Odd Emails and Other Strangeness

There must be some sort of blogger master list circulating among the various PR firms out there. I regularly receive "press releases" announcing something or other, usually utterly banal, sometimes truly weird. Here are a few recent favorites:

From Melanie Young Communications, representing the good folks at Georges Duboeuf (sorry to ask you to read 3 paragraphs of this, but it's so absurd that I thought you'd enjoy it):

SIP INTO SUMMER WHITES WITH GEORGES DUBOEUF! IDEAS AND PARTY TIPS FOR THROWING YOUR OWN WHITE PARTY AT HOME New York (July 8, 2009) - Les Vins Georges Duboeuf was on the white carpet at summer's biggest White Party of the Season, Sean "Diddy" Combs' annual White Party, held July 4th at a private mansion in Beverly Hills. The 400 high wattage guests included: Ashton Kutcher, Demi Moore, Mariah Carey, Lindsay Lohan, Kim Kardashian, Khloe Kardashian, Lil Kim, Garcelle Beavais-Nilon, Shawn Wayans and Forest Whitaker.

The Combs party featured stylized white bars, white sofas and coffee tables, white bean bag chairs, white beach blankets and balls, trapeze artists dressed in white, white cabanas, stilt walkers wearing white, jars of white candies from Dylan's Candy Lounge in New York, a revolving white dance floor and streams of sheer white fabric cascading around the long pool area.

But, one does not have to be a celebrity to throw a fabulous white party, according to Duboeuf. "Summer whites extend beyond a crisp linen shirt, white jeans or a white cotton dress. The crisp lightness of summer whites can also be found in the white wines of France's Mâconnais region in Burgundy. The wines are soft, yet supple and versatile with many summer foods from salads and ceviches to grilled fish and roast pork," said Georges Duboeuf. "They are perfect for easy summer entertaining."


This next one comes courtesy of Laura Winters at Pirate's Booty. The subject line of the email reads 'Recent News from you friends at Pirate's Booty.' The text encourages me to write a story about Pirate's Booty's tips for a healthier start to the school year. They offer six tips for packing healthy lunches. Here are the tips, exactly as the writers of The Simpsons might have titled them:

Don’t Be a Son of a Biscuit Eater
Lay Off the Meat Pie
Open the Hatch
Cut the Sugar, Scallywag
Avast ye the Salt
Don’t Drop the Snack Anchor


Here is a recent email from Jomar of a blog called Qvinho. I get lots of emails like this, but there is something that I particularly enjoy about this one - the smooth first sentence:

Dear friend,

I am an avid reader of your blog, and I am really pleased about its content. My blog is called QVinho. It is a blog in Portuguese for the Brazilian aficionado for wine and gastronomy. We want to bring up to date info on wine tasting for the increasing Brazilian wine market. I would be grateful if I could have our blog included in your list of links.

I was tempted to write back to Jomar because he clearly thinks of me as a friend, and also because he obviously really likes my blog. I just haven't gotten around to it yet. Hope you enjoyed these. If you have a blog, I bet you get them too. I promise not to do this again, unless something extra-specially insanely weird comes through.