Another random picture-message appeared on my phone from Q:
Right off the top, I’d like to offer this sign-maker a cookie for going with over-enthusiastic DOUBLE UNDERLINING instead of quotation marks. You know some people would have gone with quotation marks, because — as Q’s venerable father said to me a few years ago — it’s what the discerning writer uses to express enthusiasm. So, have a cookie.
Also, I can’t really explain why, but for some reason I feel like the question mark belongs here. Read it like this: “Girlfriend, PLEASE? This is a hairnet area.” See?
What really confounds me is the ‘_A_’. Why are there apostrophes around it? And why is it underlined. Is it _a_ hairnet area as opposed to _the_ official hairnet area? Ack!
For me that first question mark speaks of poignant, exhausted desperation. Trying to be reasonable has failed, trying to be friendly has failed, even a brief stab at authoritarianism has yielded nothing. All that remains is to ask you to please, PLEASE, respect the hairnet area. Please?
Perhaps it should be posted to the Passive-aggressive notes site.