Street Mall
- Story about hailstorm: close-up of local bloke's hand holding big f*ck-off hailstone
- Story about drought/water restrictions: image of puddle of water surrounded by cracked, dry earth
- Story about anything to do with Muslims: image of women in hijabs at local shopping centre
- Story about apartment building on fire: image of residents in jammies standing in street
- Story about bushfire: image of fireman squirting own face with hose
- Story about bush/sea rescue: image of person wrapped in blanket
- Story about sex scandal: image of Shane Warne
- Story about court case involving teenager killed in police chase: image of mother/sister/aunt arriving at courthouse with bad perm and cigarette
- Story about baby animals born at zoo, shown after the weather bulletin: whatever you like, channel has been changed immediately after surf/snow report

Please also tell Sandra to pull back on the fake tan.

Regards,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #11

Dear Bindi Irwin,

Go to school, honey.
Them critters is dangerous.

Best,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #10

Dear Steve Irwin,

Never smile at a crocodile.

And for goodness' sake, mind that stingray.

Adieu,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #9

Dear Nigella,

I like seeing you rip into a curly endive. I love watching you slop extra-virgin olive oil all over a vat full o' veg. I adore the way you drizzle chocolate, beat hell out of a chicken breast, and pound pastry vigorously into submission. I don't even mind the fact that your cooking shows are just as much about your jewellery and your norks as they are about cooking.

But, my friend, when you head downstairs to the fridge at midnight in your jammies to scoop handfuls of trifle out of a half-empty bowl and smear great wodges of it into your waiting gob, please TURN THE CAMERAS OFF.

Enough already. It's turning my stomach.

Yours with, comparatively, the appetite of a bird,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #8

Dear television producers,

I, and most of the people I share the planet with, do not give a rat's arse about ice skating. Unless you can promise me that Karl Stefanovic cracks his skull on the rink, I'm not watching.
Just put the Goodies back on and be done with it.

Yours almost indifferently,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #7

Dear Catriona Rowntree,

GET YOUR EVER-PRESENT NORKS OFF MY TELLY.
And while you're at it, put those massive teeth away.

You're so excited about your boobs, aren't you? It's like "Here's the sweeping vista of the Greek Islands, as seen from my expensive balcony. But more importantly - here's a great big look at my fun-bags! Woo!".

We want to see the pretty scenery, not the mammary glands of the hyperactive bimbo sent on a plane to present it. The producers put you on a plane because they couldn't stand you hanging around the office anymore.

Put a skivvy on and get on with it.

Yours with a comparatively uninterrupted view of my feet,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #6

Dear Deni Hines,

You've had your turn, sweetheart. And you stuffed it. Now go away.

There's just no place in the world for vibrato that sounds like Tiny Tim singing through a fan.
Whilst your star turn on that television juggernaut Skating On Thin Ice obviously shows you to be a stack-hatted force in the entertainment industry, there's barely enough of us left who give a rat's about your mother, much less her sproggy, annoying little offspring.

You're not sexy, hilarious and wacky. It's just transparently obvious that you'd like to be.

Put a bra on, have a wash, and shut the f*ck up.

Sincerelyish,

Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #5

Dear Jessica Rowe,

Oh, you inane, bony little pixie.
I can't listen to your forced vacuous giggle any more, or tolerate your cheesy fairy-tale grin, without wanting to take to my television with a hacksaw.
I know by rights I should also send an email to Karl Stefanovic, your meatheaded boof of an offsider, but I suspect that he can't actually read big words. Like 'Stefanovic'.
Even Sharyn Ghidella looks at you like she wants to snap you like a brittle, elfin twig.

Please take your alarming jutting collarbones and your pointy, pointy, face elsewhere, quick-sticks. Don't make me get the hose.

Yours with a comparatively well-concealed skeleton,
Jo.
x

Emails I May Never Send #4

Dear David Caruso,

Okay, so part of my beef might be with the writers, producers and directors of CSI Miami, but when it comes down to it, I don't want to take a hot iron to their faces like I do with you, David.

Point one: You Are Not Sexy. Just come to terms with it, honey. It's partly because you've had the same hair for two decades, you have the physical presence of a marionette, and your eyes are like two beady little licorice bullets. But it's mostly because you're Ginger.

Point two: CSI MIAMI is fictional. They make all those women talk to you, because it's in the script. They make those children look up to you like a father-figure, because they're paying them. And sweetheart - in real life, Ginger people don't drive Hummers.

Point three: Leaving big spaces in between each of your scripted words isn't enigmatic, charismatic, or dramatic. It's f*cking annoying.

Point four: The costume department didn't give you those sunglasses for dramatic effect, so stop fiddling with them. They gave them to you because you're ugly. And Ginger.

Thanks, mate. Sort it.

Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #3

Dear Tom Cruise,

Just stop it.

Sincerely,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #2

Dear Kylie Kwong,

I don't give a rat's arse what you were like as a little girl, so I'm certainly not interested in watching you pay a little pig-tailed actress to impersonate you in foggy-focus flashbacks in your TV cooking show. So your uncle made noodles? Big freakin' deal. My uncle ate prawn heads, but you don't see me crowing about it.
I also don't need to waste valuable retinal cells watching you thumb through magazines or paint primary-school quality swirls on paper while you're waiting for your scallops to marinate. You think you're creative and artsy. We GET it. We just don't have a pathological desire to prove it to anyone.
Despite the fact that I haven't been to a professional culinary academy, I know which end of a lobster is the head, and from a very simple subsequent deduction, which end is the tail. Stop condescending to me, and just cook the bastard.
Most of your dwindling numbers of viewers also know that you're of Chinese parentage, specialising in cooking Chinese food. You can probably drop the constant and tedious habit of prefixing every ingredient with the word 'Chinese', then. If you say "rice wine", we're going to assume you don't mean "Yugoslavian rice wine". If you say "Chinese pickles", we're going to assume you don't mean Branston pickle, or the oft-flicked serrated gelatinous things plucked from a Quarter Pounder. And if you say "Chinese shallots", we're just going to use shallots.
And don't pretend I didn't see you in Macro, moving your own cookbooks to the front of the shelf.
I just know you were that annoying slap-magnet kid at school who almost gave yourself a hernia rocketing your hand up to answer every question.
We don't care about you, honey. Get on with it and make my dinner.
Best Chinese regards,
Jo.

Emails I May Never Send #1

Dear Britney,

Thanks once again for letting me watch your slow and agonising descent into Celebrity Insanity. The fact that you're accompanying your psychic crumbling with weight gain, acne, laughable parenting, a hilarious marriage, an intense dependence on ready-made coffee drinks and a devotion to clothing made famous by various freeway hookers only endears you to me more.
I like that you can drive with one hand on the wheel, one hand around a mocha latte crush, and your child on your lap. I like that your chins now outnumber your hit singles. I like that your husband is a weaselly slut who may or may not have scattered his demon seed across the continent, giving rise to cut-price bastard offspring throughout your fine country. I like that, instead of a tedious old bridal waltz, you chose to celebrate your marriage with a quick drunken pole-dance in a tracksuit.
Of all the celebrities currently tumbling down the slippery slope of public kookiness, you're my fifth favourite.
Don't ever change, Britney.
Oh - except maybe keep your boosies out of sight. Enough already.
Yours in anticipation of more New Idea photos of you shopping in a t-shirt,
Jo.
x x x