The absolute worst

That's what I am.  I had all day to do a letter yesterday, but I put it off, put it off, put it off until I was falling asleep where I sat.  I wrote two letters tonight, but the one I thought perhaps was offensive (it's from Germany to Japan), so to make up for the lack of letter yesterday I'm instead posting a letter I wrote a while ago that happens to be quite long.  That's a good replacement, right?

Dear Museum Patrons,

May I be the first to welcome you to our humble museum: welcome!

As this appears to be your first visit to a museum of any kind (and indeed your first visit away from your home and out into what is generally known as The World), here are some friendly tips to make your time with us as enjoyable and fulfilling as possible:

While there are few restrictions on how one treats one's family, we at the museum ask that you behave courteously with our staff as well as our other patrons.  This includes but is not limited to exhibiting patience, politeness and a certain degree of regard for other’s opinions, cultures, and habits.

We would love nothing more than to have free admission for all our patrons.  This is sadly impossible as our museum requires money for its continued upkeep.  While this may upset and even offend you, visiting our museum is not compulsory, and once you have entered our shop you are by no means obliged to purchase a ticket.  Furthermore, should you choose to leave your home again at some future date you will find that most museums charge for entrance into their galleries.

As mentioned, the notion of paying for tickets for our museum may offend you, but we do ask that you do not protest this practice by entering the galleries without making said purchase.  If you feel particularly adamant about spending money to culture yourself, the most effective action to take would be to write to the Director of our museum or your local congressman.

In addition to their considerable decorative appeal, our ropes and stanchions are also functional!  We use them in lieu of walls to enclose certain areas of our museum and restrict patron movements therein.  While they are easily maneuvered around, their purpose is to politely but firmly discourage such maneuvers.  If it helps you to adhere to this request, please think of the ropes as actual walls.  Would you allow your children to run through a plaster wall?  We hope not, and so we hope neither do you allow them to run under our ropes.

If you decide to purchase tickets into our galleries, we can only presume that you consider our exhibits worth seeing, which would suggest that you implicitly agree that they are also valuable (which in fact they are, as well as old).  Therefore you can understand that we wish to protect our exhibits.  When we ask that you check any large bags at the counter and refrain from using flash photography or eating or drinking anything inside the galleries we know that you'll understand this is for the good of our collection, and we sincerely appreciate your cooperation in such a timely, bothersome process as handing your bag to one of our staff as well as the inconvenience of fasting for a 30 minute period.

Whatever the purpose of your bag, if it is worn on your back, it is, by our terms, a backpack and must be checked.  We understand that labeling a bag a "purse" does endear the accessory to one and increase its retail and sentimental value.  However we regret that we do not consider this a valid defense for why the offending item must remain on your person and not in our possession while you tour the galleries. 

As you turn your most valuable possessions (which you most logically and commendably carry with you at all times throughout your touristing) over to our staff, you may be asking yourself, how safe will my valuables be?  For everyone's convenience our security has officially and certifiably been rated on an internationally established Museum Security Scale which judges museum security from 1 to 10, 1 being as secure as leaving your bags on the street with a seemingly nice though mostly incoherent homeless person and 10 being as secure as locking it in a safe in a vault underground with 24-hour sentries.  You will be relieved to know that our museum has been rated a 4, which is above the legal minimum required for an operating American museum.

While as a museum we are a bastion of culture and information, we are not to be confused with a Visitor Information Center.  "Museum" and "visitor information" are similar words--they in fact have two letters in common--and are easily mistaken for each other, but please allow us to put you to rights.  We at the museum are in the business of housing and preserving artifacts relating to a specific time and place and are knowledgeable in this area.  They at the Visitor Information Center are in the business of giving visitors information pertaining to the region.  So if we do not know where your hotel is or the best way to purchase theatre tickets, you will please forgive our ignorance and accept our advice to make your way to the nearest Visitor Information Center, which as it happens is located in the building directly across the street from us.  We apologize that we could not for your convenience place the center in our own building, but our space is limited.

Similarly, our gift shop is a shop in the traditional sense, that is goods are traded for currency or accepted forms of credit.  We do not have complimentary items.  That is also the business of the Visitor Information Center.

Our shop follows other shop traditions, most notably the line, or queue.  Rather than waiting at random, shop customers are asked to form a line leading to the cash registers, of which we have only two.  Please wait until the customer in front of you has been completely helped and left the counter before approaching with your own purchase.  If the line does not move as quickly as you would like, we ask for your patience.

Regrettably  we are not able to keep our doors open 24 hours a day.  We recognize the inconvenience of forcing you to visit within our 8-hour daily time frame and sincerely appreciate your efforts to fit us in.  Should this 8-hour window prove evasive to your vacation schedule we have confidence that you will show an equal measure of understanding and not expect admittance at five minutes to close.  Please trust us when we tell you that, though small, our galleries require more than five minutes to walk through and fully appreciate.

We hope that you enjoy your visit to our city as well as our museum and we know that it will be trebly so if you follow these easy tips.  Should you be visually impaired, aurally impaired, or a non-English speaker, please apply to the staff at the front desk for this information gesticularly.

Sincerely,

Museum Staff.