An open letter to the chopping block fan club

Dear characters,

The chopping block is not a toy. If you have a really good idea for how you might die in a plot-relevant and emotionally significant way, you may step up to the chopping block and state your case. I will hear you out, and in rare cases, I might accept your proposal and leave you on the chopping block to be killed off as you wish.

The chopping block is NOT to be used for the following purposes:

• finding out how I'd kill you off in...this situation? Well, what about...this one? Or hey, what about...this one?
• depressing me to make me listen to that Aimee Mann song you like
  
• getting a sneak peek at who else is on the chopping block (which you can't know for real, anyway, given how many of you are up there dicking around at any given time)
  
• proposing your own dramatic six-page dying monologue
• seeing if I have the guts to kill you off (aside to first-person POV protagonist: that's not funny)
  
• hosting picnics with dead characters from the last book/short stories I've written/old seasons of Supernatural
  
• trampolining

These behaviors are unacceptable. If they continue, the chopping block will be cordoned off and none of you will get to play around with fun death scenes that weren't on the novel outline. All this is really not making me eager to return to your story. Please knock it off.

Yours (unfortunately),
the author