My cousin Wayne told me to get ahold of you because he says you’re a decent company that’s done a lot of good for dudes like me, so here goes nothing. Lately I’ve been playing a lot of your online games. My girlfriend is always yelling at me for being on my phone but, like Wayne says, sometimes we men just want to come home from work, sit in our semi-clean boxers, and not talk about our feelings. Am I right?! (INSERT: Fist-pump).

I love playing your soul-crushy, blood-diamond-diggy, endangered-species-punchy games. They’re real mind blenders and I’m sure are keeping me sharp and fertile. But Candy Crush is the best. For serious, you’ve got to tell me how you come up with all of those snazzy scenarios? The strategies you must have to create in your lab just to get us players through the mazes of nougat and jellies? Genius! It’s all I can think about! I dream in red jelly bean, striped peppermint, purple gumdrop. When I lie down to play my synapses start firing like I’m fighting rabid insects or terrorists: left green blob to middle gum drop—COLLISION; bottom lemon to top orange— BOOM; corner cherry to perpendicular grape—DESTROY; side blueberry to side strawberry—KILL, KILL, KILL. So many possibilities, I could just burn a flag thinking about it. And when I get those three gold stars at the end of each level, I know my life, including the premature balding, the clogged toilets, and my second divorce, has all been worth it.

But here’s the thing; most recently this game of yours is keeping me up at night. Playing it feels UNREAL, like you’re riding on a double rainbow, or tasting that first drop of sweat you get when you’re cutting up bacon to put in your Hamburger Helper. I mean the graphics alone…they’re fucking wild—like firm, round, succulent, throbbing breadsticks. Problem is, I’m stuck solid on this one level and I can’t get out and it’s making me sick. My girlfriend tells me the game is all luck and that I need to get over myself. But we all know what she’s really thinking: the more time I play your games, the less time I have to talk about marriage number three. Am I right? (INSERT: head nod). Yeah dude, I know you’re probably thinking: Jerry, is she the one? Sure! Maybe. I mean, I don’t really have much time to think about her, because I’m still stuck on level 19606.

You got to know me, that I’m not that guy—the dick who complains. I once found a human eyeball in my Big Slop at the diner and all I asked the waitress for was a refill. But I’ve been stuck on this level for six months now and it’s got me really messed up. And before you say it, yes, I’ve been proactive. I’ve already Facebook friended every person I know for additional lives. I also Facebooked my girlfriend’s friends, her dead mother’s friends, and even made a separate account under the pseudonym “Ripe Cherry” so I could hit up all of the recommended friends of friends of friends Facebook sends my way. It’s just not enough!

I started Candy Crush by promising the girlfriend I’d never spend any money on it—you know, for extra lives, or gold bars, or black donut holes of death—super candies that can annihilate all of my enemies. And I am a man of my word. But I have dabbled with a bit of online buying. Who cares, right? That’s what third credit cards are for. I mean, that holiday fund was just as much mine as it was hers, and I can stop playing whenever I want to. I want to spend my hard earned money on something hard won. Besides, that kidney dialysis treatment I just got told to have is only one doctor’s suggestion, and I’m a gambling man.

I know in my heart it’s the chocolate’s fault. You know, those brown squares that invade the screen? I’m sure you created those little bastards for a reason that you all think is super important to the mathematics of the game, and I respect that, I do. But I want to talk to you about the dangerous mental health concerns that lie beneath the chocolate square. First the facts: since they were introduced around level 100, my personal health has been, well, touch and go. I’ve become a tad paranoid. Like take the other day for instance: I came home to our place early, hoping to take a dump and play some Candy Crush in peace, when I saw cousin Wayne jumping out of our bedroom window, naked. I know what you’re thinking: Relax Jerry. It’s Wayne. He’s your cousin, man! But my mind went right to no good. It wasn’t until my girlfriend kindly explained to me, that Wayne had just been there trying to fix her plumbing, that I calmed myself. Can you believe it? I almost freaked on Wayne, the one guy who has been trying to help my girlfriend out. What is wrong with me? There’s more, too. Lately whenever I play any level where the chocolate shows up I experience the following physical symptoms: dry mouth, heart palpitations, rashes, painful boils, extraneous haemorrhoids, sleep apnea, chest pains, and minor erectile issues. I have no appetite for the morning wheat germ smoothies my girlfriend makes me and Wayne on the nights he sleeps over to keep her company while I play; some of my pubic hair is falling out; I can’t see out of my left eye. And I can’t shit.

The problem? There’s no logic to your chocolate; they act like my herpes, showing up all unannounced just to be an asshole, and even more so when I’m already losing, kicking me right in the balls.

I’ve had to take a leave from work. My girlfriend has set me up with a private room in the attic, you know, to make it easier for me to play, but it’s going to shit. Now when I’m trying to play chocolate overtakes everything. My mouth dries up and I can’t keep fluids down. The walls of my room start coming closer and closer, and the chocolates keep growing, popping up everywhere like my ex-mother-in-law. It’s like I’m being eaten alive. I see my mortality melting. EAT THE CHOCOLATE a little voice inside me says. DON’T GET MARRIED it says, too. WAYNE IS NOT A PLUMBER I hear, as the cocoa bites ingest the screen, faster and faster, swallowing the jellybeans, towering chocolate squares on top of chocolate squares like a diabetic Trump Tower. Candy Crush needs a trigger warning, or a cheat button.

Wayne says it’s all in the wrist, but what does he know? He’s only on level 16. Clearly these chocolate pieces are dangerous for me, toxic even. My girlfriend thinks your game might be giving me an anxiety disorder. She thinks I should get a 1 million dollar life insurance policy that names her as the sole benefactor, you know, in case something should happen to me. Wayne agrees with her, but I dunno. Is it possible I might just be overreacting?

Thank God my girlfriend has been really patient as of late. Since she’s a pharmacist’s assistant she’s been giving me lots of little pills, and has been cooking me delicious meals while I play Crush all day. And even though they taste a bit funny, like sour metal, she’s a catch. She even has stockpiled rat poison and arsenic in the kitchen next to the condiments just in case we develop a pest problem, which Wayne says is super likely since he’s been helping us with my girlfriend’s plumbing. I’m so lucky she puts up with me. Oh look! Here she is with my dinner now. What’s that, that you’ve sprinkled on top of my meat, honey? A new kind of salt? You’re so wonderful. Yes, I’ll keep playing now. Love youuuuu! She’s so supportive, always cooking for me. Wait. Uh oh, here come the chocolate squares. I can feel the dizzy spells coming on. AH! TAKE A BITE OF FOOD. My heart is starting to pound. Oh shit!! I. just. can’t. breathe. This game is killing me!

Sincerely,

Getting Candy Crushed