Hey Websites, Hire Me Today!

The Paris Review – I’ll tell it to you straight, I can write fiction for you each and every day. I’ve received higher tier rejections from several okay publications and my friends say I have a great deal of resiliency. So I know your readers would love my work. But, if you already have enough made up stories about broken hearts, I can do other things. I’ll tweet for you. Clean out your spam folders. Maybe even braid your poetry editor’s hair. He has a ponytail, I assume. I’ll do whatever you need. I’m your man in Paris, or here in the United States.

The New Yorker – I know, you’re The New Yorker, everybody wants to do things for you. But I’m different. I’m not some guy who’ll just lie down because David Remnick says a story should or shouldn’t be in the next issue. I’ll tell like it is. I’ll say, “Hey David Remnick, this story is like the last one we published. It’s by the same author and  again about a man hauling a sack of grain across a field and also an allegory for American policies in Iraq. All we did was take out the last paragraph, like we always do.” I’ll be your ombudsman. Let’s be buds, man.

High Times – I don’t want any free drugs. I just want my byline next to an extreme close-up of a flower, so close it’s like porn. I want to make more connections, hedonistic ones.

Cat Fancy –  The internet, boy, that was a bummer for you guys. Anyone who likes cats is now always a click from their cute needs. But that’s what I love about you, that you kept going, that you would fight the good fight, championing cats the old-fashioned way, with pictures of them against a white background in a wicker basket playing with a ball of yarn. Let me write the line that goes, “Whiskers is having a BALL in this basket.”

Tin House – Do you need someone to read all those stories? How about this, hire me and I promise to respond to each and every one. I’ll say to the submitter, “If you EVER submit to Tin House again we will come to your house and eat your face.” Getting a rejection like that is much more helpful than the standard one. It could very well convince the submitter to stop writing, which is what they should do. I’ll be saving them, and you, so much time.

Harper’s – I love your index, but it is dated, I’m sure you’ll agree. So, how about if I help you make it more relevant? The rule on the internet is that every article starts with a number. Such as X Ways To Find Your Soulmate or X Things You Can Do That Are Fun, or X Poops You Can Take and etc. No more burying the lede (the number) at the end. Hire me. I’ll help you transition into this bold new millennium.

Playboy – I don’t know if you guys exist anymore. Though, if you do, I’d like to throw my hat in the ring for the biographer position at your publication. Those things are always inserted in the bottom of the page like a folded note card and there’s a heart on it and it has crucial information like the model’s name and weight and height and bra size. I know I’d be good at that, maybe even great.

Grantland – I once read Chuck Klosterman religiously. And sure, his fiction is silly, but I’ll be darned if his essays aren’t fun, except, as Klosterman would now say…when they aren’t.

Thought Catalog – Many of you who work at Thought Catalog may not know this, but I write for you guys. I enjoy doing so, though I’d like it even more if I was paid to provide the content that runs this website. Hire me and I’ll start following all of you on Twitter. And when I come to New York we’ll have a drink and laugh and share many inside jokes.

Vice – I’ve written for you before. Only a few articles, but I was thinking I could get like a Megan Boyle gig and write whatever and whenever I like. To start, I have an idea for a series. I’ll call it “Why Your Lit Scene Sucks” and I’ll go around the country – with a young photography if you can spare one – to document each city and why their lit scene is incestuous and terrible. Let me know what you think. Email is jeffreyellinger at gmail dot com

Pitchfork – It was a long time ago and I only wrote the news, do you remember? Back then you guys had four stories a day. It was like an old-timey newspaper, but at the very end of my tenure you moved from that format into a primitive iteration of what you have now. Back then, you advertised for writers, right there on your website. Can you imagine that now? It’d be crazy, all those submissions. Well, anyway, that was a nice stroll down memory lane. Maybe sometime we can talk. Ryan once emailed me and said, “I got the gig.” Let’s make that happen again. Only bad news is I think Arcade Fire is worse than The Eagles. I hope that doesn’t dampen our relationship.

Pop Serial – Do you guys need someone to read the new Marie Calloway novel? I can be that guy. I don’t know if I can be as creepy as the others, but I can try. I can try my very best.