Sunday, November 06, 2005

Let's Turn Back on Forwards...

Is there anything on God's green, muddy earth more annoying than chain e-mails? Besides Paula Abdul's voice, that is? And Simon Cowell's--well, Simon Cowell?

I encounter these pre-fab messages every morning, but today was worse than most. I opened my e-mail to see literally dozens of e-mails with "FWD:" in the subject line. Sometimes they're really good jokes, which are fine. Because I like a good joke as much as anyone. But the ones I hate (and which I get the most) are those ones that are called something like "FWD: Fwd: fwd: Delete This If You're Ashamed" (a religious challenge even a moron could smell a mile off) or "FWD: Fwd: fwd: This Is Sweet--I'd Better Get It Back!" (Here's a tip: you won't get it back from me.)

What drives me crazy about these things is that they're not only full of preachy, holier-than-thou advice and judgement, but they're also spread with tired, stale platitudes thicker than the vile frosting on a store-bought cookie. Things like "It takes 48 muscles to frown, but only 20 to smile!" or "Every 60 seconds of anger is a minute of happiness wasted!" Such sentiments might have propped Ann Landers up during her entirely-too-long career of giving out no-brain advice on the obvious, but they aren't very compelling these days. You can practically hear the preface "My grandpappy used to say..." before these maxims, in much the same fashion that we say "...in bed" after a fortune cookie reading.

And let's not even get started on the ones that say "FWD: Please help. My daughter is missing." It's always from someone whose 12-year-old daughter disappeared from the Karmel Korn shop in a mall or something. And it's always the same picture, since 1997. I'm sorry, but that girl is at least 20 years old by now. And if she doesn't want to come home, she doesn't have to. Just hope that when she does come home, she doesn't turn up with a grandchild she expects you to babysit!

Now, I can hear you saying, "Why don't you just delete them?"

That's all very well and good, but if you happen to be away from your e-mail for only one day, you'll have 100 of these little bastards. It takes forever to slash and burn all of them. Besides, it takes 50 muscles to delete an e-mail, but only 5 to...oh, never mind.

Have a stress-free day...!

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