To the occupant(s) of the apartment in my building who is/are ripping me off,
In general the people in the apartments of our building are a fine group, and I hate to complain or bunch you all together in this negative light, but this shit must end. I'm aware that the rent we pay is ridiculous, and maybe some of us are cutting corners to make ends meet, having to do without the little things we want or love. Maybe some of you love movies, tv and music but no longer have the means to stay up to date on the entertainment news you crave. I feel for you, I do. Still, I do not believe this grants you license to steal my copy of Entertainment Weekly on a now semi-regular basis.
I'm sure it must be tempting each afternoon as you walk into the building, the new EW just sitting there beneath the mailboxes. When the lovely Nicole Kidman or that dreamy Aragorn fella from LOTR is staring up at you from the cover of my magazine, begging to be read on the can, I can only imagine how hard it is to control yourself. But you must. I know there are times when my magazine may sit there for days, until you finally decide that the owner must not want it, and it is therefore free for the taking. This is just not so. Sure, there is always crap down there that nobody wants, and it just sits for a while until the foyer gets cleaned out. But see, generally this is free shit, shit that no one wanted or asked for in the first place, the Beacon Hill Times for instance, or a Speedy Wong's menu. The truth is I want my magazine, I want it every week (except for twice a year when they put out a double issue, in those cases I want it once during each bi-weekly period). The reason it may sit a day or three is that my job requires me to travel quite a bit, so I may be gone for a few days, and my magazine must wait for my return. While in airports, browsing the periodicals at Hudson News between flights, I always resist the urge to buy the new EW, because why on earth would I do that when I have a perfectly good copy waiting for me at home at a significant savings off the newsstand price? Why indeed.
I hope you can see my point of view. I like insightful entertainment news as much or more than you do, I like it so much I pay for a subscription (again at significant savings). I like it so much that when I fly home on Friday, and get to our building, all the while knowing for a fact that on newsstands throughout the airports of this nation is a new EW whose cover promises a list of the 50 Greatest Cult Films that Reference the Simpsons, and I don't find said magazine resting beneath the mailboxes in the foyer, I launch into an internal rage so fitful that it causes my left eyelid to flutter uncontrollably.
Well the time for eyelid fluttering has passed, my EW snaking friend. I've got a plan. Of the 7 apartments in our building that I don't live in, I've already eliminated 3. You can call it profiling if you like, I call it detecting. Thus far I've been able to discern from the type of mail the older women in unit 4 gets that she has no interest in the goings-on of Nick and Jessica. And the dude in 6 is clearly not ganking my mag unless Jerry or Phish are on the cover, so he is out. The couple below me were harder to eliminate, until I set up a sting operation that ultimately ruled them out. You want details (which is actually another magazine I subscribe to that you steal), well you can't have them. Just know that I am on this. I am giving you fair warning to keep your meat hooks off my magazines. I will catch you, it is only a matter of time, and when I do I am going to go bananas on you. It will be a scene, you will be embarrassed, made to feel cheap, untrustworthy and altogether unsavory. You don't want that, I assure you. So lets end it right now. When I get back next week, if my magazine is in place, I will call off the operation and forget the whole thing. If not, may God help you.
p.s. And don't think I forgot about my Rolling Stone issues too, scumby