The bed linens with a money-back guarntee.

Before I tell this bed-linen story, I must tell another story.

During the years when I blogged for the Albany Times Union, I had many extensive personality conflicts with the TU’s social media strategist and self-appointed blog snitch, Kristi Gustafson Barlette. She always sent me unwanted notes about how I could improve my blog to help generate click-throughs so the TU would make more money off of it (while I still received valuable “exposure”). “Chuck, your blog posts are too long, state workers don’t have time to read those posts of yours.” “Chuck, blogs are not for serialized fiction, nobody really cares about your Collarworld and Iverhill fiction.” “Chuck, you really stop using two spaces after a period, it makes you sound ancient and not worth reading.”

Then again, one time she blogged about the “juntaposition” of two different ideas, and I wasn’t sure if she meant “juxtaposition” or “the junta’s position,” as if some paramilitary group had invaded the kingdom and demanded regicide. But hey, that was Kristi – mistakes for thee, not for me.

And I tell that story because of something I noticed yesterday.

It involved new bedsheets.

I needed new bedsheets, so I ordered a set from Amazon. My mattress is what they call a “twin deep pocket,” so it’s not exactly a sheet set I can pick up at the local Walmart. The sheet set arrived within a day of purchase, so that’s a plus. And it arrived in eco-friendly packaging, so we’re two for two here. Nice threadcount, too. I’ll hit Slumberland at 100 miles an hour on these linens.

Then I opened the package up. Okay, nice little advertising card that shows a stock picture of a smiling family, along with a statement that if I’m not satisfied with the purchase, I can contact the company for a money-back guarntee.

Nice. I like companies that offer money-back guarntees. It’s a good thing when a company stands by its product and offers a guarntee against defects or damage.

And at this point, somebody’s running to the Times Union and crying, “Kristi, Kristi, Kristi, that mean old blogger who didn’t follow YOUR rules just misspelled a word in his blog, you should do something about it.”

Hey, listen. It ain’t ME with the spelling issues.

As the old saying goes … pics or it didn’t happen.

There it is. Right there in a fancy font. Guarntee.

Wow. Just unbelievably wow.

Okay. Someone at the print shop missed that one by a country mile. I mean, it’s not worth blogging about, it’s just a silly typo –

Until I opened the sheet set up and another advertising card fell out. And this one … offered $5 for positive reviews of their product on Amazon. Including step-by-step instructions on writing that glowing product review.

Seriously.

There you go. Write a positive review in 7-10 days and this company will pay you $5 for the effort.

Five whole dollars. Oh man, let me log into my Amazon account and …

I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. This is just too freakin’ easy.

I get it. Sometimes people misspell words. I misspell words all the time. But it’s not like you’re selling a product and your proofreading department messed up on the first thing someone sees.

It’s like the people who kvetch about “I don’t have to tell you my medical history, it’s violating my HIPPA rights.” Um, no. It’s HIPAA rights, and it only applies to entities like insurance companies who are legally barred from accessing your medical history without permission (i.e., Allstate can’t just call a hospital and glance at your medical records and then jack up your rates because they saw something that might actually cause them to pay out a claim for you some day). It’s also not your HIPPO rights or your HIPPIE rights, man. And for goodness sake, it’s not your hippy hippy shake rights, man.

But it shows that you didn’t pay enough attention to something that would entice a customer to purchase your product, or to recommend that others purchase that product as well.

So yeah, I’ll give this sheet company a “review” on Amazon.

I’ll talk about their wonderful money-back guarntee. And how by writing this glowing, flowery pile of hagiography, they’ll send me reimbursement that would give me just enough for a Sugar Free Red Bull tall boy.

That’s my juntaposition, and I’m sticking with it.

Every single word of it, and every single double space after every single period.

Pfft.