Angela W. asks: “Why do people send those annoying family newsletters with their Christmas cards?”

Ask Red says: The motivations vary depending on the sender. There is the “In your face” people who seek to demoralize you with descriptions of their family’s mega-achievements when the biggest feat of your year was breaking a personal record for skipping a stone across a pond. There is the “My life is no more exciting than yours, but I’m embellishing nonetheless” people. Finally, there is the “We are such losers that it takes us two pages of single-space, one paragraph copy to describe our miserable lives” people.

One way to be removed from a newsletter list is to fight back. Send out your own missive that reads like this: “It’s been another typical year. Little Johnny was denied parole again for that Girl Scout incident. Sally came home with her tongue pierced claiming it will make her more popular with the boys. Marge continues to skip her methadone treatments but gives plasma three times a week.”

If they don’t get the sarcasm they’ll never want associate with you anyway and you’ll be crossed off their card list.