Letter writing

Last month, Teeni and I set each other another writing assignment. The deadline was originally February 14, but we decided to extend it. Life was getting in the way of my writing time! How rude!

Anyway, Teeni set me this assignment:

Please write a complaint letter addressed to the North Pole. This could be to Santa for forgetting an item on your list, or to Mrs. Claus regarding Santa’s disrespect of your home during his last visit, or to an elf, etc. Please be sure to address what exactly you are unhappy with, suggest possible remedies or improvements and keep a professional tone (you don’t want to risk losing out on any loot next year).

Here’s my letter:

Customer Services Manager
North Pole

Dear Sir/Madam,

Having been displeased with the behaviour of one of your employees, a Mr S. Claus, I have formed a list of complaints. If these issues are not addressed, I will not hesitate to take the matter further.

Firstly, I will begin by outlining my displeasure at your employee’s recent treatment of my household. This unacceptable conduct occurred while he was delivering several items on 24 December 2007. When I awoke on the morning of 25 December 2007, I was appalled to find a significant amount of what can only be described as “reindeer excrement” on my polished wooden floors and on my tiled fireplace hearth. I understand that your employee’s primary mode of transportation is the reindeer. However, I am uncomfortable with the fact that these beasts were permitted to enter my home. The carrot left dangling from the doorknob was intended to be consumed OUTSIDE. It was not an invitation to open the door and grant several four-legged mammals access to my living room!

Secondly, I appreciate that your employee has a healthy appetite. For this particular reason, a cold beverage and a small portion of freshly baked goods were provided for his personal consumption. As the mother of two small children who are both able to eat a cookie without dropping three hundred and seventy five individual crumbs, I would expect your middle-aged and presumably house-trained employee to possess the same ability. At the very least, I would expect him to keep MOST of the crumbs on his plate, as opposed to all over the surface of my antique coffee table.

Finally, it would appear that your employee has a very unsanitary habit of not showering before embarking on a long and physically demanding shift with significant travel requirements. His work hours on 24 December 2007 were particularly long, without any provision for a shower break. As a result, an extremely unpleasant odour persisted in the fixtures and furnishings of my home for several days following his departure. This required the employment of several representatives from an expensive cleaning agency. The resulting bill for these services is attached to this letter, and I have notified the agency that you will be providing remuneration.

Please notify your employee of these indiscretions, and kindly offer him a refresher course in the area of cleanliness and personal hygiene.

Thank you for your time. I am positive that future correspondence between us will be more positive once these issues have been addressed.

Sincerely,
Hannah Blair

——————————-

And now … it is time to announce the next assignment! Remember, you are all welcome to join in by doing my assignment, or Teeni’s (or both!) and then linking back to our post(s) so we can read what you’ve written. The “flexible” deadline for this assignment is March 20th.

Okay, here’s the assignment:

Open your dictionary at random, close your eyes, and put your finger on the page. Write down the word closest to your finger. Repeat this step 5 times, until you have a list of 6 words. Now shape your list of words into a poem. Obviously you will need to add other words as well, but you must use all 6 on your list. No cheating or “exchanging” words! ;-)
*If you are up for an extra challenge, make the poem a sestina.

Happy writing!