Too Many Delays, and a Fun Chat

I've been pretty bad about updating this blog, but things have been a little hectic. Oh well. Anyway, here's another crazy IM chat I had with a robot/scammer.

When "Annita Sansing" contacted me with "[smiley face] hi sweetie" I knew I was in for another round of instant-messenger lunacy. I keep this going until I finally get bored, which happens quickly because it's probably not a real human on the other end. The "conversation" starts out well, but devolves into an argument between two deaf mental patients.

But see if you can spot my references to Shakespeare's Richard III, Logan's Run, Wikipedia, and a sign that you'd find on a wet floor!

Don't Ask Me About My Weekend

Not my weekend.

How was your weekend?

Does that innocent question cause you to clench your fists and/or sigh pathetically?

Everyone knows how the question How are you?, particularly around the workplace, can be an open-ended query with the potential to open a Pandora's box of misery.

What I realized recently is that there's an even worse question you can ask a person in my state of life:

"How was your weekend?"

For starters, Saturday and Sunday haven't comprised "my" weekend since 2003 or so, perhaps earlier. I know I'm preaching to the choir to many of you, but when I'm asked about my weekend I'm forced to remember how much of my weekend has been chewed away like the income of a rich person without a smart accountant.

A worse question is What did you do this weekend?, but there's yet a still more horrible question...

The Annoyance Is INSTANT, Too

You'd better run away, you bastard!

When you use Instant Messenger, unless you fastidiously maintain your list of contacts, you'll have people on your buddy list for years, even if they no longer qualify as a buddy, friend, amigo, or bro.

I can always see when these people are online, yet I never have the urge to shoot an IM to ask, say, Julie Klausner, with whom I took a couple of improv classes at Upright Citizens Brigade Theater like 10 years ago, how she's doing. (Apparently she's doing much better than I am in terms of writing and performing, thank you very much.)

I even have "buddies" I can longer identify. Who the hell are you, Rizzjox75? Did we used to work together? Did we do stand-up at New York Comedy Club back in 2003? It's not like I'm going to IM you to find out!

Then, the other day, I received an odd IM...

Does This Mean I'll Have to Block My Own E-mail Address?

It tastes like discounted Viagra.

In the old days (the late 1990s) I used to be fooled by spam. I thought every e-mail that I received was sent to me because someone knew me, or because I had requested some information. Several computer viruses and one large cash transfer to someone who turned out not to be Prince Abinala Umbutu of the People's Free Democratic Republic of Congo later, I learned that that was not always the case.

Spam has become much craftier, what with those fake bank account alerts that look like real e-mails from real banks if the person in charge of writing those e-mails had third-grade grammar, but some spam I get makes me wonder whether they're even trying.

Obviously, the senders listed for spam are fake. You won't be getting e-mail from jim.richards@stealyourmoney.org. The pseudonyms are usually normal-sounding names, but quite often I receive an e-mail that alleges its address of origin to be my own.

THAT'S WEIRD
Yes, it is. Take the example below:

 

Now, why would I send myself an e-mail about a Viagra discount? Even if I were to e-mail myself such an alert, because maybe I read about it somewhere and e-mailed myself a reminder, would I put my username in the subject line as well? Am I that clueless that I would have forgotten about sending myself an e-mail about Viagra discounts?

And wouldn't I ask myself, "Self, why did the discount suddenly drop 14 percent?" (Then again, the subject line says it's a minus-61 percent discount, so that actually means that the markup is not as large. I'll my own biology handle my erections at least until I get that "-47%" discount alert.)

That's all I really need to say about this. It's been a great week, The Anthony Show-wise, and I wanted to write a shorter post today. Besides, you can see that I need to respond to "Jacqueline Jones" — I have the opportunity to chat with girl! ME LOVE CHAT WITH GIRL!