With all these debt collectors always hounding me, I’ve decided to start screening my phone calls.

That’s right: I’ve cleaned out the garage, set up chairs like a theater, and starting Tuesday, I’ll be using my Optoma Neo-i Video Projector & Speaker System for iPhone & iPod to literally screen my phone calls for anyone willing to pay the nominal $5 admission fee. After about two or three weeks, I’ll see how much money I’ve made and use it to pay off my debt.

So how do you, my friends and family members, play into all this? It’s simple: I’m going to need you guys to call me. A lot. Otherwise, the Optoma’s 120” widescreen projection will be filled with nothing but my iPhone’s wallpaper, the 16W stereo audio with DSP and Bass Reflex technologies will remain silent, I’ll get bad reviews from the press, and then I won’t be able to draw a big enough audience to raise the funds I need.

But I don’t just mean, you guys should call me to talk about anything. These need to be interesting phone calls if I’m going to really pull people in and leave them wanting more. That’s why I’ve put together a little bit of a “style guide” to help liven things up:

1. Confessing that you’ve secretly been in love with me is great, but it’s even better if you’re married, because it can lead to a great confrontational phone call with your spouse later.

2. If you don’t enunciate, people, including myself, might get a bit lost. If you enunciate too much, that leaves no room for comic misunderstandings. Let’s try to find that balance together, okay?

3. We may Facetime so personal appearance is important. Consider wearing an eye patch to build intrigue. (Note: I’m going to need you guys to get together and decide which one of you will wear the eye patch, because too many people with eye patches builds the wrong kind of intrigue, i.e. “Does this guy have a weird thing for people with eye patches?”)

4. Paul Flemming: you and Paul Johnston are both named Paul, so, to avoid confusion, I’m going to need you to go by your last name or come up with a new one (I’m thinking, Don Houston, but don’t feel married to that). Also you guys have a similar-sounding voices, so (again, to avoid confusion) I’m going to need you to speak in a thick Cockney British accent. (This doesn’t buy you the right not to under- or over-enunciate, as specified in item 2 above.)

5. Nothing’s quite as dramatic as dying mid conversation. But remember, if you die, you won’t be able to call me again, and that’s one character out of the rotation. Maybe save the deaths for late in the run, or else almost die but then survive.

6. If you choose to die and not survive, why not confess your love to me? Can’t hurt, right?

That’s the basic stuff. Feel free to email me with questions about your character specifically. And thank you! With your help, I should be financially stable again in no time.

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