We interrupt this regularly scheduled column with the following public swind...er, service...announcement.
Greetings friends, SJ, here. Some of you may not know that Paddling Upstream, Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of a wonderful and truly generous 100% American holding corporation headquartered in Grand Cayman called Profit Media Conglomerate.
I hope this doesn't come as a shock to you, our valued reader. Compiling columns has costs no honest person can pay. So we sold out and it's working for us.
We love our corporate overlords here at P.U. First, they pay us, unlike Huffington Post. Second, they hardly ever tell us what to write. If it weren't for them, we'd be owned by NewsCorp or worse, Disney. Hardly anyone pays attention to those yahoos!
But I digress. I'm sharing this information with you for two reasons.
One, to make sure you understand this paper isn't responsible. Profit Media Conglomerate (let's call them PMC) sells Paddling Upstream and other columns to newspapers around the globe. Their business model and sales just can't be beat.
It's like a subscription where you sign up to get free magazines for six months then find a credit card charge for $347.53 in the seventh month because you forgot to cancel. You missed all the small print, printed in off-white, and now you're tied to a contract in perpetuity. Haven't we all made that mistake?
Which leads us to the second reason I shared that information.
Profit Media Conglomerate, a full service media provider, has experienced massive growth in the last few years, acquiring high profile media and physical properties like this column, pets.com, the Stamp Channel, and the Alpike Motel. We expanded our media services to serve our customer base. And what patient customers you've been!
But costs of acquisition are high and paper clips are getting very expensive in Grand Cayman. Beginning a month ago, there will be a 4.5 cent facillitation fee for reading this column.
Here's how it works. When you begin, you are in the first paragraph. Your reading comprehension is craftily facillitated by me using professional tricks like periods, prepositional phrases, and paragraphs. Without these facillitations, you could never maintain proper media comprehension.
From now (a month ago) on out, every time I jump paragraphs, there'll be a 4.5 cent charge. Without it, we just couldn't deliver the quality verbage that's ink splattered down this page. So you have to pay up front.
This may sound fishy to some of you, but don't worry about it. Many of you carry media insurance. That covers most of it. Think of it as a copay. And if you just don't have that 4.5 cents up front, we'll loan it to you for only 45 cents in two weeks. We have your credit card information already.
Remember, the media services provided by all PMC properties.are made possible only by our ability to get paid. By the electron.
This is SJ wishing your a great week and be talking to you next Friday.
Kaching!