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Ah, thank you for the ping. Yes, this is a topic not to be underestimated. It is, after all, the presumptive finale to one's public persona, and should be treated as the very acme of a number of emotions, some of which I shall list below. These need not all be addressed in the body of a single post - Libbylu's, for example, was a masterpiece of brevity and concision - but if your inchoate rage runs up against a case of writer's block worse than three bran muffins and a suicidal dose of Kaopectate, please feel free to employ the following list.

Item - invoke a sense of outrage. This need be no further away than the caps lock button - again, I reference Libbylu - but a sense of frenzy helps. Help the reader to visualize the spittle on your monitor and keyboard.

Item - invoke a sense of entitlement. Slightly embellished military service may help here: "I got my Medal of Honor with the oak leave cluster during my blimp service at the battle of Bok Choy, where Charlie blew off my arm, I grew it back, and then a Chechnyan sniper blew it off again, so don't you DARE criticize my opinion on the draft!" No one on FR will ever catch you, trust me, and anyway you'll be long gone by the time they do.

Item - invoke a sense of pathos. Remember, declining to post to an anonymous Internet forum is tearing your very heart from your body and leaving it bleeding on the imaginary floor, dammit! It's true that no one here actually knows you and it is likely that no one cares, and so your job as an opus author is to make us care, like forcing an intestinal worm pill down the gullet of an uncooperative cat.

Item - state that FR has changed. While this is certainly true at any given point in the gradual evolution of the collective neurosis that is our beloved website, it should be a change that is somehow intolerably repellent to someone who is, after all, coming here by free choice. Old-timers especially love "FR is no longer the civil, learned, congenial place it used to be." Be sure to open your windows when you post that - the shrieking of laughter that ensues might be your neighbors who have posted here longer than you have. No one who enjoyed the fevered dribblings of Toiletman or read with satisfaction Deb's immortal description of A+Bert as a "urine-soaked old rummy," can remain silent in the face of this sort of sanctimonious absurdity.

Item - project blamelessness. For example, if you have spent the last several months calling a political candidate not of your preference an ax-murdering po-faced swindler who sacrifices puppies to Satan (this may, actually refer to pretty much everyone in DC and certainly to everyone in journalism), and his followers brachycephalic cretins who belong in an institution learning to make brooms, be sure to state piously that you never said a bad word about anyone and anyway the other fellow started it. You won't be around to hear the collective sigh of relief upon your departure anyway.

Item - post drunk. What the hell, why change?

Item - invoke a sense of righteous vengeance. This site, the proprietor, the moderators, the ping lists, and the general membership will all be wearing virtual black armbands of mourning as soon as you deny them the nuggets of your wisdom that pepper your postings like fresh deer pellets on a dusty trail. Wey'll pay, damn us all, oh yes we will. We'll be begging you to come back. You know it's true.

The list above is by no means complete and categorical, it is merely intended to fill in those embarrassing lacunae in a stream of consciousness that make it gurgle like a terlit with air bubbles in the line when you give it that one last righteous flusheroo. It doesn't have to be perfect. The readers would be disappointed if it were.