January 2019 Q+A

Jack Kirby (public domain)

Q: Dear Raffaele, what should I do once I graduate?

A: This is an excellent question. Throughout my days at Yampage, I have observed many misguided youths of this high school talking about “college” and, “graduate school” but please make sure to ignore this obscene propaganda when picking your future path. As I see it, there is only one way to spend your life after high school. Find a way to make as much money as possible in as little time as possible.

You may be asking, “but Raffaele, what about hard work and obtaining a higher education?” Gross. This is America, you think we believe that “hard work” makes your dreams come true? Disgusting!

When it comes to making fast money, there are many ways to do this. You can find a nice company to sue over a minor injury, become a reality tv star, tik-tok influencer or advertise on instagram. The options are endless and much less boring than a fulfilling career. Once you have amassed a minor fortune, invest your money in international stocks. For maximum revenue, find a way to avoid paying taxes.

After this is done, spend your money on boosting your popularity on the website, “Famous birthdays”. After you reach the top 20 birthdays, the illuminati will be in contact. I have told you all I can. They will take it from there.


Q: Are advice columns harmful to journalism?

A: My good sir, upon receiving this question, I cannot help but feel a little bit, slightly, extremely offended. Why on earth would advice columns, such as the Pulitzer Prize, Nobel Peace Prize, and Grammy winning column, “Ask Raffaele” be harmful to journalism? The public should be so lucky to have people such as myself bestow our knowledge upon you mere “average joes.” My wisdom and life experience rivals that of Gandhi’s. My intellect would make Einstein cry himself to sleep. Who else could tell you how to mountain climb using a fish hook while escaping Norwegian police? Nobody.

If anything, Yampage needs this advice column. I’m basically holding the whole operation together. They’re so obsessed with me. They keep begging me to write more and more, saying things like “oh, Raffaele, write something or we’ll have to fire you.” So as you can see, my friend, you must ask yourself not if advice columns are harmful to journalism but if journalism is harmful to advice columns…

Raffaele Quintino
Raffaele Quintino was born in Idaho in 1956. Before Yampage, he served as a spy for the FBI. Raffaele is, in fact, not his real name. In his lifetime, he has been assigned over 150 different identities by the witness protection program. This is because of all the enemies he made throughout his career. He is actually banned from Russia, North and South Korea, most of the Netherlands and all the Dollar Generals in Wisconsin. He did not wish to elaborate on the last one, but explained in full detail what he did to make Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un cry via Facebook messenger. He wants to write for Yampage because he feels he can add a “personal touch” to the articles. “As an FBI agent, I was able to learn a lot about people through their phone cam- I mean by talking to them when I was doing normal FBI things not related to watching people on phone camera- damn it, never mind.” Raffaele’s writing style mimics that of Abby Morgan (’20).