Dear Penthouse...
Around ten years ago, I started freelancing. I had left a safe staff job with good benefits, a real office, and lovely coworkers to join a dubious startup that was borrowing office space from a coconut water company. We folded within a year. So, I needed to find another way to make money.
At the time, I had this amazing girlfriend who totally believed in me, and her advice was simple: write your way out of this jam.
I took her advice. I called all my old editors and told them to expect some pitches. That meant working five beats: law, advertising, tech, porn, and personal finance (there's more overlap than you might think).
It also meant pitching magazine editors cold. For those who don't remember, there were these physical products called magazines with pictures and really long stories that could pay writers as much as $2 per word.
One Sunday afternoon, my amazing girlfriend left our tiny apartment to go hang out with some friends. I told her I was going to work on some pitches. But as it so often does, work turned to procrastination. I ended up watching a cheesy docu-drama about the end of the world.
By the time my amazing girlfriend came home, I was in full panic mode.
"We're not going to make it," I said. "We're all going to die."
I explained how this show, which for some reason was on the History Channel, told the story of a couple from Los Angeles who escaped some sort of grid-down situation, almost got themselves killed on the road, then made it to a utopian-style commune with nice people, where the husband accidentally cut himself peeling an apple, and died of a fucking boo-boo because there were no antibiotics to save him at this point in the apocalyptic future.
"Honey, those people are fictional," my amazing girlfriend said. "And how is a show about a fictional future on the History Channel anyway?"
"You don't understand," I said. "This guy was a paramedic. He knew how to use a gun. He had skills, and he died of a fucking boo-boo."
Then I took off my glasses and said, "I lose these and I'm a goner. Two is one. One is none!"
My amazing girlfriend gave me a kiss, put her hands on my beard and pitched a different solution.
"Or, you grow out this epic beard, play up the blind guy thing, drop a little wisdom on people, and become a cult leader," she said. "I'll handle all the organizational details. You just focus on the messaging."
That made me laugh, but it didn't really calm me down.
I spent the next few days doing what a freelancer should never do. I stopped writing. Three days, zero pitches.
"If you're still freaked out about this, you should write about it," my amazing girlfriend said on the morning of the fourth day.
Again, I took her advice.
I wrote a pitch about how regular guys—fat dudes, who wear glasses, and are kind of klutzy—won't last long in the apocalyptic future. I polished it, proofed it, and copied the text into an email. Then, I added a subject line about how we're all going to die. I sent it off to every men's magazine editor I knew, then I went to grab a slice of pizza.
When I came back, I had some responses. Maxim told me my pitch was "clever" but not right for them. Details said it was stupid. Later, Details folded, so who's stupid now? Most of the other men's magazines never wrote back. But one said yes.
Penthouse!
Now, I know what you're thinking. And the answer is yes, people really do read the articles, or at least, that was the assumption in editorial, because they paid $2 per word.
"This will be perfect for our annual badass issue," the editor told me. "Can you get me two thousand words in two weeks?"
I said yes and got to work.
I spoke with survivalists who gave me all sorts of tips. I tracked down one "legend" in the community, but he refused to speak to me about his bestselling book because he believed the "sinners" who read Penthouse deserved to die. So, I tracked down a few more survivalist authors. They gave me lengthy interviews. Then word got back to the legend, and he decided he wanted in, because let's be honest, you don't turn down media when you're selling a book.
I also spoke with Rudy Reyes, a former Recon Marine and martial arts badass who had become a media personality after he played himself in the HBO series Generation Kill.
"You got to team up with people," Rudy told me. "This idea of one man against the world, this last man on Earth stuff, it's all crap. We're social animals, bro. In a crisis, we either pull together, or we fold."
Rudy also gave me some tips about hand-to-hand combat, hot-wiring cars, and other badass stuff. I wrote it all down for the article, but I knew I wasn't going to hot-wire a car, or beat a ninja in a fist fight.
Finally, I tracked down a doctor who drops into disaster areas. He had just gotten back from an Earthquake in Haiti. He thought it was kind of goofy that Penthouse would do this kind of article, but he played along.
"Hygiene, that's the most important thing," he said. "I normally wouldn't mention this, but I'm guessing that the readers of Penthouse have some goofy ideas from disaster movies, so let me also add that a grid-down situation is no time to try and get lucky. Seriously, no fucking. Put that in the article."
I didn't put the doctor's advice in the article. I put it in the sidebar.
I filed my story, went through edits, and collected my fee. My amazing girlfriend even convinced my wary mother to go pick up a copy of Penthouse at a magazine stand on Ventura.
"It's like a gynecology magazine," Mom said.
"Do gynecologists have magazines?" my amazing girlfriend wondered.
"I don't know, but if they do, I'll pitch them."
As it turned out, I wrote about a half-dozen more articles for Penthouse. Eventually, my editor was laid off, and in his parting email he said something about my last story—an article about space tourism—being put in the well.
"Maybe the next editor will do something with it," he wrote.
As far as I know, the space tourism story died. At least, that's what I told the woman I had interviewed about the space suit she invented for sex in zero gravity.
But by the time the Penthouse gig went bust, I was well on my way. I had a roster of regular clients. Plus, my amazing girlfriend had agreed to become my amazing wife. And I got this nifty story to share with you.
So, allow me to give you a few takeaways.
The so-called survivalist people are cynical dip-shits peddling snake oil.
Rudy was right. We need each other, especially now that we all need to keep our distance.
The doc was right. Hygiene is life, people.
Christina was right. If you dig in and get to work, you'll get through the shit storm.