Well, it seems that Laura has received her first request for brantextualization (contextualization + brant) from Wendy H. a reader who is particularly literal. The reader asked this question regarding the “Voldechords” posting.
“Were you guys just sitting around talking and vocal chords happened to come up?”
Laura’s answer is:
“When Laura burned her vocal chords swallowing that stupid pill they did.”
Hope this helps clarify.
The first bit of news is that at Wendy’s a friend’s suggestion, Laura wrote to Brigham’s to tell them about her brant last week. Specifically, she emailed Darryln Leikauskas, V.P. of Marketing for Brigham’s (there was a partial corporate listing on the Brigham’s website) that she’d branted about Just Jimmies and how many people sent back comments either about the flavor in particular or Brigham’s in general. Laura mentioned this amazing “brand loyalty” (she just learned this phrase in Branding for Dummies — not to be confused with Branting for Dummies which she plans on writing but which of course she hasn’t even started isn’t finished yet) and she also mentioned the collective state of panic that many Massachusetts-ites seemed to be in given the uncertain future of Just Jimmies. Laura begged suggested that they make it a permanent flavor and also suggested they check out her brant to see all the pro-Brigham’s comments.
Unbelievably, later that night (this was Sunday) the Brigham’s executive emailed Laura back, which, for one thing, was an incredible example of excellent Public Relations and for another thing was great news since this is what the email said:
Dear Laura,
Just Jimmies is soon to be a regular flavor. Look for it with a bright blue lid in the coming weeks/month. I’m glad you like it and I will definitely check out the webite tomorrow.
Thank you!
Darryln
Laura wants to thank Darryln from Brigham’s for such a quick response and for the good news!
p.s. In case anyone noticed Laura’s lack of usage of personal pronouns in relation to Darryln Leikauskas’ name, it’s because Laura isn’t sure if Darryln is a man’s name or a woman’s name. Laura sort of assumes it’s a woman’s name but isn’t at all certain so if anyone knows for sure — or if anyone has any strong opinion about this question — Laura would love to hear from you.
A friend — Wendy H., the afore-lauded braint of Laura’s brant — sent this to Laura yesterday in a desperate attempt to get Laura to brant. (Please note that Wendy H. addressed her email to Laura, The Branter, as opposed to Laura, The Person. This means that Laura has succeeded in convincing her readers (both of them) of her dual personae!) And so, while Laura is usually 100% responsible for the content on her website and especially on her brant, her need for something funny to throw at her starved fans — and her agreement that this news item is really funny — this one time she is allowing herself to be “pitched” and “used” to “advance another person’s agenda” by posting something suggested to her by someone else. (Another note: this gets dangerously close to how P.R. people and journalists work which makes Laura very very nervous, but rest assured that this will never happen again.)
Scruples and brantilistic ethics aside, here’s the pre-written item, completely written by Wendy H.:
“So, perhaps Laura could brant about this, the amusing part being that they arrested a naked man ‘on suspicion of indecent exposure’… like they couldn’t tell for sure.”
“A man was arrested on suspicion of carrying a concealed weapon after police found him outdoors — naked — and he told them he had a tool in his rectum, authorities said.”
(From Boston.com: “Naked Man Arrested for Concealed Weapon”; November 4, 2006.)
(Laura wishes that Wendy H. — the managing editor, copyeditor, proofreader, and all around bradvisor — were awake now to instantaneously provide Laura with feedback about typos, content-problems, and any inadvertent and accidental references or links to swingers or swinging. But considering the fact that it’s almost 1:45 a.m. — even with the extra hour to be gained after turning the clocks back in fifteen minutes — Laura understands that Wendy H. is, like most normal non-branters, sleeping now. However, Laura would like to request that as soon as Wendy H. is awake and functioning she get her corrections and comments emailed to Laura post haste.)
Laura just came up with a word for what Wendy H. is: a braint (brant + saint = braint).
Laura wants to thank her good friend Wendy H. (another modest person, this one, who doesn’t want to call attention to herself) for
a) reading her brant religiously;
b) teaching her (or trying to teach her since Laura never actually figured out how to do it without Wendy H. standing right there next to her telling her what to do at every step) how to use the check-out scanner aparatus at the Williams School library where both of them volunteered last year during their sons’ weekly Kindergarten visitation;
c) catching a major glitch in one of her posts tonight: the link to Laura’s sister-in-law’s- radio show “The Good Stuff” which she’d just added to her blogroll.
“The Good Stuff” is on the Lifestyle Talk Radio Network, and Laura mistakenly entered the website address as “www.lifestyletalk.com” instead of “www.lifestyletalkradio.com.” Unfortunately, “www.lifestyletalk.com” is a WEBSITE FOR SWINGERS which Laura certainly wasn’t intending to link to.
(Not that there’s anything wrong with that).
(But for the record, Laura thinks swingers are kind of gross.)
(Again, not that there’s anything wrong with swinging.)
(But Laura feels a need to express her rather strong opinion and clarify her position on the matter.)
(Just in case people think her “mistake” was a cry for help — OR a sneaky way to find other swingers to swing with.)
(But all joking aside, Laura wants to make it VERY CLEAR that she and her husband DO NOT SWING, HAVE NEVER SWUNG, AND DON’T INTEND TO SWING IN THE FUTURE.)
(Again, not that there’s anything wrong with that.)
Her (negative) opinion of swinging notwithstanding, Laura is hugely grateful to Wendy H. for catching the embarrassing (but neither intentional nor sub-conscious de-lidding of her id) mistake within minutes after it was posted.
Every branter should have a Wendy H.!