Dear CRC Press,

I am writing to say that I am forced interpret your recent postal offer of “deep discounts” on several dozen poorly-written, shoddily-manufactured, untimely and obsolete vanity press offerings in fields for the most part unrelated to my work or interests, said “deep discounts” reducing the price to a mere $99 per useless volume, as a telling symptom of some sort of neurodegenerative or psychopathological disorder.

In you, I mean.

I hope you take the time to see a doctor, and you may want to set your affairs in order.

My deepest condolences, in any event, to the authors of the poorly-written, shoddily-manufactured, untimely vanity press offerings you have been foisting for decades. They will inevitably be forced to seek actual editors among their peers and readers, and rework their peculiarly isolated notions in order to appeal to an actual audience, and I am saddened to observe that you have given them little or no cultural support in those skills through the years.

That said, if you have any more 1980s-vintage Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, I am interested in taking them off your hands. Ever since I graduated (with my first degree in the sciences), I have found they are excellent for pressing flowers and leaves for art & craft projects.

The latter offered by way of solace, if you were feeling completely useless. Buck up!