Editor B's photostream  

This is the envelope for a mailer sent out by the Democratic National Committee in 1995. I got one and was intrigued to note an apparent mistake in the address line. An incorrect house number had been written and then crossed out. This seemed strange because the address was surely not written by hand. Surely it was a font designed to look like handwriting. Surely the whole thing was automated. But that would mean the mistake was intentional. I asked around and found a friend who had also gotten the mailer. Sure enough, we found the exact same mistake. I'd just read an article on "creeping surrealism," the idea that our world is getting steadily less real, and this seemed like a perfect example. I thought this would make a good essay for publication somewhere, so I combined forces with another friend to try to secure an interview with whatever marketing wizard came up with this idea, but nothing ever came of it.

Self-portrait circa 1996.