Sometimes I suspect people are fucking with me on purpose

It’s hard not to be a little bit offended by the hundreds of pitches I get offering me diet pills and lipo coupons, but I just ignore them and add them to my list of people to kick in the groin if I ever meet them in real life.  The pitches are often insulting, but I got a fresh, new perspective when the casting people for the My Strange Addiction show sent me an unsolicited form letter asking for head-shots and for a summary of how my addiction is affecting my loved ones.  Keep in mind that this show is exclusively about the kind of people who can’t stop eating their own furniture.  Awesome. I considered making up my own strange addiction but the last episode was about a lady who’d secretly eaten seven couches and two chairs and I don’t even know how to top that.

Still, I did respond to them:

I’m assuming someone in my family asked you to contact me, as I am cripplingly addicted to watching shows about crippling addictions. Of course, the great tragedy here is that I would almost certainly develop an addiction to watching the addiction show about me being addicted to watching addiction shows and I’m pretty sure that’s how worm-holes get started. To be honest, I think it’s dangerously irresponsible of you to even ask me.

Hugs, Jenny

No response yet.

136 thoughts on “Sometimes I suspect people are fucking with me on purpose

Read comments below or add one.

  1. Awesome answer!

    I thought all those emails about Nicaraguan investments and penile enlargement were bad enough, this is even goofier. And uh I am assuming these are all random, right….?

  2. Your response was brilliant.

    Maybe it was the wine slushies that earned you a referral. Or it could be the taxidermied animals in clothes that did it.

    Actually, there is a pretty significant list of strange addictions your family may have used here.

  3. As far as I can tell, the only thing you’re addicted to is pointing out that people are assholes. (Writing this by candlelight in a bathtub while I’m taking cover from tornadoes. Yeah… I’ve got my priorities straight.)

  4. First I thought you were being ‘punk’d’ .. .then realised you were talking about a real show.
    Now I’m so stumped at the eating of seven couches.
    And secretly.
    Was she locked in IKEA for the night?

  5. Awesome. They need to take into consideration the fate of the space-time continuum when they do these solicitations.

    As an aside, she ate a couch? Really? Man, I gotta step up my game if I’m ever gonna be famous.

  6. I also have an addiction to watching addiction shows. Some things just can’t be helped, like eating toilet paper…right?

  7. Did you just divide by zero? I had to read that reply paragraph sixteen times, then my head asploded.

  8. I cant watch that show. Makes me wanna eat furniture and sleep with my blowdryer. Cleaning my cat with my tongue would take a serious hit and I just dont have any more free time for another hobby.

  9. I don’t get many pitches, but I get tons of emails telling me about sexy adulterous housewives in my area. I often wonder if I should feel complimented (maybe they want me to join, though I’m not a housewife or adulterous), or if I should be insulted they think I’d go for cheating skanks, or wonder if they know something about me that I don’t know. Maybe if I try that Viagra they keep trying to sell me, I’ll think differently! 😉

  10. Oh I TOTALLY want to get this email now.

    “Yes, I have a crippling addiction that is affecting my loved ones. At night, when I’m sort of lounging around in my adult-sized Power Ranger PJs (they have footies! Or feeties. Two of them, so pluralizing seems to be the right way to go there.) I am compelled to smear honey on freeze frames of Anderson Cooper and make the dog lick it off while I…

    Watch.

    As you may imagine, this is difficult for my family. Mainly as we end up buying a lot of televisions. And honey. That Costco membership is really paying for itself I can tell you that. Anyway, addicted, need help, pay me to humiliate myself on your show, yadda yadda.”

    Or I could just pretend to be on crank. Whichever.

  11. I’ve got a sectional that I’ve been wanting to get rid of. Bring a fork.

  12. Omg!!! I think I just choked trying not to spit all over my screen! That was a superb answer. . . and I think that Dr Kaku would agree about the wormhole thing! Thank you for sharing that insanely funny post!

  13. I started laughing but then just got pissed because nobody ever calls me with interesting stuff like that. Sure, I get hit up to increase my credit limit or buy home insurance, but I never get the stuff that worm holes are made of. Best you can get with an insurance pitch is a freak tornado upon turning it down.

    Worm hole…damn you’re lucky…

  14. I am concerned that they didn’t tell you what your strange addiction was. Sounds like entrapment to me. Or, as mentioned, maybe it’s the taxidermied animals in clothes thing. Because although I personally think that’s awesome, I could see where some misguided, narrow-minded person who doesn’t know about James Garfield saving Christmas would think that was strange.

  15. How can somebody Secretly eat an entire couch? Didn’t somebody notice there was half a couch missing at some point?

    Personally, I prefer remote controls and socks. Much easier to handle and digest, with the added bonus of driving other people mad.

  16. Seriously? SERIOUSLY? There are other people in the world that eat their furniture?

    Fuck.

    I honestly thought my kid was the only one – he started a 3 when he ate a pine coffee table – and was about to go reality tv shopping… guess I will just have to go with that homemade weather balloon idea then…

    UPDATED TO ADD: That has already been done too? Fuck this shit.

  17. Were these seven normal sized couches, those large L shaped couches, love seats, or Polly Pocket couches? Because, like the three bears, the L shaped couch is probably too big, the Polly Pocket too small, and either the regular couch or love seat just right depending on how many calories she has already taken in for the day.

    Also do you fucking remember Polly Pocket? They were the shit!

  18. It’s nice that the lady stuck to eating her own furniture. I’m not sure I’d know what to say if I invited someone to dinner and she thought my chairs tasted better than my cooking.

  19. I’m pretty sure if I started chewing on my furniture, I would get hairballs. Then I would have an addiction to coughing up hairballs in front of people, just to prove it was actually happening and I wasn’t just being facetious.

  20. Brilliant. I feel bloated just thinking about all that fabric consumption. I’ve gotten my habit down to one tea-towel a day, so proud. Oh America-land TV how do you keep coming up with these things.

    Your response ranks up there with the Seinfeld episode where he asks for the telemarketer’s number so he can call them back later at home. Anything that references worm-holes and then signs off with ‘Hugs’ gets my vote for fav post of the day!

  21. I am so impressed by your response that I don’t think my brain can process that much awesomeness. I need to go lie down now.

  22. Um… I saw Donnie Darko and any wormhole attached to Mr. Gyllenhaal is one I want to jump into. Also, can “Two Worlds Collided” be the opening song for the addiction show about being addicted to addiction shows… ya know, for effect. Basically, what I am saying is, I NEED this… to live vicariously through your wormhole jumping addiction reality show. Wait… can I host?

  23. I feel like we’re wasting a valuable natural resource by putting these addicted persons on television instead of harnessing their powers. You eat couches? Bam, we move you to the local landfill and you can eat all the old couches you want. Feel like snacking on some old tires? Have I got a dumpster for YOU!

    Maybe these people aren’t crazy. Maybe they don’t have a problem. Maybe they’re evolution’s way of cleaning up our mess. Why are we being so unscientific?

    And you get way better spam than I do.

  24. I know they say you need to get more fibre in your diet but I’m pretty sure that they don’t recommend eating your couch or chair. I wonder what they think your addiction is. It can’t be your being prepared for zombies as that would that be an addiction to living. Taxidermy? That is a real occupation… Vodka slushies? No, I’m pretty sure that is one of the four main food groups…

  25. Why would they email you? That is totally bizarre. Of course, I once had Wife Swap send me a private message through a forum and ask me to apply to be on the show. I wondered how I could be weird enough to be on that show and suffered from anxious aggression about my weirdness and then realized that I am in no way weird enough to be on that show and suffered from a deflated ego because of my lack of appropriate weirdness. It was scarring. Just scarring.

  26. I can only imagine that sinking feeling of despair when the person opened their fridge to find a midnight snack.
    You know something a little bit sweet, a guilty pleasure, a tasty treat to be enjoy whilst savouring the late night TV shopping channel.
    Only to find it empty…

    I can see how that long gloomy walk of back to the sofa ends with….
    Wait a second I have 2 couches…
    I could eat one…

    Hey we have all been there.

  27. I would be really offended at this, mainly because I would have to ask for clarification as to which addiction they were referring to. What is this, like anonymous intervention?

    For some reason it reminds me of something that recently happened to a woman, a friend of mine, who’s married to the kind of asshole who drives your friends away because he’s not just an asshole, he’s bizarre but not in a good way, a complete sociopath, etc., etc. Anyway:

    She gets into a minor fender-bender and calls him so that he can check on the Internet for the number of the garage around the corner.
    He’s all:
    “I don’t have time. I’m reading.”
    “Come ooonnnnn….”
    Sigh. “OK. But I’m not going to call them. I’ll get you the number. I’ll call you back.”
    She waits five minutes, calls him.
    “Did you get the number?”
    “I’m finishing my chapter first!”

    So she gets home and bitches him out for being uncaring, a freak, etc. His answer?
    “You’re cheating on me, aren’t you?”
    “What would make you say that?”
    “Because I know by the way that I reacted to your car accident that there must be someone else in your life.”

    Yes, you heard right. Because of the way HE reacted, she must be jumping in the sack with someone else.

    I say spam the hell out of those addiction people. There are some genes running around this world that should not be propagated.

  28. I saw the one where the woman eats Draino. thought, What in th fuck? then never watched it again. But I’d def tune in to see you addicted to your own addiction episode.
    Also, I don’t even know what a worm hole is.
    Lastly, how can you secretly eat a couch?
    I’m contemplating that and it’s puzzling me.

  29. ok, I just watched the video and what bothered me most is how she just tosses cushion chunks in her purse all willie-nillie like.
    GET A ZIPLOC BAGGIE WOMAN.

  30. I was so confused. Do not watch this when you get up first thing in the morning. I’m thinking “Who’s Jenny new friend and how come Jenny isn’t in this video?” After stumbling about YouTube for a while, I discover this video isn’t Jenny’s and is “real.” Wormholes indeed!

    Huh, “wormholes” is NOT flagged by the spell checker. Now that’s cool. Wormholes are therefore real! Best find of the day!!!!

  31. If Richard Bey (of the “Richard Bey Show” glory that I miss so much with its enlightening topics like “[Insert your own adjective and body part, such as ‘Large-Bottomed Women’] and the Men Who Love Them,” is hosting “The Addiction Show,” I would gladly develop an addiction to audition. If they’d appreciate weird food combinations, I’ve already gotten a jump on that.

  32. Perhaps they were talking about your addiction to adorably taxidermied animals?

  33. hahaha…that was a great answer. It’s like when i was younger and all these people would say to me because i needed to lose weight “but you’ve got such a pretty face!”

    Really? and that was supposed to give me incentive to lose weight how?

    Fucking people …

  34. I totally watch that show. Really, Jenny, the first step to overcoming addiction is admitting it. Especially in a gratuitously public manner for cash.

  35. I’m addicted to reading responses about addicts addicted to addiction shows who create wormholes. Great. You just ruined my entire week.

  36. Don’t make too much fun of the chick that ate a couch or two…sometimes it starts little, like eating an M&M off the floor, and then progresses to taking the salt from your sweaty face and putting it on your french fries, and then… eating your own hair. And then a couch.

    There was once a girl who had to have surgery because she ate so much of her own hair. They got a stomach shaped ball of hair after that surgery. I’m not so sure if she really started with M&M’s off the floor, but it seemed like a VERY logical progression to me.

  37. I always wonder how someone would find out they liked eating furniture in the first place. I’ve never seen the show…mainly because the previews for it are bad enough. How did they first think of eating chalk, toilet paper, and laundry detergent? I’ve used all of these things…it has never once occurred to me to taste them.

  38. I was so flabbergasted by the video of the lady eating couches that I just admitted to everyone in my office that I used to eat paper when I was a kid. Great, now everyone thinks I’m a goat . . .

  39. I guess if you want to stand out in the “addiction” market, you have to have a strange addiction. There are probably too many people on crack, heroin, cigarettes, and alcohol to really make a name for yourself in the Addiction Community. That said, you could probably top that other lady by eating 7 couches and 2 chairs, but not in secret. Just bring bits of furniture with you as a quick snack throughout your day, serve some to your guests, etc. That way, you still achieve the same thing as that other lady, but with the integrity of eating all that furniture in front of people. Or eat other people’s furniture, that might work too, but it may be hard to prove that it was you eating their furniture…

  40. I don’t understand. Don’t others notice their furniture slowly disappearing in bite-sized hunks over time? Now, I know I would initially attribute the damage to vermin, and set up multiple rat traps. But after failing to catch anything but my neighbor’s chihuahua, I’d probably suspect that gal who constantly excuses herself to go to the bathroom with one of my throw pillows.

    Also, WHY HAVEN’T I HEARD ABOUT THIS SHOW BEFORE? It will make me feel a lot better about my own caffeine and Wikipedia and crack addictions.

  41. That addiction show is magnificent. It’s almost as if they KNEW there was a market for exposes on people with really, really, unbelievably twisted and fucked up compulsions because of the fact that everybody is secretly terrified that they are the single most twisted and fucked up compulsive loser on planet earth. Like Hoarders, which is in my top five favorite shows of all time. Everybody thinks their own house is disgusting, but here is proof that you can still slack off, because you haven’t had ten thousand used Depends topple on you while sleeping strapped to a chair in your dining room.

  42. What I don’t understand is how someone can eat seven couches and two chairs and live to tell about it on television. Then my dog eats a TINY PIECE of his bed made of exactly the same foam and nearly dies, only to be saved by about $1500 in surgery.

  43. sadly, I am almost jealous of all the bizarre random pitches you get…. endless hours of entertainment

  44. I second what Chelsie said, except without the tornadoes.

    My old boss used to tell me in detail about every fad diet that he was on and then urge to do it too. Other than pregnancy, I have never been overweight, but that made me feel like he was trying to tell me something.

  45. Do you think that lady has ever been sitting at someone else’s house and, when they go to get her more coffee, she gnaws on the armrest? Just picks a little bit of string off the seat…no one will notice? Who needs casters on the legs of their chairs anyway?

  46. I think it’s probably the taxidermied animals that did it.

    My dog has eaten several couches, a chair and two mattresses. You think that would get me on the show? I really do think he suffers from pica. Last night, I woke up in the middle of the night because he was laying next to me chewing on the blanket.

  47. I’m casting my vote for Mandy Fish for comment of the day “Strange addictions are the new lapdog.”

    LOVE IT!

  48. The first time I met one of my in-laws, he told me that tai chi would be a good idea for me, if I was interested in losing weight. I was pretty thin so I wasn’t sure what he was getting at. Then he told me that he loved Thomas Kincade, and I realized it wasn’t me. It was him.

    Just remind yourself. “It’s not me. It’s them.” Then, even when it IS you, you’re covered.

  49. I wonder if those cushions have been sprayed with pesticides. If they were imported, most likely (imported things are heavily sprayed with pesticides, especially clothes and other materials that bugs like to eat). Talk about not eating organic. Oh, I know, it’s a cushion, (and a compulsion), but still, I think if I had it, I’d go out of my way to make sure I wasn’t poisoning myself.

  50. I somehow missed the link to the video earlier. And I don’t have TV at my house. I *totally* thought the woman who ate seven couches and two chairs was something you made up. Because it sounds like something only you could make up. I know people *say* truth is stranger than fiction, but really…. this is like WAY beyond strange.

    I used to eat butter as a kid and my mother shamed me into stopping. Where the fuck was this bitch’s mother when she was eating the couch as a child?

  51. I just found out (tearing my hair out now) that the shareholders of one of the financial corporations that wrecked the economy decided to sue their CEO for his dishonest behavior, and…his legal bills are being paid by taxpayer money.

    I bring this up because I think your letter-writing skills are greatly needed in the battle against the Corporate Greed bad guys.

  52. I think you are addicted to performing miracles with a boars head. (I think I saw him do a cameo in the original Night of the Living Dead. Just after Barbara enters the house.)

  53. I wish you could send a virus to their computer that used the built in camera to take a picture of their face when they see emails like that. AMAZING.

  54. The couch eating video: beyond words.

    I wonder if it swells up when she eats it, like a foamy sponge would? I wonder what her poop looks like.

  55. Oh my god Tracye, I think I just developed an addiction to wondering what people’s poop looks like when they eat couch cushions all day. THANKS.

    Seriously, though. That video makes me wonder what couch cushions taste like. It’s like when you have one of those friends who raves and raves about graham cracker flavored ice cream and then every time you go to your ice cream place you’re really tempted to order it JUST TO FIND OUT. Except you can escape the ice cream place. You can go home or to a friend’s house or whatever. You can’t escape couches. Hell, you can’t even drive down the road without seeing a couch sitting out there.

    I’m sitting on my couch right now. It’s getting really hard to NOT take a bite out of it. Just one bite. Just to see. But that might result in my developing a crippling addiction that puts me on TV and I’d be famous for eating couches, and is that really what I want in life? This is a tough decision.

  56. I don’t know how you do it, but you get the.best.emails.EVER…. And yeah, I totally watch that show. The toilet paper lady was freaky, but that sleeping with the hairdryer chick?!

  57. What concerns me is not so much the creepy addictions, but the head shots. Like, if you are ugly there is *no* way we are going to give you help. Just move along. That’s right, keep going. Shoo.

    There are probably hundreds of My Strange Addiction Rejects with even WEIRDER addictions wandering around out there, thinking they are normal, eating dish soap and shopping carts or rubber bands and axle grease, all because the TV show is asking for head shots and no one likes a hook nose.

  58. sending e-mail responses about worm-holes is why I love you.
    in a non creepy stalker way.
    maybe.
    I mean hey look a worm-hole!

  59. We had to throw out a foam mattress after catching a family member eating it. Her excuse? “I’m 18 months old and don’t know any better.” Or words to that effect. It was hard to tell through the mouthful of foam.

    True story.

  60. Haha, nice response.

    Those shows basically encourage people to be creative with their addictions….or encourage them to try to acquire a strange addiction. This world keeps getting weirder. This show has proven to me that people will literally eat glass to be on tv.

  61. You’d think she’d be stuffed.

    LOL, sorry could. not. resist.

  62. You are hilarious…and I think reading you has had a positive affect on my blood pressure.

    The nerve of those fuckheads to send you that letter. You handled it beautifully.

  63. Tracye, to answer your question, her poop looks like a futon. A ‘pooton,’ if I may be so bold.

    Don’t ask me how I know that.

  64. @SisterMerryHellish (#74) — is that a couch covered with Mike Rowe that you would eat or Mike Rowe covered with Nutella? Either way, is there enough Mike Rowe for you to share with the rest of the class? I think so.

    Have you seen this? Specifically the question that starts at about 7:30.
    http://youtu.be/Xs61lfhqeNg

    You’re welcome.

  65. I’m amused by the fact that you talked about wormholes … and your readers thought you made ’em up.

    Nope, REAL, folks! Well, we think they are ….

  66. I’m addicted to reading about people who are addicted to watching people who are addicted. I think I just had a stroke typing that. Also, poodles. Just because it’s a funny word.

  67. I think it’s really rude to out for a strange addiction and not tell you what it is. Maybe you are the secret furniture eater? Which I have to ask, how do you secretly eat furniture? Wouldn’t your family notice bite marks in the sofa or a lack of chairs in the living room?

  68. My dog ate a floor, a wall, some cupboard handles and a tent. But he’s a dog, so he has an excuse. Boy you get some doozies, dontcha? The weirdest thing I got in the mail was an offer for free hand-delivered cat litter. Of course I went for it.

  69. Am I the only one who wants to know about the sofa eater’s shit? I mean, seriously. How do you digest a fucking sofa?

  70. Wow. I once had a student that was addicted to tissues… to the extent that we had to keep her away from the box if we wanted to have any for the next kid that sneezed. She would go into classrooms where she didn’t know the teacher and ask for tissue… but then she’d eat it.

    This is much weirder.

  71. All day, I’ve been asking myself “If I had to choose between eating a small amount of sofa cushion or a small amount of , which would I choose?” The results: for any food that I’ve eaten before, no matter how much I hated it, I’d choose the food. For casu marzu (that cheese with the live maggots), I’d go with the sofa cushion.

    Now that I think about it, “would you rather eat sofa cushions or maggoty cheese” is probably a great conversation opener, especially at dinner parties.

  72. This reminds me of when I got addicted to worrying about whether I had any addictions. Luckily, I took up drinking.

  73. What the hell? I thought people were supposed to contact them?

    You should send them a photo of you staring at the television screen whilst gnawing on a corner of your ottoman, while your husband looks on, a single tear falling down his face.

    (ps. That’s the first time I’ve ever used the word “whilst”. I think it really works for me!)

  74. So what you’re saying is that I should put the couch down and step away…???!!!

    Or are you saying that I should take the couch out back, beat the shit out of it, take away it’s pillows and flush it down the toilet.

    But maybe, just maybe I should SIT on my couch. Watch a show about people that have a debilitating phobias while feeling superior while I drink my French chardonnay.

    Or I could just sit here and not know what to make of any of this and wish that people just treat them selves with the respect and love they all deserve.

    Unless they are eating kittens. Then they should go straight to hell.

    Also, I am sick and have had some wine with my “HEAD COLD MEDS”

    XOXO-AVB

  75. I think you made us all go back in time with that one. I look forward to they show about your addiction to addiction show. GOLD!

  76. How do you SECRETLY eat seven couches and two chairs? She had to live alone, right? So that no one else noticed that the couch was slowly disappearing? Or did she tell her family it was mice? Obviously I didn’t see the clip you posted – really nice of you, but I CAN’T SEE THAT. I really can’t. I have had chalk cravings, which I’ve heard is due to a calcium deficiency. I did eat paper when I was a kid, but don’t lots of kids do that? And my aunt used to eat dirt, I think. Of course, lots of kids eat boogers… My son doesn’t EAT weird stuff but he does like to stick his hands in his butt and then smell it. Maybe they can put HIM on the show. Although he’s only 3. But you COULD make a whole show on the weird shit 3-year olds do…

  77. Are you sure it was a family member that suggested you? Maybe it was someone addicted to signing up unassuming bloggists for all kinds of stuff like how to enlist in the armed service, the Hair Club for Men, etc. By the way, if you’re not too busy, pass the library paste. This sandwich is kind of dry.

  78. If they just troll for guests like that, can you imagine how ecstatic they must’ve been to get a response from the woman who eats furniture? And how likely is it that she was just having them on as well…just like you only in such a way that they were compelled to send somebody with a camera and a microphone out to her house to film her eating cushions. Your response may have been more clever, but hers got her on TV doing weird shit. Think you may have missed an opportunity here, Jenny.

  79. I stared in disbelief at the episode in which the girl is addicted to eating cigarette ashes. That’s odd behavior. I even stated to judge her but then realized I’m addicted to eating bean bag chairs wrapped in toilet paper while I do shots of laundry detergent and chew on chalk.
    So, it’s a push.

  80. I just wanted to come back and let you know that I haven’t, as of yet, tried eating a couch. The temptation has gotten quite a bit better since I first watched the video. I ate some ice cream and realized, “there is no way couch tastes better than this.” That’s all.

  81. Omg… I know what you mean about those emails! Some of them are getting sneaky in their titles where I pause for a second. For instance I got one on a package mailed to me by dhl. I thought it was real. Than it seems everyone in third world countries wants to put money in my account and be my friend….lol

  82. Fuck those diet ads/lipo people. You are beautiful, smart and funny! I don’t usually comment, but I love your blog. Don’t change!

  83. @Brian…As a child, I LOVED to eat cigarette ashes!! This post made me have flash-backs! and….needless to say, now all my ash-trays are spotlessly clean! 🙂

  84. You should tell them that in addition to your strange addictions addiction, you ate TEN couches and THREE LazyBoys…just to see if they bite.

  85. How do you think they would address an addiction to Zombies? just wondering. I never get cool mail like you…sadness 🙁

  86. I always want to come up with a response like that one when I get shit in the mail but can never come up with that kind of quality. Its a true talent you have there.

  87. Mmm. Wormhole soup. That would look great in a picture with all of your taxidermy behind you. Instant head shot.

  88. What’s so special about eating seven couches and two chairs? Don’t you know a lot of our fellow-earthlings like to EAT WOOD? 🙂

  89. that show makes my soul cringe. also, i don’t ever fucking need to know about chalk-eating wannabe screenwriters. the makers of that show should be burned at the stake.

  90. (I realise this is like 8/9 months old but I had to reply)

    @ SuzRocks I had a flatmate in uni who hadn’t had a haircut since she was 11 (phobia or something) but her hair was still only shoulder length & fashionable enough. We discovered she sat and chewed it, almost constantly. She had to have surgery for hairballs, the doc told her to stop or she could kill herself, she didn’t care she just kept right on doing it. I think it had gone from habit to addiction by that point. Never really occurred to me to ask how she started with it though.

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