The holidays can be a difficult time for introverts: Family gatherings and work functions abound, everyone wants updates on what’s going on in your life, and all those bothersome friends and loved ones just want to spend time with you. This year however, one introvert has devised a way to avoid the waking nightmare that is holiday revelry.

Richard Townsend is a movie theater manager originally from Milford, CT but currently living in Riverview, FL. Every year he flies home against his better judgment to spend time with family and catch up with old friends over the Christmas holiday.

“It’s like torture,” says Townsend describing reuniting with all those people who miss him now that he’s moved away. “I think I get it worse because they don’t see me very often so it’s just a bombardment of pleasantries.”

As an introvert, Townsend tends to avoid large gatherings or situations that require a lot of interaction. Unfortunately, a big part of Christmas festivities is pestering people for not wanting to participate and forcing them to do it anyway.

“I try to weasel out of it every year,” he says, “but my mother always guilts me into it. Then I remembered this thing that happened last year and it gave me an idea to at least make it bearable.”

Townsend recalls his previous visit home and Christmas dinner at his Aunt Cathy’s house.

“I remember seeing my cousin David sitting in the corner playing with his phone,” says Townsend. “Nobody was trying to talk to him, which was weird because even if you’re a stuck-up little shit like my cousin Nancy or a pompous blow-hard like Uncle Andrew, people will still find an excuse to talk to you. I mean, David is kind of a dude-bro douche nozzle, but not so much that everyone would just ignore him.”

So what was cousin David’s secret?

“It turns out that David got big into NFTs. Apparently it was all he’d talk about; over-explaining how block-chains work, trying to get people to invest, buh-buh buh-buh, that kind of stuff; and everyone was sick of hearing about it. And that got me thinking….”

Not long after, Townsend was approached by his uncle Roscoe, the kind of guy who probably got in a fight with his wife earlier that day for trying to wear one of his sixteen “Let’s Go Brandon” tee shirts to Christmas dinner and would always assume you not only agreed with him politically but that you wanted nothing more than to hear his opinion on everything wrong with the current state of the country.

“Uncle Roscoe is like a worst case scenario,” says Townsend, “but I thought of how embarrassed he was the year Aunt Tilly lost like half their savings on an essential oils scam and I looked over at David, alone and unbothered in the corner, and something just clicked in my brain.”

“How they treatin’ you down in Florida, Richie?” asked Uncle Roscoe. “Must be nice down where the politicians got their head screwed on right. Not like up here, I’ll tell ya!”

“Oh yeah, things are great!” said Townsend. “Just last week actually I met this guy selling shares of the Skyway Bridge, you know, the one that goes across the bay? Anyway, I guess there’s this new law that commercial businesses can own infrastructure in the state of Florida now, so now I’m investing with him to own like 3% or something of this bridge, and since the state does all the maintenance and upkeep it’s all profit!”

“Well, that’s uh,” said Uncle Roscoe, “yeah, how exactly does that profit?”

“I don’t know,” said Townsend, “tolls and government subsidies and stuff. It’s complicated, but the guy says it’s going to be like 600% return on investment or something. Hey, you should totally come in with us! I got the guy’s info, just a couple of thousand and you’ll be looking at an early retirement in like a year or two!”

Before you could say “due diligence”, word about the investment opportunity had spread across the party. Townsend now found himself, not unlike The Farmer in the Dell’s cheese, standing alone and finally able to enjoy spending time with his family by not interacting with them.

“People walked longways around the room to avoid bumping into me,” says Townsend, “or just didn’t make eye contact when we passed each other. It was great! A couple people were concerned I was getting ripped off, but I assured them it was on the up and up and promised to send them information later. My dad had kind of like a ‘we’ll talk about his later’ attitude, but after a few egg nogs it must’ve slipped his mind.”

Richard Townsend tells us he plans on stepping up his game this year.

“It worked so well, I wanted to keep it going,” he says, “so I started early this year to ensure nobody would want to talk to me this Christmas!”

Townsend devised a plan, which he calls Introvoidance, that he’s agreed to share with the world in order to help other introverts survive the holidays. It may seem like the kind of hairbrained scheme George Costanza would come up with in Seinfeld’s later years, but Townsend swears by the results.

Step One: Devise the Scheme

There are a lot of multi-level marketing (MLM) companies, commonly known as “pyramid schemes”, out there to model your “investment opportunity” on. You’ve probably heard of several already: AmWay, Avon, goop, Young Living Essential Oils, Tupperware, Aflac, and Kohl's Cash to name a few. While Townsend’s previous idea worked, the “I got a bridge to sell you” scheme is as tired and obvious as they come..

“The scam should be obvious,” says Townsend, “but not too obvious. Unless your family already thinks you’re a complete moron, it has to be just plausible enough that someone would fall for it. Mine is called EmSurance, which sells supplemental unemployment insurance. Basically, I offer to let you pay me fifteen dollars a month, that’s the basic package, and if you ever find yourself unemployed it gives you a bit of extra income while you look for another job. Either that or you can invest as a partner for a couple grand.”

“You also want to mix in some cultish elements,” he continues. “It’s all about the balance though. You want to try to land somewhere between like Mary Kay Cosmetics and The Church of Scientology. Just be careful not to go full NXIVM. You never go full NXIVM.”

Step Two: Make it Look Legit(ish)

The next thing Townsend did was set up a Facebook page for his MLM.

“I thought of doing an entire website,” he says, “but honestly, nobody’s going to look into it too thoroughly. A page on Facebook is good enough, but if you want you can set up a fake page through WordPress or SubStack or something, that’s up to you, but it’ll just be more work for something you don’t really need.”

Townsend set his Facebook page up in August in order to get ahead of the game.

“You just need a basic set-up,” he says, “company name, logo, header, and a few posts now and then. And not just business stuff, like affirmations and mantras too. It’s really just for you to share to your own page to get your friends and family used to the idea that you’re someone to avoid. If you’re lucky, most of them will unfollow or unfriend you before the holidays even come around!”

Step Three: Put it in Action!

“I couldn’t wait until Christmas to see if it worked,” says Townsend, “so I scheduled some time off in November and told my family I’d be flying home for Thanksgiving this year.”

Ignoring the irony that his system has actually made him want to attend a large family gathering, Townsend took a plane to Connecticut and put his plan in motion.

“You just gotta hit a few people early,” he says. “If you did your social media work right, people should already be talking about how you’re in a pyramid scheme this year and looking for investors. I even texted my friend Nick I used to work with and then my cousin’s husband about how they should get into this EmSurance thing before it blows up.

“Make sure you have a good pitch,” he continues, “and work on making it sound over-practiced. Be monotonous and look slightly away from who you’re talking to. Mine is something like ‘the job market is harsh right now, and you never know when you might need a life vest, buh-buh buh-buh, yada yada, oh, you gotta go? It’s cool, we’ll talk about it later.’ Wink!.”

He said the “wink” part as he winked, I don’t know why.

Step Four: Enjoy Your Solitude!

If you did it right, you should be able to enjoy your holiday without having to interact with anyone who cares about you!

“I was overwhelmed with how great Thanksgiving went,” says Townsend. “I mean, sure my dad might be planning a Christmas intervention and my cousin David actually gave me two grand to come in as a partner, but I had a whole three days back home where practically nobody would talk to me or ask me to to hang out!”

Richard Townsend says he’s now looking forward to Christmas and continuing his scheme of fraudulent scams in order to swindle people into not spending time with him.

“I think EmSurance is going to have a team-building retreat for top sellers out in the woods or something,” says Townsend, “lots of badminton and tug-o-wars, that kind of stiff. And maybe a fake celebrity endorsement from like Rob Schneider or Joe Rogan. I’ll also think of an excuse to give David his money back. Or maybe I’ll keep it when EmSurance ‘goes under’ next year, we’ll see. He’s really pissed at that Hawk Tuah girl right now, he might not even remember everyone who’s taken his money by then.”

In fact, Townsend has even expressed taking his method to a whole new level in the new year.

“Oh yeah” he tells us when we ask about the Facebook page he’s recently started for Introvoidance, “I think this thing has got a lot of potential. I’m thinking of doing two or three seminars between like now and March, only three hundred dollars or so a seat. After that, attendees can learn how to run their own seminars under the Introvoidance banner just as long as they pay the franchise fee and buy all the course materials directly from the company. I think it’s got a lot of potential. Hey, you’ve got a lot of reach with your website, huh? Maybe you can come in–”

Haha, yeah, okay, sounds great, we’ll definitely think about it. Oh hey, sorry, this is my editor calling me, I have to take this….

As we slide through December into the dark abyss of the holidays, we asked Richard Townsend if he had any parting words for other introverts out there looking to evade festivities this year.

“Christmas is a great time of year to get together with those you love,” says Townsend, “but that doesn’t mean you should have to interact with them. Being in the same room is enough, and if they don’t understand that, well, now you have this simple, proven method of how to be insufferable enough that they’ll leave you alone. I hope others try it as well and that it works for them like it did for me!

“In fact,” he adds, “if anyone would like to learn Introvoidance, you can sign up for a seminar over on Facebook–”

Oh, sorry, hang on a sec, I’m getting another call… What’s that? Oh no, I’ll be right there! Sorry, I gotta run, my kid’s school just called and he hit a teacher or something, but I’ll definitely text you later about that maybe.

So this Christmas, as you find yourself brooding alone in a corner while everyone else has fun around you, don’t forget to thank Richard Townsend for your newfound respite from the holiday bustle. Just not in person.