Recruiting efforts neglecting a critical demographic

There's been a lot of talk lately about recruiting people into the Columbia Basin.

New workers, families, tourists to spend their money locally — all have been listed as part of the ideal arrival.

Everybody would be a welcome addition to the area, of course, but I find myself worrying about whether or not the efforts already under way are neglecting a key — some would argue, even critical — demographic.

Where are the single twentysomething ladies?

As anyone who knows a member of this category will tell you, single twentysomething ladies form a crucial part of today's American society. They are the ones who stand to inherit the world from their foremothers, and it is their dreams and visions which will ultimately shape the future of the planet.

Within our efforts to recruit such an important category, we should be sure to draw from an especially key subject: Those single twentysomething ladies who like hairy men.

Speaking as a single twentysomething male, I am all for any effort to lure more single twentysomething ladies to the area. Behind it 200 percent, in fact.

Willing to front the official welcome wagon, or be the Columbia Basin Ambassador to the Land of the Single Twentysomething Ladies, even.

Seriously.

I'll make cardboard signs to greet them.

Even bake a pound cake with the words "Welcome Ladies" on it.

In the interest of launching a full-scale movement into the area (sample motto: "Single and Twentysomething and a Lady? Come to the Columbia Basin!") I attempted to conduct a painstaking, meticulously researched study into their interests in effort to form a stellar marketing campaign.

Alas, all potential respondents were "washing their hair" or "just wanted to be friends" or had "standards which don't include you, you loser columnist you."

Which told me, if I knew what single twentysomething ladies really wanted, I probably wouldn't be a single twentysomething man in the first place.

So someone who knows what to do had better get crackin' and soon.

Or else soon I'll be bellyaching about recruiting single thirtysomething ladies into the region.