Dear person who happens to be just ahead of me in the queue for the “True Blood: season 1” Blu-Ray discs from the Richmond area Netflix distribution center,

You know, you really ought to treat the discs the nice people at Netflix send you with a little more care and respect. Someone (read: me) has to use them after you, and some of us don’t appreciate the fingerprints, scratches, and cracked hubs you leave in your wake.

High-definition, high-capacity optical media are fragile, and require some modicum of careful handling. If my hyperactive children can manage this most of the time, so can you, a person I assume has reached the age of majority, given that you are watching this “not suitable for children” program. If you need assistance in that area, please see these instructions, direct from the Library of Congress, an entity that ought to know a little bit about the care and feeding of information storage media.

If you’re acting deliberatly out of frustration, I suppose I can understand to some extent. I fully recognize that the otherwise nice folks at Netflix sometimes put those little identification stickers off-center on the disc, which tends to throw them off-balance and interfere with playback. There have also been some isolated incidents of incompatibility with certain hardware reported. And of course, the program, while engaging, isn’t anywhere as good as it might have been (though I’m sure you’ll agree with me, the show’s a little better than the books upon which it’s based, if only for the way the character of Tara is presented).

But, none of those things are a valid reason to abuse these poor slabs of polycarbonate and aluminum and ruin the next viewer’s enjoyment. Seriously, no reason at all. Please, try to be more careful in the future.

Sincerely
-me

P.S.: By the way, if you’re one of those guys watching just to see Rogue from X-Men naked, just skip to the end; she doesn’t get her kit off until the last episode. Do the rest of us who want to enjoy the entire plot arc a favor, mmmkay?