P.J. Clarke's, the use of Courier--and leggings are not pants.

GK received an impromptu invitation last night--as is common in Manhattan; knowing that one's friends are likely working within a two-mile (or twenty minutes on the train) radius leads to many  last-minute invites--to P.J. Clarke's, one of the bars featured in Mad Men.

And my friend "happened" to be dressed like Peggy Olson.

You can tell how old it is when you go in--the bar is well-weathered, there are interior stained glass details, and it manages to be very cozy and warm on, say, the first day of hail (yes, hail!--though it's gone up to 53 again today) for the season. Drinking the house sidecar (which involved the bartender setting the lemon briefly on fire before throwing it into my friend's drink) and a gin and tonic, we were amazed by how very Mad Men-esque the place still felt--many professional men, few women, discussions about investments and stock portfolios and contracts and trains to the suburbs.

Yes. The perfect amount of civilized: no New Yorker logo man posture; no monocles; no hushed voices--or spilled drinks, yelling, or pushing, either. The people on our left ordered oysters; the people on our right ordered beer and watched the game--and both parties were perfectly happy.

Soon--odds being in our favor--two well-dressed young men approached my friend and me, inquired about our beverages, locations, jobs.

"Do you make people send you everything in courier?" one asked.

It's a fair question. A number of New Yorkers still think of writers as people who sit in their West Village apartments with typewriters, looking down on bohemians and lively street scenes below. It's been many years since that was the case (or since writers without trust funds could afford Village digs), but it's a pleasant image, and has stuck.

Here's the truth of the matter, though: I have never once taken on a project that came to me in Courier. Does this mean that I won't? Of course not! It's just a coincidence that I find amusing.

Does this mean fonts matter? No, not really: with a few CTRL-As and CTRL-Ds, it's taken care of, and I hardly remember.

I think it's more the personality type that sometimes goes with the font.

My friend (yes, the one dressed as Peggy Olson) mentioned that it's a great font for proofreading, since all of the letters (and therefore the errors) become quite large. So, yes. Maybe that will help you in proofreading, and not help you during submissions.

But I think most writers (especially those reading blogs, especially YA writers) are very--well--of the moment, even if it's because they have teenage children (who inevitably are surprised that their mother or father is cool enough to write for teens, but that's another matter). Courier has been out of fashion, in my mind, for years. And, unlike leggings (again: they're not pants!), I think it will stay out of fashion.

Again, would anyone ever reject you for your font? No. And, just to be clear, if we had a meeting with you, I wouldn't reject you for fanny packs, overalls, disco wear, poodle skirts or whatever else you like. I'd probably think it was cool. No worries.

You can imagine the strange questions I've gotten about my work over the years ("Do you enjoy rejecting people?" "Do you hate writers?" "Do you wish you could just never read again?" "Do you get a lot of paper cuts?"--No, no, no, and yes--occupational hazard). Surely you must have some too.

Ask away, fellow writers--anonymously, if you like. The weirdest agent life questions you can think of. GK will be pleased and amused, no g&t necessary.

Today's beverage is yet another French press coffee. On cold days, I can't get enough.