After a Fashion

Weird Zone Royalty at Youth Interactive's Weird Zone section of the Keep Austin Weird 5K run (Photo By William Geisler)

CIRCULAR LOGIC I hate all those junky ad circulars that jam up my mailbox at home. I'm simply not interested in buying a set of oak bunk beds or getting a coupon for $1 off on baby wipes at HEB. Where I live, there is a trash can discreetly installed underneath our mailboxes with a slot and a tasteful little sign that says "Junk Mail." And every week, that trash can is emptied several times, usually overflowing with ad circulars courtesy of a company called Advo, as well as the Austin American-Statesman. It's trash to most of us: the print version of spam. After finding my own personal mail crushed and wrinkled because someone decided I needed all this valuable information, I decided to take action. So I asked my postman. He said, "Sorry, there's no way to stop it." Excuse me? No way to stop it? Hmmm. So I took all the junk mail up to my place to examine it. Turns out that Advo is responsible for the slick-paper circulars with all the pizza coupons in them. So I went to their Web site (www.advo.com/consumersupport.html) and found that they provide several options for unsubscribing to their service. The site said it would take six to eight weeks for my request to become fully effective. It seemed to take a little longer than that, but they did eventually stop. After dealing with Advo about the circulars, I examined the next piece of junk and decided to take action against those infernal "Have You Seen Me?" cards with the missing children – and who's responsible for inundating us with those? Yes, our good friends Advo! Missing children are all very sad, of course, but now that Advo has stopped wasting all that paper and printing on me, they can probably add a new wing onto their headquarters. (Honestly, I'd never recognize any children on those cards anyway, because when I see children, I either head in the opposite direction or avert my eyes. There are plenty enough occasions in life when I'm forced to deal with someone's ill-behaved children, so whenever I have the option, I choose to keep my environment child-free.) Then there's the mother of all junk mail: the circulars from the Statesman. Feeling empowered after my experience with Advo, I now wanted this trash, I mean valuable information, out of my mailbox, too. But the Statesman doesn't make that an easy process. I spent most of a day trying to call various departments at the Statesman to find someone who could help me achieve my goal of unsubscribing. No one at the Statesman seems to be aware that their company sends out these circulars. I know I'm not the only one who receives them; I see the trash can by my mailbox full of them! But apparently none of the Statesman employees has even seen or heard of them. Going through the company's Web site (www.statesman.com) offers no answers. For all the links about advertising, not a one of them is marked "Unsubscribe from our annoying circulars." I called some of the phone numbers listed and left messages. No one returned my calls. I even wrote to the fabulously resourceful Jane Greig. She did not respond. So I went back to the Statesman's Web site and did a little spamming of my own, sending out several e-mails outlining my frustration. Within a very short time, I received a really pleasant and courteous response from someone at the Statesman saying my name had been removed from their list. I wrote back asking how a person can go about doing that, and she replied that by going to the Web site and sending an e-mail to the circulation department with your address and request (https://chatterbox-isd.ca/austin/SpeakToAgent.asp?c=1). And, voilà! By the next week, there were no more circulars with my address on them! Now, if I could just get the postman to stop putting my neighbor's circulars into my mailbox …

THE DATE BOOK Happy Birthday to the Top Drawer Thrift Store (4902 Burnet) as they turn 12! Top Drawer is a program of Project Transitions and provides 20% of the annual funding for the agency that operates a five-bedroom residential hospice, Doug's House, and three transitional housing programs for people living with HIV/AIDS. Celebrate on Saturday, Aug. 27, 10am-7pm, with live music, refreshments, and 50% off all clothing… For other merchandise on sale, don't miss the annual Le Garage Sale (www.legaragesale.net) at the Austin Music Hall, Aug. 27-28. Featuring goods from By George, Fetish, Shiki, Crofts Originals, Adelante, Garden Room, and more. Saturday, Aug. 27, also brings the Youth InterACTIVE Weird Zone, part of the Keep Austin Weird 5K weekend, noon-7pm at Auditorium Shores. The Weird Zone is a free, interactive village consisting of tons of fun for the whole family. I, along with a panel of celebrities, will be judging the costume, dancing, and karaoke competitions. See www.keepaustinweird5k.com for more info. The next day, Sunday, Aug. 28, 12-5pm, at Festival Beach/Fiesta Gardens, is Youth InterACTIVE's huge, free day of fun, in association with Humana's Companies4Kids. It is a fundraiser for YI's afterschool programs. Learn more by visiting www.companies4kids.com.

VANISHING ACT Don't you just love that Karl Rove has vanished from the headlines? Red Rover, Red Rover, let Karl come over!