Time for a word about lost photos, mentioned in that last blog post. A message, thrown out as a digital bottle into a digital sea. E-mail me.
Response?
A very kind man from Nigeria sent me an e-mail I didn't open. Instead, I noted the very kind man's name and Googled the shit out of him.
That's how I know he's from Nigeria. Or, at least, he says he's from Nigeria. I'm guessing he's a he, too. Let's suppose there's a human lurking somewhere behind the bot.
We can't be sure.
I was amused when my search threw up a blog post by a guy asking WHO THE FUCK ARE THESE PEOPLE? The very kind man from Nigeria made that list...
Alongside a bunch of robots who had, at one time or another, offered me untold sums of wealth from Nigerian banks...
Little blue pills to aid the treatment of erectile dysfunction...
The opporchancity to meet in an unnamed city in an unnamed country for presumably indescribable unfilmed casual sex...
And enough penis-extensions to carry any man's modified member around the moon and back.
That's not quite what Archimedes had in mind, when making his point about the fulcrum. Let us draw a veil upon that scene.
I don't receive much by way of fraudulent e-mail. The first time I received that crap, it came through a trusted source. Damn those trusted sources.
For a very short while, I received blog comments stored backstage. The blog wouldn't allow thinly-obscured adverts to appear as comments. I checked these curiosities...
Mostly, after being praised generically for my wit, wisdom, incisive views, and the ability to transmute lead to gold, I was offered the chance to buy headphones.
Headphones. Cock-extensions. Untold riches, salted away in Nigerian legal hell. Warnings, instructing me to confirm receipt of that parcel.
What fucking parcel/concert tickets?
Ignore ignore ignore.
I increased blocking levels, and the tide fell. Today, I'm left with the odd droplet. An out-of-place globule. Remnant of Sani Abacha's time in power.
The number 419 refers to that section of Nigeria's criminal code appertaining to advance fee fraud.
I like the word appertaining.
So. Here's the Nigerian scam. Supreme Dictator for Life Reichsmarschall Sani Abacha, Victoria Hot Cross Bun and Coffee Bar, died leaving a shitload of cash in a dodgy bank.
I can't touch the stuff. Details, details. Blah, blah, codswallop, blah. But you, MY FRIEND, complete stranger that you are, could just about access the funds.
All you have to do is turn up with the right paperwork and a bright smile on your face, and we, ME OLD CHINA, will live in the lap of luxury.
There's a catch. To access the £MILLIONS, you'll have to stump up the processing fee. Payable to, er, me. We're looking at a guaranteed million payday. You front the £10,000 fee, and I'll be generous enough to split the FORTUNE fifty-fifty on release.
It's not strictly above-board, so, shush, don't tell anyone else. More in the pot for us, eh...
And so on, with variations and ever-increasing demands.
Sani Abacha died in 1998. I'll probably receive half a dozen e-mails a year, concerning his missing billions. Offering to return photos I found inside a book - that's what triggered the latest fraudulent message, when I sacrificed my e-mail address to the prowling autobots.
My offer, to return missing photos, is genuine. Though there's more chance of coming away rich from participating in a 419 scheme, Mr Abacha, than there is of finding anyone connected to the little old lady in my previous blog post.
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