Dear SWWYPOKE, landpoke, bullpoke, etc.,

Most of the board knows me as the egomaniacal NYC big-shot corporate lawyer nikuman, but there is another side to me that I think you may find educational. You see, behind the business casual, the Ivy-league law degree and the Wall Street office lies another nikuman, a different nikuman, a nikuman of 20 years ago. A nikuman just like you.

You see, I didn't always live in the big city or even have big time aspirations. I grew up in a small rural hick-town not unlike the place you probably live now. In fact, I would say that it is just like Rawlins, except it was somewhat smaller, we didn't have any sheep, and the topography didn't look like the shaved backside of a spider monkey. And we had fewer double-wides per capita, but I digress.

Now, my parents hadn't always lived in this town, and were in fact considered "outcasts" because they exhibited locally curious traits, such as "education" and "the ability to open their mouths without sounding like a complete yewt". For a time, their influence swayed me and I was much the same. I even inherited their obsession with BYU football. However, as I reached the pre-teen years, I noticed that words and phrases such as "pig castration", "four-diggin'", "draggin' main", "wrasslin'", "duallie" and, most incriminating of all, grammar patterns such as "we was" were starting to creep into my daily speech with alarming regularity. And it was all downhill from there. I gave in to the temptation of the surrounding culture. I started rebelling against the normalcy of my parents. I grew a mullet. I tried to castrate myself by wearing wrangler jeans. I wore cowboy boots and rode horses. I started participating in rodeo. I became, in short, a white trash hick.

I am not proud of this time in my life. As anyone who has been in such circumstances can empathize (as I imagine you can), my life was a self depricating spiral of depression. I hated my life. I fought with my parents non-stop. I was a passive participant at best in school. I contemplated suicide. In my darkest moments, I even thought about doing the unthinkable and (gasp!) becoming a 'Poke fan as an outward expression of my inward hopelessness.

Thankfully, several of my teachers performed an intervention and brought me out of my seemingly endless doom. I cut my mullet. I started speaking normally again. I started reading books again. I paid attention in school and got into a good university - and went (oh, the horror!) AWAY for college. Then I left the country entirely. Then I came back, went FAR AWAY for law school and got married. To a girl, no less. I got a good job. I'm happy. And I shudder to think at what might have been.

'Poke fans, I tell you this because, deep in my heart of hearts, I think there is still hope for you. I too know what it's like to be so utterly miserable that there seems to be no end in sight. And it's particularly bad for you. Your state (save a few spots) looks like it was created when the gods vomited after a night of too much drinking. You've just had a documentary starring Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhall expose your alternative lifestyle once and for all. Increases in the demand for mutton are hampering your love life. You've had somebody say that it's better to lose and live in Provo than win and live in Laramie, for crying out loud - if you'd get out of your state and actually go to Provo, you'd understand what kind of a horrible insult that actually is.

So I say to you, cast off your Wyoming chains. Cut your hair. Wear a pair of jeans that give your boys some room to breath once in a while. Get that whole reading thing figured out. Start dating. Girls, I mean. In short, I invite you to rejoin the human race and take your proper place (it's just above ambulance chasers and just below people who sell crack to schoolkids).

Once you've done this, you'll find that you no longer need to attach your fandom to a team that embodies lonely hopelessness. You'll find yourself cheering for other teams. It may not be BYU - which is okay. Almost any other team (save the yewts) will give you the sport that you crave without subjecting you to a black hole of humanity every year.

But please, do it soon. We care about you.

Your Friend,

nikuman