Hunk o' Mania: A Tale of Romance, Fortitude, and Gangstalking
There comes a time in every young person’s life when they ask, “What if I took a growth marketing approach to dating?” Or, if you’re an empath like me, “What if I took a growth marketing approach to fixing my friends’ love lives?”
I broached this topic with my usual muse, and he agreed, “sure, whatever.” And so with this enthusiastic stamp of approval, dear reader, our journey began.
Friend #1 - aka Mr. Lost Romantically
I really put myself in the mind of my friend, using my powerful empathy skills, to craft a series of posters. Since he had recently shown up outside my parents’ house (uninvited) (explicitly told not to come) and pouted in the rain when I didn’t let him in, this made me think of sad, wet, lost dogs. (I say this with immeasurable affection.)
Also, to protect Friend #1’s anonymity, I will henceforth refer to him under the moniker “John.”
I also created a Date John application (see exhibit 2 in the appendix) and a Date John hotline for admirers to call in.
Life’s more fun when you rope your friends into your stupid bits. What is a jester without a court to entertain? NOTHING. And so I put a bunch of my and John’s friends into a groupchat called “The John Girlfriend Taskforce.” This committee was crucial for assessing the romantic inquires for John and deeming if they were worthy of a chance.
After adorning the city with flyers, strangers started sharing pictures of the posters on reddit/twitter, and that solicited even more interest for my dear friend John. A dozen suitors filled out the Date John application, and even more left voicemails. A reporter from SF Gate inquired about writing a story on John’s quest for love. For only ~20 posters on the street, most of which got torn down in less than 24 hours, not bad. From wanted by no one to desired by all - oh how lady fate is capricious.
Enter stage - The Reporter. At first, I dismissed her as merely the second reporter that had contacted us. So how did she earn the proper noun title of The Reporter? This is best explained via the following exhibit.
Exhibit 1: Ways The Reporter has attempted to contact John
Calling and leaving a voicemail on John’s dating hotline
Filing out the Date John application
Posting about him on Twitter (which she then pinned)
Finding & DMing John on Twitter
Sending a connection request on LinkedIn
Emailing the support email of his startup
@ing him on Twitter
What will she do next?
I respect and fear how she refuses to let a man (and his dating committee) ghost her. Is this a millennial thing? Gen-Z is fine with ghosting, celebrates it, even.
To parry, I wanted to send these nice wedding invitations to all of The Reporter’s coworkers (there’s only like 30 of them) but John said no :(
Instead, I mailed John a letter as The Reporter (it’s what she would’ve wanted). I expertly crafted it to be somewhat plausible in the introduction, to elicit suspicion midway through, and to artfully reveal itself as my handiwork by the ending.
