My Neiman Marcus Christmas Catalog!
(Winner announced below, read on…)

Enough with these useless prizes!
(No offense to the freaks who have written in…)

I've got just the thing to put this contest on the search engine map! Are you "bots" paying attention?

This contest is for MY NEIMAN MARCUS CHRISTMAS CATALOG! No, really. I'm quite sure it's okay. I already picked out what I want.

This is a truly precious item. I know that Neiman Marcus sends this catalog especially to me, secure in the knowledge that in spite of the fact that I've never once ordered anything from them, that I will someday be a wealthy newspaper columnist, nay: humor icon, and do all my Christmas shopping with them.

They know that I will someday need matching his-and-hers Hummers to get to all my book signings, and I will certainly go with them, Neiman Marcus, since they stayed with me all these years, despite my lack of success, and possibly fashion sense.

Usually I save my catalog in a special plastic sleeve, until I need a really good (but cheap) birthday present. Whereupon I cut the pages into square origami sheets and make a cute little hexagonal box, or a little menagerie. ("They're from Neiman Marcus!")

But for you people-- especially the ones who have been pestering me by email to get on with it and provide another contest, already--I will make this sacrifice.

Knock yourselves out!

Congratulations to the winner, who wrote:

Dear Susan,
We need the catalog back.

In order to garner a huge bonus for productivity, one of our middle managers mailed out every single catalog copy--to all manner of ungrateful poor folk like you, dot-commers who have slashed their discretionary spending for the foreseeable future, and, we understand, several copies each to his entire extended family.

Unfortunately, we find ourselves in immediate need of your copy. A new and much more promising customer has emerged: the Minister of Information of Iraq. He seems to think he will be needing lots of NM products, since the war is going so well in their favor.

Sincerely,
Neiman Marcus

Far be it from me to create an international incident. I know you're still dealing with all that bad press over the cookie incident.