I am the Meh copywriter. Query Me Whatever!*

@tightwad Who said anything about dedicated? I'm keeping my options open, man.

@tightwad I live in Texas, so I can say with authority that there's no good reason that anyone should live in Texas, okay, well, excepting maybe precisely "dedication to meh," which, you may already realize, is quite the oxymoron.

@joelmw I think you're doing it wrong. As the natural enemy of Texas (a born and bred southern California hippy liberal) I love it here, but mostly because I live in Dallas.

@joelmw That's a broad statement to make about a big state.

@Moose @JonT Sheesh, sheesh. Can't a guy talk a little trash around here. It was hyperbole. Though I definitely don't think that Texas is as big and awesome and important as its natives seem to think. And it's really not the place for me and mine. It has a few charms. And, yes, Dallas (where we live too) isn't horrible; it's kinda okay actually; meh even. But I can think of 26 other states I'd definitely rather live in, and a half dozen countries--and that's without even trying.

@JonT I am in fact somewhat fond of Dallas. It's a decent city; it's got stuff (including other hippies and liberals). I'd probably rather live in Dallas than in a rural town in most of the states I'd rather live in.

@Moose Here are three big reasons to leave Texas.

@JonT Oh, and to paraphrase the words of Jesus to Saul of Tarsus: I'm tired of "kicking against the pricks."

@joelmw This right here. As a person who's lived in Texas most of my life, I can say he is a huge embarrassment. He's in no way helpful for the unfortunate stereotype held globally about our pastimes and accents.

@bluedyn I do in fact love me some Texans. And you are right.

@joelmw Aside from the heat, I'm mostly happy to be here, too. Very few complaints. Aside from him. And allowing smoking in restaurants and silly liquor laws. We can smoke all over the place but god forbid we buy an adult beverage on a Sunday.

@joelmw I enjoy living in Texas (also in the Dallas area)...close access to lakes is a big plus. Sure the heat sucks and the view is mostly terrible boring...but that is the tradeoff for living in NE Texas as opposed to other more view friendly areas of the state. I have lived in various states and for the most part prefer TX. Personally I wish Californian's would just stay there...don't change TX to be the state you were so happy to move away from!

@tightwad That's what Coloradans say about Californians...and Texans. Or rather, did say, back in the 80's, before so many invaded. http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/08/13/upshot/where-people-in-each-state-were-born.html?smid=fb-share&_r=0&abt=0002&abg=1#Colorado

@tightwad I want the progressiveness of my old state with the cost of living of this one. I just want to buy a house that costs less than 2 million dollars.

@Mavyn But as the article states "...Texas has always retained a high percentage of its natives, and since 2000 has had the highest retention rate in the country. " @JonT Many would say the "progressiveness" attributes to the high prices. It always comes out the same way..."I love Texas...if only it were more like (fill in state name)"

@Mavyn @tightwad I'm from Montana. That's what Montanans say about Californians . . . and Texans . . . and Coloradans ( . . . and, okay, any non-native with a lot of money and dubious understanding of the environment). Coloradans aren't bad though. I hope to be one some day.

@tightwad It's just adorable when you Texans talk about your "lakes." ;-)

@tightwad I'm going to hop over the land mine of discussing politics and not get any closer, I'll just say that Texas has been good to me since I've been here and have no plans to leave. Feel free to continue expressing your disdain for non-natives :)

@joelmw I grew up in Colorado, and then lived in Wyoming, and got to call all the Coloradans 'greenies'. ;)

I grew up moving back and forth between Colorado and Texas. There's not a more xenophobic place than Colorado, as far as I've ever seen.

@Moose Let me guess...Colorado Springs?

@Mavyn Evergreen and Golden.

@Moose I can see that. Pretty isolated communities, though less so now. I was on the I-25 corridor, so we turned 'melting pot' in the 80's in a big way. Lots of places tried hard to avoid having the same thing happen to them.

@Mavyn @Moose [Admittedly butting in . . .] My devoutly Christian daughter lives in Colorado Springs (as do at least a dozen major Evangelical ministries, one of whom she works for). My weed-loving, pharmaceutical-experimenting atheist friends live in Denver. Each is at home in two decidedly different (not without certain similarities) cultures (notwithstanding Manitou Springs). I love my daughter, but would rather live in Denver.

@JonT To avoid confusion it must be stated that I am not a native either. I miss the mountains but I don't miss the snow.

@joelmw I visited a friend in Dallas a while back and didn't hate the city anywhere near as much as I expected, though it was basically 1) Mexican dive 2) Kessler Theater for Lucinda Williams 3) Belmont for drinks and view 4) Leave for Austin. But those stops were worth it. These friends and I visited Lubbock a while back, and all I can say is that if you manage to find the subculture, you can make it through a weekend.

@JonT et al (all y'all transplants)

I once heard someone (Steve Earle?) joke "You never ask a man if he's from Texas. If he was, he already would have told you and if he isn't, you don't want to embarrass him."

@Moose Aww, I live in Golden. It's a nice place and we're only a stone's throw from the mountain. In fact, I can go out and throw one right now and hit a mountain if you want.

@bluejester Golden is the best. I lived right below the Jetson house in Genesee; my whole family is in Texas now but they all still say that was the best place we ever lived.

@SSteve I was thinking you where talking about Steve Urkel. Which makes it that much better, as I can see him saying that on the show. Well the "You never ask a man if he's from Texas."

@bluedyn At least you do not have Steve King as a rep.

@Kleineleh Hey, Texax would want me, man!

@joelmw I've spent time in Colorado Springs and Manitou Springs - have family there. Beautiful stuff. Their term for what the CA transplants are doing to CO: "Californicators".

@RedOak We might have meant some similar things about Californians in Montana. But I'm ambivalent in that I actually like the Chili Peppers' song and Duchovny's show--which, I'd argue, celebrate as much as they judge their subject.

@qwertyuiop000 Freelancing: yes, definitely! For Woot, no. They've got a bunch of other great writers on staff. These jokers needed me a lot more.

@JasonToon You should at least have a special "freelance" badge. It might make you feel special.

@Kevin I assume you mean, like, something that ends in "-off", right? I could be into it... it all depends on how quickly we run through the sales and what we would do creatively for each one. Full product stories for, say, 150 items would be a lot to keep up with. And probably pointless since so few people would read each one.

@JasonToon Meh. Just copy and paste, since 149 of those 150 items are going to be speaker docks anyway.

@qwertyuiop000 Well, I guess I'd say that the whole thing showed St. Louis at its worst (Ferguson PD, rioters) and at its best (Ron Johnson, peaceful marchers).

@qwertyuiop000 St. Louis is definitely still the motherland, but no plans to move back at the moment. My kids love their schools here.

@JasonToon This is what people say when they don't want to say "When Missouri legalizes what we legalized here, Missouri can have me back," isn't it?

@editorkid Exactly. "My kids love their schools here (almost as much as their dad loves waking up with a dozen roaring bong rips)" is the unspoken subtext.

@medz It's even less comfortable than that, because it's all pennies.

@jsh139 Thanks for the kind words! "Pieces" is an imprecise measurement, but I ate 3+ pounds of cake (about 1/3 of a Costco sheet cake). It messed me up for days, but I kept it down.

@JasonToon I'm nauseous just thinking about it. You were a trooper!

@jsh139 I love cake, I all-caps LOVE it, but by that point it just felt like I had a gut full of epoxy in my gut.

@JasonToon you had a gut full of epoxy in your gut? that's pretty full, I've never stuff my gut with a full gut; I doubt I'll try that as I like being able to poop, and that doesn't sound like you could without medical help.

@badmnky But you've gotta admit, stuffing your gut with a full gut takes guts. And yes, I do always go for the obvious joke, why do you ask?

@BillLehecka Better yet, an Erlenmeyer flask full of corn nuts.

@BillLehecka Ooh, like, half a flask, since he's freelancing!

@Thumperchick is the flask half-empty or half-full, though?

@carl669 There are no accidents.

@JasonToon More Cursing. Less Speaker Docks.

@JasonToon It needs more paranormal teen romance.

@JasonToon i actually kinda liked the more-product-reviewy blurbs. gives us both sides of the story, better than wading through dozens of comments to get some sort of narrative of the good the bad and the ugly.

@JasonToon I think you are striking a nice balance between informative and fun. I did enjoy the product review videos on woot. I learned some interesting cooking techniques.

@JasonToon Having only 1 page to read/skim per day is nice and I'm more likely to actually look. I did notice the product-centered style, so I wouldn't have guessed you had wrote them all. Mix it up with a crazy story that has nothing to do with the product or its real usage every once in awhile. Keep us on our toes.

@JasonToon More cowbell!

@JasonToon I like the gooey, dripping contempt the early writeups here had. Both for the product and its buyers. Any one style of writeup would get old fast, but I hope those don't vanish. Also, stop using metric. America got where it is using inches and ounces, dammit.

@editorkid @jasontoon Yeah and we need to continue to show our superiority so that it is those outside of the USA (you know who you are) have to convert to that useless "foreign" measurement system. Not the other way around.

@JasonToon more Korean

@JasonToon Some of the writeups should be done in the style of one of the ebooks bots (or just let the bot do the writeup): https://github.com/mispy/twitter_ebooks

@JasonToon I like the pros and cons spelled out, the price comparison to Amazon.

@JasonToon I'm enjoying the write ups. The people I work with all get a good laugh from the daily nonsense. It's fun to read.

@JasonToon I think it's fair to say that the writeups (and, really, the whole spectrum from more review to more snark) are a big reason many of us love the site. So thank you. Truly. You're good with the funny. Whatever you do, don't get too serious, 'cause that would suck.

@joelmw aw man SO MUCH PRESSURE NOW No, seriously, thanks. I can't say how much I appreciate that. It's just incredible that I get to do this.

@JasonToon I think if you write them as a script so we could get a daily Irk video on the product, it would be great. Meh has time to produce that don't they? (Especially during a meh-off)

@JasonToon I enjoy how you're integrating forum chatter in the writeups... mega Kudos for the Christmas ban as well.. genius! Keep it up.

Alright, I'm the third guy to bring it up. I know that now.

@LadyLeela I hope so! It's more likely to be Matthew, our brilliant video producer, but I'd tag along if invited. Wouldn't mind a break from CES for the rest of my life, though.

@qwertyuiop000 Most people as smart as they are would be intimidating. They're approachable, awkward, my kind of guys.

@JasonToon Any opinion on Dave's breath?

@medz Those discussions are confidential. Dave is aware of my feelings on the matter.

@medz I met Dave and he introduced himself as the "lesser Rutledge". As for breath I didn't notice anything so he may be a robot.

@SkippyKJ good to know. I saw a hilarious post on an article regarding the matter and thought it might be an inside joke.

@medz I'm more likely to hit them up for money. "Hey, give me $20 and I'll write a story about your lint roller."

@JasonToon So, is $20 a firm price or is it negotiable? And is it $20 per lint roller, or all my lint rollers for $20?

@slydon do you like dr. who?

@jaybird I'M THE ONE ASKING THE QUESTIONS HERE

@slydon Have you ever seen a grown man naked?

@slydon Only the ones I make at home.

@JasonToon Only the ones you make out with at home....what?

@BillLehecka Totally. The funny thing is, with Matt and Dave, about half the time it's because I went too far, and half the time because I didn't go far enough.

@JasonToon Can you give us an example of going too far?

@chellemonkey Meh decided they'd rather not run my reference to a certain product as a "botched gadget abortion". I can't really blame them.

@JasonToon I appreciate the example. I can see why they may have wanted you to tone it down. Also if you put a dash between those words it looks like my recent order numbers

@JasonToon I would love to read the "too far files"

@Thumperchick @jasontoon it would awesome to get a day of the "too far files"

@JasonToon Fascists. ;-) "Botched gadget abortion" is brilliant. And "edgy." Sigh, but I can appreciate their hesitation. Put me on that daily "too far files" email list with @Thumperchick and @aaronhurt (this must happen). Hell, I'd probably read those before I read the daily deal.

@joelmw ditto

@narfcake Someday I hope to top World's Crappiest Projector. We've been close lately, but not yet... http://www.woot.com/blog/post/worlds-crappiest-projector

@JasonToon That one's classic! Sold 839 of those, IIRC. As for topping it ... well, they do sell speaker docks here ...

@BillLehecka Breakfast is one situation where I really don't feel any drive to be adventurous.

@JasonToon ????? http://www.woot.com/blog/post/ces-2010-no-way-to-start-the-day

@carl669 I don't know what attntion is, but why does it make you so upset? Plus, this is more copy-wrong than copy-right...

@Moose If i'm writing, that becomes intrinsic to the story. Probably good that I'm not writing. Mostly because I'm a bad.

@Moose That doesn't really happen. What's nice is, the companies that make the truly shitty stuff are also the ones we care least about offending.

@JasonToon And thank you, btw, for using words like "shitty." For formerly repressed types like me, seeing something like that at a commerce site is, well, fucking awesome.

@BillLehecka 1) It looks pretty bad to me, but you should really ask a doctor.

@BillLehecka 2) Salmon P. Chase

@BillLehecka 3) I stopped beating my wife three mont- hey, wait a minute

@BillLehecka No, but for real, I wouldn't hire Jeff Bezos, what with everything else he's got going on. Sorry, Jeff.

@JasonToon Funny story on Salmon P. Chase...we named our son after him (Chase)

@PoopFeast420 <---- Seriously.... This is your handle?

@BillLehecka Well, I just laughed at that, anyway.

@jimmyd103 Their first reaction: "What? What is it called? Was that a word you just said?"

@jimmyd103 And yes, I bought the Xmini Kai speakers. I like 'em.

@JasonToon So, did the product description help you make your decision?

@jimmyd103 Actually, yes! When we were working on it, Dave told me everybody in Dallas was surprised by how non-crappy they were, so I took a chance.

@darksaber99999 The Cadillac. It's got it all: the cable guy, Marisa Tomei, Jack Klompus, the callback to "The Rye" (another favorite).

@JasonToon Marisa Tomei will never not be attractive and awesome.

@jaybird Livestreaming would be fun when and if we could do it even half-assedly. Right now we'd be zero-assing it.

@jaybird As for ideas, the actual titles and content we created for Woot belong to Woot. Nobody owns the concept of live video (or funny product descriptions, or goofy daily videos), fortunately.

@JasonToon who needs a studio? just use your smartphone and pay the kids a couple of bucks to operate it.

@JasonToon as for the ideas ? I realized it was pretty dumb and i knew the answer as i read your response. thanks for taking it easy on me...

@narfcake I always eat 40 hot dogs in a sitting, so it works out for me.

@JasonToon And chase it all down with a little cake?

@narfcake ball park franks come in packs of 8.

@qwertyuiop000 So do the Oscar Meyer hot dogs I buy.

@tightwad I thought that acronym might take the discussion in an unwholesome direction.

@JasonToon What's wrong with donkeys?

@BillLehecka They aren't goats, for one.

@editorkid

@editorkid "if your site ever runs a photoshop contest, don't make any pics of yourself available on the internet"

@editorkid First of all, consider what other kinds of writing you might want to do. There aren't many jobs like this!

@editorkid Beyond that, write anything and everything you can, especially when you can find someone to give you money for it. When good luck finally comes your way, you'll be ready to make the most of it.

@qwertyuiop000 Ha! I was going to ask if he had any recent pictures up anywhere for that very purpose.

@JasonToon Actually, writing is way harder than editing, and I recently turned down a promotion that would have had me writing more and editing less. So I respect what you ink-stained wretches do. Although I guess you're more pixel-stained these days.

@katylava I agree. I enjoyed @carl669's version of it over here: https://meh.com/forum/topics/smartass-answers-to-standard-interview-questions

@katylava I also agree. Although, mine just might end up being, "why do you break all our shit?"

@hart, I had a brilliant* idea today while unpacking a box of shattered dreams. If you pack everything in crushed glass the shippers will think the item is already broken and, having been deprived of their sole source of joy in life, will be extra careful with it to avoid being blamed. What could possibly go wrong! (*not a guarantee)

@ghis_CRAb Whoa, necro thread! Just in time for Halloween.

@JonT

@SSteve The answer to both questions is "almost never".

@SSteve A friend in Nebraska used to write bull semen management databases. I've heard that makes a lot of SQL statements funny. All I know for sure is that Android autocorrect really doesn't like the phrase "bull semen management."

@Bingo They were all mashed up into a super write up: https://meh.com/deals/solo-backpack

@JonT Somehow I missed that. That turned out...interesting.

@joelmw You can click any of the Meh faces on the calendar (or blank circles if you didn't click that day) to be taken to the page for that day.

@JonT Holy crap, I never knew that

@joelmw The gooey stuff and the little egg that got together when your Mom and Dad hugged under the blanket didn't give you the capacity to understand such things. It's ok. Hopefully you're pretty.

@marklog Damn. I'm screwed.

@JonT That actually makes sense. Thanks. And, yes, I do feel a little stupid. Sigh.

@joelmw

@JonT Awww, I made your "weird shit" list. :-)

@caffeine_dude the correct way.

@caffeine_dude mxyzptlk

@no1

@bluejester you should ask irk this one too!

@bluejester oooh, pick me! pick me!

@qwertyuiop000 Bet this isn't answered yes or no.

@pooflady you win.

@no1 Old Wooters do have long memories.

@pooflady I think the mistake here is clear. OP neglected to tag @jasontoon

@qwertyuiop000 Yes, we do need to know that. I would also like to know why qwertyuiop is back to 000.

@marklog Who is OP?

@pooflady

@pooflady OP is Original Poster, or the person who started the thread. In this case, it would be jasontoon

@qwertyuiop000 You did finally get your monkey, right?

@qwertyuiop000 Wow... so, I definitely remember the sad situation with ARGH. And I dimly recall passing this request on to someone who could maybe do something about it... wish I had a better answer. If anyone knows anything else about whether ARGH's family ever got the monkeys, please let me know.

@JasonToon Oh well, it was worth a shot. Thanks for answering.

@jqubed http://www.woot.com/forums/viewpost.aspx?postid=5846627

@pooflady It's like the OG. Only different. know what I'm sayin'?

@donnameh I've mellowed in my dotage (and because I realized I was probably insufferable to live with), but I can still summon the sarcastic demons when they're required.

@vetherton the good that does is now you can complaint although irk still won't care that something went terribly wrong

@vetherton If you're still having trouble buying them go to meh.com/support or send an email to halp@meh.com.

I mean, on the rare days when it isn't a TV, speaker dock, or buttload of off-brand batteries.

@caffeine_dude Of course, I like to imagine myself as Don, but in reality I'm probably more of a Harry Crane.

@JasonToon Harry is the best. You go on.

@JerseyFrank So, there have been some of these, but they all get plowed back into a future piece. I can't afford to let a single half-decent line or idea go to waste. Believe me, I leave it all on the page eventually.

@phatmass
"You had me at no payment"
-JasonToon

@phatmass I'm glad someone has finally noticed the strong streak of phat spirituality in my work. Go ham, my brother.

@phatmass Umm... you do remember what happened the last time we started selling indulgences, right? ;)

@Kleineleh Yeah, we got rid of all the Protestants. hahaha

@TheCraiggers Sometimes a week. Sometimes a day. Ten minutes would occasion an immediate renegotiation of terms.

I love purple.

@JasonToon Ten minutes notice likely would exponentially increase the f bombs in the piece.

@Headly You can thank @dave and @snapster for that. They said if I didn't say bad words I couldn't be in their gang. Don't tell my mom, OK?

@JasonToon I fucking won't

@JasonToon

@HELLOALICE Not, like, specifically YOUR job, writing for Meh. Though that'd be great. I mean, how do I get into the copywriting industry? Does it require writing dull horrid product copy for dull horrid websites for several years?