There are many joys in this world. The joy of a newborn baby, freshly fallen snow or the loving embrace of a family member. But there’s also the joy of annoying people you hate. This is the greatest joy of all because unlike hugs or squirting out a kid, smiting your enemies involves actual talent and is not just a bodily function of sorts.

Christmas newsletters are the best way to annoy others. Even the most well written ones are tedious, boring and completely useless in this age of social media. Such things used to be sent to loved ones, but they should now only be sent to people who deserve to be tortured. After Christmas is the perfect time to create one, as late Christmas letters are exponentially more annoying than timely ones. This guide will show you how to make your own.

1) First, make a list of all the relatives and acquaintances you hate. Remember that reading a Christmas newsletter is the equivalent of having the writer sit on your face and fart, so don’t unleash it on the innocent. The hatred the recipients will have for you will last well through the Ides of March, so wield this weapon wisely.

2) Remove your pants. Nothing great was ever created with one’s pants on. They cut off circulation.

3) Don’t buy stationary at the store. Professional templates are mediocre, but they’re not nearly as horrifying as a middle-aged woman armed with free Santa Claus clip art she downloaded from the internet.

4) Standard fonts are boring. Choose a festive one that’s nearly impossible to read without tremendous effort. Your newsletter should be like solving an irritating riddle that bears no rewards at the end.

5) Use a third person narrative style, like Julius Caesar or Elmo. People will become so enraged by this that they’ll fume about it for days, to the point where their family will get angry at them for not shutting up about it.

6) Brag incessantly, treating every minor event in your life as an amazing accomplishment. Little Billy drew a hand turkey? That’s worth a good 6-8 paragraphs. Your husband lost three pounds? Please fill everyone in on all the details of this completely luck-based event.

7) Alternatively, focus on all the minor woes that happen to every family, and paint them with the same brush as Hitler’s invasion of Poland. No one could possibly understand or relate to that feeling of money being tight, or having an unexpected car repair. The truly talented can annoy, bore and depress their readers all at the same time.

8) Make sure at least 90 percent of the newsletter is about your family instead of you. There’s nothing people hate more than having to read elongated updates about total strangers they barely remember meeting.

9) Write from the point of view of your pets. It’s become so commonplace by now that most people will involuntarily vomit upon reading it.

10) If you hate certain people more than others, tailor their newsletters to include more things they despise. Does Mary hate sports? Three pages of fantasy football recaps should piss her off. Does Norman always criticize you for posting too many baby photos on Facebook? It’s time for him to learn to love your baby, through dozens of awkward “nude baby in the bathtub” photos included with your newsletter.

11) If you speak a second language, switch freely between the two languages for no reason whatsoever, making your entire newsletter unintelligible to 98 percent of its intended audience.

12) Include your favorite recipes in the newsletter. There’s nothing people hate more than someone they rarely speak to encouraging them to complete a chore.

13) Spray the newsletter with Axe body spray. It will confuse the hell out of everyone.

14) Never include candy or chocolates in the envelope. Not only does it bring your enemies joy, but bulky envelopes are more likely to be sucked into the sorting machine at the post office and destroyed, completely depriving you of your chance to annoy that person.

15) If you loathe your own children, as most parents do, include embarrassing stories about them in the newsletter. Like that time in first grade when they pooped their pants, or how they obsessively fiddled with their wiener as toddlers. “We had to tape his hands to the side of the stroller. It was an embarrassment to us all.”

16) Instead of including a normal family photo with the newsletter, insert a Polaroid photo of your hairy butt. In the white space at the bottom of the Polaroid, write “Ass of the Month, Dec 2013” with a Sharpie marker. When asked about it, claim it was a contest entry, and ask them to forward it to the proper address.

17) Most importantly, have fun. If being a jerkoff to your loved ones isn’t an enjoyable activity, then there’s no point to putting in all the work. Just get into a drunken fistfight with them at a holiday party instead.