The other day I heard someone at a 6:00 am network meeting proclaim - "I have an ezine!"

Still half asleep, and hopped up on my third cup of coffee, my mind raced to try to figure out what he was talking about. I remained silent and sent my best early morning grin the way of the self-declared ezine-ite and knew I had a task for later.

"What the heck was an ezine?" I thought. It sounded sort of like a European motor scooter or something but I did not want to embarrass myself like the time I thought SEM was some kinky couples thing, only to find out it was Search Engine Marketing. I had to switch networking groups after that incident...

So after the meeting I went to the only place where you find out these sorts of things - Starbucks, during the day. Everyone knows that entrepreneurs that have a 'home office' really work from Starbucks. I even think Starbucks invented the concept to sell more fancy coffee drinks.

After ordering my latte I asked the barista if he knew what an ezine was. He instantly blushed and turned towards the comfy chair section. I didn't get it.

What did the comfy chairs have to do with ---

And then I saw her....

The hair, the clothes, the face, she was the sexiest woman I had ever seen.

She looked so familiar but I was sure I would have remembered meeting someone who looked like her.

Feeling like my 4:30 am shower and one minute makeup session was quite insufficient I turned back to the barista and mumbled, "What does she have to do with an ezine?.." but he was off blending some mocha, no whip, double shot of espresso adult-Slurpee and I found myself talking to a shelf overflowing with bags of coffee.

I grabbed my latte and headed to the comfy chairs and -- the woman.

As I got closer I knew I had seen her before. But where?

She noticed me staring and smiled. "Hello, want to join me?," she whispered. Her voice sounded like Marilyn Monroe singing 'Happy Birthday Mr. President'.

I introduced myself and mentioned the barista told me the sexy lady could tell me what an ezine was.

She giggled like a sex kitten, leaned towards me and whispered, "Can you keep a secret?"

A secret! This was getting exciting! I gulped back half my latte, burning my throat in the process and choked out a "Yes". I knew I was getting close, this definitely had nothing to do with a European motor scooter! "Ok, ok," I thought. "Tell me what the heck an ezine is!"

I closed my eyes in anticipation of finding the truth. I knew I was about to be enlightened. I held my breath - finally I would find out what an ezine was!

I waited, eyes closed, my heart beating in anticipation. I took a deep breath and squealed at the top of my lungs, "I am ready, tell me what an ezine is!"

But when I opened my eyes the sexy woman had vanished. Instead there sat John Stossel. There was also everyone else in the Starbucks all gathered around me thinking I had just experienced some sort of caffeine-induced Kundalini awakening.

"You already know what an ezine is," said John Stossel.

"I do?" I said, trying to assure my new audience I was mentally stable.

And then in John's reporter-like style he said, "An ezine is a periodic electronically published newsletter or email newsletter.Sometimes they are posted on a website but most of the time they are sent via email or even RSS. Email newsletters were getting old so we cooked up a new, sexier name."

And with that John Stossel vanished and the sexy lady appeared again. My Starbucks audience all filed back to their comfy chairs and I sat there silent.

The milk frother hummed in the background and the sexy lady patted my hand. "Don't worry about it. Beauty and value are on the inside...even with an ezine," she said.

I took a long time to walk home that day. I had been duped by a marketing gimmic. That guy at the 6:00 am network marketing meeting was bragging about his email newsletter!

I guess exclaiming to an audience of half-asleep business persons trying to remember if they had let the dog out before they came to the meeting, "I have an email newsletter!" would be kind of lame.

I felt different writing my weekly e-newsletter, um, er, ok, weekly ezine that afternoon. I felt more alive, kind of lighter. Would my readers notice the difference?

I had to promise the sexy lady that I would not reveal the secret that an ezine is simply an email newsletter so don't tell anybody,ok?

Ezine does sound a lot sexier than 'e-newsletter' and we all know sexy sells.

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Copyright Joan Pasay - 2005