I didn’t trust the Publisher’s Clearing House. I never have.

I told Martha this on a daily basis, but she always said that it was just my ‘paranoias’ flaring up again, and if we don’t submit our personal information then how will they know where to mail the oversized check, and then she’d say something about the azaleas that I forgot to water when we first moved into this ‘god damned bungalow’ and by that time I was usually giving Publisher’s Clearing House our personal information just to shut her up.

They store that personal information in a cavernous file, deep in the bowels of their godless Publisher’s Clearing Cubicles. They store it so that one day, when they’ve written the last oversized prize-check and surprised the last half-naked fuddy-duddy on live television, they can go to those houses and get the money back.

It’s not like they just take the prize money, though. Publishing and Clearing are expensive activities and they have to cover their costs. They cover their costs with your heirlooms.