current music: Minority by Green Day, The Good Life by Weezer, the horribly bad singing by American Idol

A fan letter is a complicated thing. There are factors. First you have to choose the right target. Me I choose LeVar Burton and I'll tell you why. He rocks. He's like your favorite uncle, or the coolest babysitter ever. I may have mentioned that for many years of my youth PBS was my only television option. I watched Reading Rainbow every day during the kindergarten/early primary school years. I can sing you the theme song right now. Ahem. 'Butterfly in the sky. . .' "If you mention Star Trek people will make fun of you" says Karen over my shoulder. Kids can be so cruel. I do love Star Trek to the point that I can and will argue with you about the FinerPoints of saucer separation (ok I have to say it, best sentence on the internet: 'We know the Star Trek NX-01 Enterprise can't separate like the Enterprise-D could. But what if it could?'). But that is not the POINT. Lord, can I please stay on topic for a minute? Stop interrupting me. Fan letters are important. The fan letter strategy is so complex that I've never even written one. But I do disapprove of almost everything everyone else does. (My personal philosophy: violently disapproving of things is good for the circulation. And we all have to do our part to fight heart disease, kids.) Here are some pointless things that people do:

-write a letter to someone who gets 5000 fan letters a day.

-write a letter revealing that your life has been freakishly influenced by someone's work (ex: "Dear Third Eye Blind, I was going to kill myself until I listened to Jumper after which I decided against it. I LOVE YOU. xoxoxoxo." This is a disaster. Control yourself.)

-write and tell someone that they are hottt and therefore should marry and/or date the writer.

I sneer at all of these tactics. Fan letters should be heartwarming, not creepy. They should not be written to whoever is your generation's answer to David Cassidy unless you, the writer, are under the age of 12. They should not contain poetry, food, or pictures of the writer naked. They should contain wit, charm, and a dash of earnest sentiment to weigh the whole concoction down and keep it from floating away. Like a cocktail hat, really. Remember those alleged hats that people used to wear to cocktail parties that were actually composed of three large feathers, a clump of netting and a bobby pin? It was like they were trying to exist but couldn't, quite. They were impossible, in the same way that fan letters are impossible. Hell I'm not going to write one. But if I did, I might mention that because of LeVar, I got a very high verbal score on my SAT, and that it is really our score. We share it. Together. Also the episode in the chicken factory place where he asked which came first the chicken or the egg? That got me thinking. It was like an introduction to metaphysics. And when I won the Nobel Prize for Literature? I thought of him. I THOUGHT OF YOU LEVAR. You see this? This is why I can't write a fan letter. I'm just not ready. Doesn't stop me from theorizing.

Timing can be just as important as content. Don't write a letter to someone whose career is at its zenith. This person is on top of the world, and as such is an asshole. They don't care about your paltry letter. Maybe their mother does. Also don't write to someone who at age 97 is an elder statesman of whatever industry, has already read billions of fan letters and feels an enormous sense of entitlement. Old people feel entitled enough as it is, by God. If my grandmother asks me one more time why I 'never wear anything pretty' I shall scream. Don't write to someone who isn't famous enough yet. They'll think you're weird. I would if you wrote me one. But you should still write me one. Go ahead I dare you. The secret is to write to someone who is just entering the twilight of their career. The prospect of fading into obscurity is just beginning to depress them. They are staring into oblivion and essentially confronting their own mortality. These people are afraid. You get to slide in just in time to throw them a life-raft and assure them that their lives are still worthwhile. When's the last time you saw LeVar Burton? My point exactly. Your work still influences my life LeVar. Wit. Wit. Charm. Wit. Sincerely, Me. You get the picture. So does LeVar. Pulled from the brink of despair by my timely and well-constructed epistle, he experiences a personal renaissance. He reads my letter to everyone he knows. He writes a reply letter and tells me how awesome I am. It's a little gushy, but of course he has never had occasion to ponder the intricacies of the fan letter. Success! I'm chuffed. My strategizing has paid off and I have achieved perfection. If only it could have ended there.

He decides to come and visit me so that he can give me a hug. Fine. It would be poco creepy if it were anyone but nice cuddly LeVar. So he stops by, we hug, we drink cocoa and talk about how cool Jan Brett and Chris Van Allsburg are. You can look at those pictures for hours! Well this was nice. Yes, I think you rock too. Bye!

But he doesn't leave. He hangs around under my window reading picture books aloud. I can't leave the building without him springing from the bushes and exclaiming "but you don't have to take MY word for it". It's gotten out of control. The letter was too good, too powerful. It was like an atomic letter. This is what can happen people. But don't be discouraged. It'll be exciting. If you want to practice by writing me a letter about how I kick ass and am nifty, by all means do. If I start to stalk you, well then you've gone too far. It's way less scary when I stalk you than when Bono stalks you, I promise. SO go ahead, use me. I will voluntarily submit to your adoration. That's just the kind of awesome person I am.