dear mr. paul shirley,

i have a bone to pick with you. rather, a whole skeleton of bones because the further i delved into your book can i keep my jersey, the more i realized that if we were to ever meet in person, god forbid, i would promptly punch you in the face. after which we would have lengthy discourse concerning our respective experiences playing a professional sport abroad and i would stately inform you that you really are, as you say so yourself in your book, a royal pussy.

now that's not to say i didn't enjoy said literary work of yours. in fact, i found it eery on how many levels i could relate to you (most of which give me no cause to rejoice, considering they were each examples of why the life we lead so totally sucks rocks) and was devilishly impressed with your correct reference in the use of the gorbachevian word glasnost, proving your ample knowledge of soviet history for which i must say to you: ku-dos. run on sentence. check. also, profuse thanks are in order for it wasn't until reading your glorified journal that i realized how annoying my own parenthetical rants could be to my sparse group of subscribers. i'm only half confident my family and friends read my blog every once in a blue moon, so i'm not pretentious enough to believe someone of your public status might give a proverbial nod in my direction. but either way, muchas gracias big guy.

but back to you being a pussy. having the status of picky eater, which you obviously do, how did you expect to survive the former USSR, praytell? what with their meat jell-o and sour milk okroshka? and i know the frozen tundra of siberia must have been really rough on you. for all of. . . . two months! my unfeigned condolences, comrade. try finland. the north pole. for 7 months. 3 of which the sun sees fit to peek its head above the horizon for a meager two hours a day. then call me and we'll chat about depression levels and see who can get most creative with ideas for suicidal attempts. volleyball players (who, it has been scientifically proven, do not have as big of heads as basketball players and therefore can not only laugh at their own expense, but thrive in foreign situations due to their sky high IQ's) brave much worse conditions than you ever had to for much less green. hence, complaints about your peon salary became increasingly harder to swallow.

perhaps it seems as if i'm skirting around the issue here. what i'm really trying to say, paulster, is grow a pair and quit whining so much. you play in the NBA and while you may have had some not so fortuitous foreign situations, you made more dough in one season than i have made in my three years as a "professional" volleyball player (ouch. my pride hurts). you may be huge and goofy looking, but you've got a good job and a good life and not much room for complaint.

good talk.

sincerely and cynically,
erica

p.s. please tell me you don't actually think global warming is real?