Bathroom Monologue: Excerpt from Imaginary Submissions Guidelines

Expect responses within 4-16 weeks. We regret that most of our rejection letters are pre-typed "form" letters. Please do not be discouraged by them as they do not reflect on the quality of your writing.

Alright, they reflect a little bit. One out of every ten thousand stories we get is so hilarious and creative that we five out of six house editors will quote it for in jokes, spontaneously pull out the MS to hug it, and pool together on a brief personal rejection letter explaining why it doesn't fit our magazine's theme. So if you get a form rejection, it reflects that you didn't write that 1/10,000 story.

On the flip side, one out of every five hundred stories winds up on Ted's desk and is so rife with typos, grammatical errors and cliches that he writes a personal rejection that reads more like a political attack ad. You can tell it’s Ted and he’s angry because your envelope will have been stapled shut. If the offending story is about zombies or Tolkienian elves, he may even blow his nose on your MS before mailing it back. So if you don't get a snot-strained personal rejection letters, it reflects that you aren't that bad or Ted didn’t read it.

If you do not hear from us in 16 weeks, feel free to query.