Post It Note

Dear manufacturers of Post It Notes,

When I have something important I need to keep putting off just a little longer, but in a way that constantly torments my unconscious, I reach for your product with the modified instincts of a modern human. Once I saw an office worker, having exhausted the real estate on the perimeter, place Post It Notes directly in the center of his monitor. This proved very inconvenient, as windows were in constant need of moving and resizing to accommodate these notes. But, alas, where urgent tasks are concerned, your product gave him what other scientists and philosophers have failed to deliver for millennia: a little extra time. I (heart) your product.

Book

Dear manufacturers of Books,

After another episode of aimless floundering, there is nothing like the hopeful thrill I get when I pick up a select one of your products, thinking I might at last find some lasting relief to my confusion and existential dread. Back in the gutter, I (heart) your product for once again providing the stage to this marvelous tragic comedy that I have come to love so much. Apart from that, I really must congratulate you on your excellent work in overwhelming me with knowledge and its counterfeits.

Fast Food Slogan

I would like to today express my admiration for those creators of slogans who have so profoundly contributed to our culture. Their creations are so compelling that even the enemies of capitalism cannot help but to use and abuse them for their own purposes. I would dare say that a good slogan writer could further the cause of anti-capitalist attitudes better than the heathens themselves. Advertisers, I (heart) your slogans.

I present for your admiration some of my favorite Fast Food Slogans:

I'm lovin' it

Think Outside the Bun

Do what tastes right

Where's the Beef?

I'm thinkin' Arby's

Have it your way

If you are what you eat, you are awesome.

Finger lickin' good

Throw boring overboard

Your going to get your wish. Go fish.

If it doesn't get all over the place, it doesn't belong in your face.

Who doesn't love a little something extra?

Cheese

Dear manufacturers of Cheese,

I don't know why, but the poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of your product. This is especially odd because they always want to write about things that cannot be put into words. Perhaps it is because, like me, they (heart) your product to such an unfathomable extent that at last they must shut their mouths and let your product speak for itself. Which it does, in the most remarkable lyricism of the tangy and sublime.

Garbage Bag

Dear manufacturers of Garbage Bags,

When I have various items which I no longer want or need, I need a handy place to store them until I can convince someone to take them, or until someone forces me to pay them to take my items. Your product gives me a handy solution to this irksome kind of storage and so I (heart) your product. Often I wonder what I would do if I purchased a box of your product and then decided I didn't need or want it anymore. But then I remember that I have your product to handily store the remaining box of your product, and I feel relieved.

Che Guevara T-Shirt

Dear manufacturers of Che Guevara T-Shirts,

I (heart) your product. I don't know if Che would agree, but I myself feel one of the greatest attributes of freedom is its ability to tolerate and, indeed, support startling paradoxes. Nothing could be a greater symbol of freedom than your product, and I would be proud to wear a T-shirt with the image of your product on it.

Easter Grass

Dear manufacturers of Easter Grass,

I'm not sure what Jesus and all them had in mind with all that stuff - you never can tell what these artists are up to - but nothing says Easter to me like a mysterious over-sized rabbit that lays artificially colored candy eggs for children. And your product brings this miracle of Easter front and center. But what I adore and respect most about your product is that - I hope you will forgive me - it is one of those products that I don't have to buy if I don't want it. Let me rejoice, I (heart) your product.

Lego

Dear Lego,

Your product brought reason into my heart, and with it I learned to build heart into my reason. When I consider what you've done for the world, I feel like crying in discrete, blue plastic "one-blocks". I (heart) your product.

Plastic Wrap

Dear manufacturers of Plastic Wrap,

I (heart) your product. When I need to seal in freshness at a moments notice, I reach involuntarily for your product. Beyond that, when I need a fresh layer or layers of ductile, clean, clear plastic with the ability to cling, easily dispensable, for whatever it is I happen to be involved in, I always say a little prayer of thanks that you've put it there right in front of me and I am saved from yet another logistical nightmare.

Mattress

Dear manufacturers of Mattresses,

I am in a long term relationship with your product that has lasted a third of my life. When I do word association with "mattress" I get this: raunchy, stained, old, infested, worn, sleazy, floppy. But also this: warm, comfy, cozy, intimate, restful, peaceful - in a word, (heart). I (heart) your product.

Clothes

Dear manufacturers of Clothes,

Somehow, I always find something that I like. Which is amazing given how many shapes and sizes of different kinds of fruits, flakes, hippies, hipsters, squares, straight arrows, monkey suits, soccer moms and dads, mall rats, sweat pantsers, punks, plain janes, gangstas, granola crunchies, workers, rockers, hookers, lounge lizards, cowboys, city slickers, profs, freaks, geeks, nerds, bar flies, jocks, gym bunnies, fuddy duddies, old farts, and couch potatoes there are in the world. What's the upshot of all this? I (heart) your product.

Toilet

Dear manufacturers of Toilets,

Your product belongs on an altar. What can I say but that there are people in this world, there are people in this world. And one day you will bring The Good Product to them and they will be saved. God speed my friends. I (heart) your product.

Television

Dear manufacturers of Televisions,

I want to restart the calendar with the inception of your great industry. Your product was more of an atomic bomb than any atomic bomb, with all of the awe and absurdity of that dubious enterprise, except that it exploded with entertainment, knowledge, inspiration, and choice - in a word, creativity. Is it your fault that depravity finds any means serviceable? Your product is a spur of noble minds and for that, I (heart) your product.

Bicycle

Dear manufacturers of Bicycles,

When I tire of spinning my wheels, what better remedy than to spin some of yours. Out of my tower, away I go to see the world! Or my little nook of it. Fresh air and sunshine and all that, or by night and its light. From here to there, going around, cutting through, zigging and zagging, and back another way. There is nature and man, composing the world, or mashing it up, a symphony of cacophony for the senses. And before I stop, my wheels are in motion again. I (heart) your product.

Soap

Dear manufacturers of Soap,

If I could send one message back to the 10th century, it would be this: wash your hands. But then, they couldn't, could they - they didn't have you. I (heart) your product. When I'm wallowing in the slop with all the other pigs, it's good to know that salvation awaits me.

Pen and Pencil

Dear manufacturers of Pens and Pencils,

What's in a drop of ink or a quantity of lead? Pages of copied encyclopedias, grocery lists, and budget numbers? Perhaps. But perhaps this too: a secret, a key, a solution that defied a millennium, a problem to withstand an eon, a revolutionary utterance that strives to put a new face on the world, or unmask it, a figure, a form, a design that breaks the world open and spawns new ones, the infinite and the infinitesimal, freedom charging into a vacuum! ...and the soft strokes, leaves falling, a stream learning its path, a lizard's breathe, delicate lines that cradle their content between them - love, trying to find a way. I (heart) your product.

Fridge

Dear manufacturers of Refrigerators,

After an easy day hunting and foraging at the local markets, where will I store my basket of goods? I get the chills when I think how much I (heart) your product. You take the guess work out of my belly so that I have the entire day to Stay Fresh® my soul, or ruin it. Please have a cold one on me.

Disposable Glove

Dear manufacturers of Disposable Gloves,

You keep the distance between I and Thou, and for that, I (heart) your product. You make it possible for a janitor to stick his hands in my mouth at the same time I might plunge mine into a public toilet. I am awed by the way you compress a ten foot pole into three mills thick.

Cheese Puff

Dear manufacturers of Cheese Puffs,

Here and there, I don't mind if I do. Sometimes it feels good to be bad, and so one out of one physicians of my soul agree, I (heart) your product. Beyond that, your orange fingerprints adorn our culture from the computer sciences to the velvet arts. We understand it's not easy being cheesy, and we lick our fingers to you.

Incandescent Light Bulb

Dear manufacturers of Incandescent Light Bulbs,

Even as we stand on the unenlightened eve of your product being banned like some cheap thug, I venerate, and I am firm: I (heart) your product. Its soft, warm glow is imbibed into the works of countless night owls and poets, who have found their good there. God loves man's lamp lights more than his own great stars. This single ray from Tagore's own lantern restores luster to your great enterprise.

Nuts and Bolts

Dear manufacturers of Nuts and Bolts,

I (heart) your product. I find them discarded in the gutter and I bethink myself what a spoiled age we live in to find such a marvel of form and function lying around like common refuse. It was the task of millennia to bring this wonder to the world, but only you could bring it to the table. I am come undone by the way you hold things together.

We live in the future

My friends, we live in the future. Or if we do not live squarely in the future then we at least live in a curious juxtaposition of The Future and the Dark Ages. Even so, let us be grateful. And as thankful heralds of The Future, we will be judged as true citizens of that age.

Now please join me in the many small thanks for those objects whose presence constitute nothing less than the holy imprint of the invisible hand of The Future on our time.