A Croc of … Wit

Bitter Crocs owners said they were going to rush out to buy more Crocs to punish me. Darn, didn't see that coming. Many, many readers thought I was a terrible father because I let my son poke gentle fun at people who wore Crocs. Farmgirl12 put it best when she said, "I cant beleive your raisin your son like that." One thought I was a cool dad for spending time with my boy, but that maybe it might be best if I "didn't procreate again." From your typewriter to God's ear, my friend. Another felt sorry for my son for "having a goober dad with a job writing about shoes." That one made me laugh out loud; I'll definitely be stealing that line. So will my boy.

One angry reader said he could picture me in my ivory tower sipping wine by candlelight as I typed my essay. That is a gross mischaracterization. I drink bourbon. Guilty on the candle, though.

One woman wrote that she thought it was unfair to judge me just from one story so she went and looked up my other work. She thought all of those stories sucked, too. SeriouslySad agreed: "The writer is obviously not a good one, he works for Newsweek." Another careful reader said he couldn't believe Time magazine paid me to write such garbage. The good news for me is that all of this angry reading of my awful prose drove up my traffic numbers, which only encourages my editors to let me commit more acts of bad writing. The Crocs story alone got millions of hits, so you haters can look forward to hilarious rants about people talking in public on cell phones and nasty airline food. You have only yourselves to thank.

One quick side note: To  reader Eroticism, who wrote, "I think I love you," and to laftacad who went all the way and said, "I officially love you," and to all of the women who proposed marriage: could you please send photos? I know we'll have at least two important things in common right off the bat: you love me and you don't wear Crocs.

I went through every single one of the thousands of responses and letters, and some of them were tough to read. But one stood out, and I'd like to close with it, because one Crocs wearer, Leayellowrose, got the joke: "OMG ... This was hilarious!!! Thanks for the laugh. I lost my 4 year old to brain cancer in January and hadn't laughed this much since ... Now, that being said, I wear Crocs all the time!!!"

It was signed, "A dork in Texas."

© 2008