Tag Archives: spam scammers

Biden, celebrities, humor, narcissists, politicians, politics

More than I bargained for… and blonde jokes are stupid!

It’s Thursday already! And although it’s early August, it feels more like mid September. As I write today’s post, it’s about 59 degrees outside and overcast. I don’t normally like to include weather reports in my posts, but this is kind of unusual, even for Germany. Not that I’m complaining. This year, at least we have a nice, green lawn in the backyard.

I just checked my spam folder for my Hotmail account. I got another one of those “I’ve infected your computer” emails. This time, the message was different, though. Sure, there were the usual threatening words about how, if I don’t pay them, they’ll send my contacts pictures of me doing unmentionable things. But this time, they included several graphic dick pics of some balding guy with a beard and the threat that next time, the photos could be of me. Trust me, it wasn’t what I wanted to see… especially first thing in the morning.

It’s funny, though, because they would never get such graphic photos of me, even if they could video me doing “nasty” things. It just plain isn’t possible. Was sending those nasty photos supposed to convince me to pay them? I don’t know. But it didn’t work, and it was really gross. I reported the email to Outlook, not that I think they’ll do anything about it.

I also came across a stupid blonde joke this morning. Check this out…

I don’t understand why it’s funny to make fun of blondes…

I think blonde jokes are stupid, mainly because I’m a blonde, and I’m not dumb. I mean, some people might call me dumb, but I know I’m not a dim-witted person. I have blonde friends– natural blondes, mind you– who are also not deserving of the dumb blonde stereotype. I spell it with the “e”, because blonde jokes are always directed at women. You rarely hear someone making fun of a blond man.

Among Dolly Parton’s first hits… but she didn’t write it. At least the words are sort of bucking the stereotype.

Wikipedia tells me that the “dumb blonde” stereotype comes from 18th century Europe. Blondes were supposedly more desirable, but less intelligent than brunettes. It’s sad that in 2023, people are still promoting this idea through lame jokes. I was a big fan of the old sitcom, Three’s Company, back in the 70s and 80s, and Suzanne Somers played a “dumb blonde”. When she left, her character was replaced with a clumsy blonde, Jenilee Harrison,… then came Priscilla Barnes, who played a smart blonde. But, Priscilla’s character didn’t do that much to change the stereotype.

I’m back to natural blonde…

When I was younger, I did have sort of light brown hair for awhile. But I started getting silver hair when I was 24 years old. I’m now 51, and I don’t use haircolor anymore. My hair is now naturally blonde again. Not only am I not dumb, but I never had that much luck with men, until I met Bill. Then, I really hit the jackpot. I think he married me for my mind, rather than my looks. When I ask him, he says it’s because he felt comfortable with me. It wasn’t because of my blonde hair and blue eyes… although my big boobs probably did play a part.

Dolly is no dumbass… that’s for sure. Is she a blonde? Who knows… but the end effect is the same.

The funny thing about the above interview is that Barbara Walters is acting like Dolly looks like a “freak”. I guess in 1977, Dolly’s appearance was pretty extreme. But then, I can think of other people from that era who were also pretty extreme in the way they looked. In 2023, that look is nothing, though. Now, so many people seem to be covered in tattoos and piercings.

In 1977, we couldn’t conceive of some of the stuff that is going on today, with some folks trying desperately to take us back to that less liberated era, and other people fighting desperately to keep evolving. It certainly is a strange time to be living… but I guess that could be said for almost any time in history. Imagine how people felt during World War II, when Hitler was trying to take over Europe. Maybe then, it also felt like the strange times would never end.

Watching the news every day, as Donald Trump gets into an ever deeper legal pit of quicksand, I wonder if his reign of the absurd will be ending anytime soon. I don’t think he’ll be president again, but I do think his influence is going to make life more challenging for a long while. He opened a Pandora’s Box of delusional weirdness that may never again be squelched in my lifetime. I have to admit, though, it is kind of satisfying to watch his legal woes pile up.

I am also quite proud of Joe Biden for telling Alabama to stick it and deciding to keep Space Command in Colorado. Fuck those anti-choice people. In Colorado, the whole force will be more ready, because females and LGBTQ folks can get the healthcare they need in PRIVACY. This is about military readiness. In Colorado, it’s more likely the military will be ready to deploy than they would be in Alabama, where politicians want to force people to gestate.

Fuck you, Tommy. You shouldn’t be in office. I love how he’s whining about Biden playing politics, as if Trump wouldn’t do the same thing or much worse.

In any case, as the old saying goes, “nothing endures but change.” This weird stuff isn’t going to last forever. I do wonder, though, if I’ll live to see the end of it. It’s got me feeling a little unsettled.

Yesterday, as I was writing my blog post, I was looking for a clip from the show, Avenue Q. I didn’t end up finding what I was looking for, but I did watch a very reassuring video of the original cast singing the last number, “For Now”. “For Now” is a comforting reminder that everything in life is temporary. Times will either get worse, or they’ll get better, but the one thing we can all count on is change. Just as I had platinum blonde hair as a child, that turned kind of dishwater blonde, then light brown, and has now gone back to platinum blonde, change is a given, and it’s a constant. I’m sure eventually, my hair will turn white. If I manage to live that long, that is…

I’ll admit listening to this made me a little emotional. There’s a lot of truth in this song. I see they made this during the hell of 2020. It was a message we all needed. I still need it in 2023.

Speaking of change… my life changed when I saw the video below. I had never seen it before today, but it’s been around for 16 years.

Don’t be put off by the name of the channel. This is a pretty funny song. Matt Lucas is also in this video!

I’m all over the place with this blog post today. I had meant to write about a different topic entirely, but I got sidetracked by that disgusting spam email with the actual dick pics. And now I’m a bit traumatized. I need some eye bleach, because I can’t unsee those pictures.

Then, I saw the dumb blonde joke, and wondered why so many people think women with light colored hair are dumb. I think it’s a mistake to underestimate people… especially those who are beguiling. There have been many blonde performers who have milked that stereotype all the way to the bank. While I congratulate them for making money, I also think it’s sad that some people feel compelled to promote a negative stereotype to make a living. No one should be encouraged to act “dumb”… at least not unless it’s being done for a very good reason. I don’t think getting rich is a particularly good reason to act dumb.

Anyway, if you managed to follow me through this convoluted morass of a post, I offer my congratulations. Maybe I am a dumb blonde, after all. But I would never park my ass in first class when I paid for economy. 😉

Well… I suppose it’s time I closed this post, and got on with the day. It’s Thursday, so that means vacuuming. Yecch. Maybe Noyzi will get a walk. He didn’t get one yesterday, because of the rain. I’ve also got to buy some new dress shirts for Bill. So… I’m off to tend to my chores. Have a good one, y’all.

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scams, sex, true crime

Partial repost: A scammer tries to threaten the Overeducated Housewife…

I am reposting this post from July 2018, because this just happened to me again… it’s basically the same crappy, threatening email from some scumbag loser who buys old passwords from the dark web. I am not scared of this scam, but want to share it for those who are scared… or just as amused as I am. I have gotten this email a few times by different “people” or “bots” or whatever. It’s always the same stupid threat. For the record, no one on my friends list or contact list would even care if I looked at porn. They’d probably congratulate me.

I see I also wrote about this scam in 2019. Well, the warning bears repeating… Fuck these people!

Picture it.  You’ve just opened your eyes for the first time of the day.  You’re scanning your email messages, most of which are either from mailing lists or just plain junk.  Your eyes hit a message entitled, “Alert!”, followed by part of your email address and one of your passwords. 

You scan the message and it’s basically full of threats and accusations, followed by a demand for money paid in bitcoin.  The scammer claims he or she has infected your computer with malware that can turn on your webcam and has filmed you doing nasty things as you view porn.  If you don’t pay up, the scammer is going to send a sex video of you to your online contacts.

I got a message like that this morning.  There I was, sitting on the toilet, taking a dump, and deleting most of the worthless spam that collects in my email accounts every night.  I got an email from a chap calling himself “Elton Delaney”… (almost certainly not his or her real name).  For the purposes of this blog post, I will refer to “Elton” as male, even though it’s just as likely that the culprit is female.  Here is a screenshot of what Elton sent me last night as I was going to sleep.

I was alarmed the first time I got one of these. Now, I just roll my eyes.

I’ll admit, my first reaction to this email was shock and alarm.  I was barely awake and, the fact is, Elton did have one of my passwords. It’s a very old and weak one that I used on a regular basis maybe 15 years ago.  I have long since upgraded my passwords to more secure ones.  The password Elton has won’t grant access to much now.  
Elton had sent the message to my newest email account, one that I don’t use for emails to friends and family.  Clearly, my email was in a database that got hacked and sold to scuzzy lowlife bottom feeders like Elton and his ilk.  Still, in my sleepy condition, I was initially taken aback by this message.  Poorly written as it is, it was designed to provoke a panicked response, prompting victims to act before thinking.  I surmise that some people must have taken the bait and paid up.  Fortunately, I am not among the duped.  My brain kicked in and I realized that Elton is full of shit.

As of 2018, this was about $4000. The guy who wrote today offered me a bargain at about $2300.

Elton wants me to pay him almost $4000 to keep Bill and a bunch of online retailers from seeing intimate videos of me. It’s not happening. Actually, Bill would probably enjoy seeing such a video. It’s a shame one doesn’t exist.

Despite Elton’s ominous threats, I deleted the message without sending him a .5 bitcoin payment, finished my morning rituals, stripped the sheets off the bed for the wash, and then went down to the living room, where Bill had already set out my morning coffee. I told Bill about Elton’s threat. Not long ago, Bill finished his second master’s degree in cybersecurity. I thought he’d get a kick out of hearing about the threatening scam email I received. I joked to Bill that Elton might send him a video of me doing what he’s seen me do live thousands of times since we’ve been married. Believe me, it’s just not that exciting.

Then I did a quick Google search and found that this particular email scam, which has evidently been around for years, has recently resurged.  Of all of the email phishing scams I’ve seen, this one is probably one of the most infuriating.  It employs shame and the threat of humiliation to blackmail and extort money from the unaware.  While I know what Elton claims to have on me would not be very interesting to my email contacts, plenty of people are looking at things online that might damage their reputations or upset their friends and loved ones.  Those people, eager to keep their embarrassing online habits under wraps, are most likely to give in to demands for payment.  Unfortunately, our culture promotes shame, especially regarding sexual matters.

Although some people have been swindled by these emails, the scammers themselves are often quite stupid. Here’s a link to a story out of Miami where a woman named Briyana Valls tried to extort money using threatening text messages. She texted a guy who had briefly left his phone unattended at a bar, and threatened to tell his wife he was cheating on her unless he paid Valls $500. For all of her threats, Valls didn’t prove to be very savvy. She agreed to be paid in person, and that’s when she got nabbed by the police. Valls is now cooling her heels in jail, where she faces extortion and grand theft charges. The FBI also recently issued a warning about these email scams.

Sure, I’ve looked at porn on the Internet.  I expect a whole lot of people have.  It’s not something I do very often, though, because frankly, I find most porn videos boring and kind of gross.  I am much more inclined to read dirty stories, and most of the free ones on the Internet are terrible.  I’d do better to write them myself.  There was even a period in my life when I wrote erotica just to pass the time.  It’s part of what attracted Bill to me.  Given that fact, Elton’s threats mean very little, especially since I don’t have a boss and my mother doesn’t use the Internet.  If she did, I doubt she’d care that her married 46 year old (er 49 year old) daughter is finally sexually active.    

But even if I was watching a lot of porn and Elton’s threats were somehow credible, there is just no way Elton got any videos of me doing nasty things.  It simply didn’t happen.  There is no way it could have.  If Elton did send all of my contacts a “sex video” of me, it would probably either bore them to tears or make them laugh.  Besides, most of the people who would be getting the videos would be spammers like him and burned out online retailers who might welcome the distraction.  I don’t use that particular email address for communicating with most of my loved ones.  The lone exception is Bill, who is well aware of my tastes for sexually explicit stuff.

I was also pretty put off by Elton’s nasty and threatening tone.  Some of the scammers who send out these emails are at least decent enough to be funny.  Elton’s email requesting money comes across as very rude.  It definitely wasn’t something I wanted to read first thing in the morning.  Hey Elton, you get more flies with honey than vinegar, you feckless fuckstick.  The next time you send me a threatening email, have the decency to say “please” and “thank you”.  Maybe if you did that more often, your life’s mission wouldn’t be reduced to sending pathetic scam emails to uninteresting and unsexy overeducated housewives like me.

So… if you happen to get one of these emails yourself, just toss it into the round file.  Don’t worry.  It’s a scam.  If any of you happen to get a video of me doing nasty things, I hope you enjoy it.  And Elton, if you ever read this post, please go fuck yourself… and be sure to video it and send it to all of your friends and loved ones.

Edited to add:  Bill says the people behind this scam have already collected over $250,000.  Don’t fall for it!

Edited to add in 2021: At least this time, the email was in my spam folder and had a big red warning on it, so at least the email servers are getting that this crap doesn’t belong anywhere where people might take it seriously. Seriously… none of my friends would care if they saw a video of me looking at porn. And any that would care aren’t worth my time, anyway.

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complaints, narcissists, poor judgment, rants

“A man’s got to put in overtime to get me off…”

If you happened to notice the three book reviews I reposted this morning, you might have noticed a theme. This morning, I have sex on the brain. It might be because of a spam message I got on messenger yesterday.

This is just one of thirteen spam messages I got yesterday, but it’s by far the funniest of the lot.

Lately, I’ve been responding more to comments on newspaper sites. I think that has prompted spammers to send me messages like the one above. The vast majority of people write “Hallo” or “Hello” to me. I especially get tickled by the ones who think I’m German and attempt to write to me in Deutsch.

I usually just delete these messages without a second thought, but the one above cracked me up. I shared it with my friends. One even responded by inviting me to share her page with this guy. She’s kidding, of course. We shared a laugh. Laughter is a good thing right now.

Last week, I got two spams from the same guy– clearly someone from Ghana who had hijacked someone’s Facebook photo and location and was sending out these random invitations to chat. On that particular message, he referred to me as “Bud Queen” and congratulated me for looking “clean”. That one cracked me up the first time, but then he came back!

My mom would be so proud that she did her job right! I’m “clean looking”!

And the rest of the funny ones I’ve gotten over the past couple of weeks and shared for my friends’ amusement appear below…

  • Fuck off, Marcus.
  • Sorry for your troubles, mon.
  • I cringe when people call me “dear”.
  • Something tells me Albert’s name is a subliminal message for horny women.
  • This person seems to have an identity crisis going on.
Actually, I’ve gotten a lot more of these. I only save the funny ones.

As I was thinking about these “invitations” to chat with strange men, I remembered a funny scene in Eddie Murphy’s hilarious 1989 film, Coming to America. He and Arsenio Hall are in a bar meeting women, and they’re all very strange or annoying.

So much to love about this scene. I miss going out. And I relate to the woman who can’t be satisfied, starting at 35 seconds. So… I don’t think James Michael and I would be a love match.

I watched that clip again as I was writing this and it made me laugh. That’s a good thing, since I was getting pretty annoyed by the news last night. First off, I read a very pathetic article about a bunch of people who stormed the Capitol last month. In the article, it stated that many of the people who got in trouble are folks who have serious financial problems. Case in point, 50 year old Texas real estate broker and life coach Jenna Ryan, who projects an air of success and supposed sexuality is, in reality, broke. A couple of weeks ago, she was accepting donations for her legal defense fund. Then she wrote that she didn’t “need” the donations, but people would be “blessed” for helping her. Now, come to find out, she’s actually in pretty serious financial trouble and has been for awhile…

Now, y’all know me. I try to give a lot of people the benefit of the doubt. I’m not a big fan of prison. I try to realize that everyone makes mistakes. However, I am also not a big fan of narcissism and, frankly, Jenna kind of reeks narcissistic tendencies. I was about to share her Twitter, which until yesterday, was on full display. But I just went to her page and it looks like she’s deleted her account. I found my way to Jenna’s Twitter account (which should have been deleted weeks ago) after reading an article describing her as “gorgeous”.

A bunch of people were calling her out for her “attention seeking” behavior.

Most people, when they get called out like this, retreat into the shadows. But at least until yesterday, Jenna was still engaging the masses, who were not falling for her sob story. From the Washington Post:

Despite her outward signs of success, Ryan had struggled financially for years. She was still paying off a $37,000 lien for unpaid federal taxes when she was arrested. She’d nearly lost her home to foreclosure before that. She filed for bankruptcy in 2012 and faced another IRS tax lien in 2010.

And yet, just a couple of weeks ago, as she begged for donations for her legal fees, she tweeted this:

So… basically, besides being pathetic enough to fall for Trump’s bullshit and getting involved in criminal activity, Jenna is also a liar and a fraud. She’s not unlike those spammer scammers who try to engage middle-aged broads like me, thinking flattery and the promise of a sugar daddy is a “blessing”.

Jenna Ryan also recently whined about how she doesn’t think she deserves a prison sentence for doing what “her president” asked her to do. She hoped Trump would pardon her, but wasn’t smart enough to realize that Trump doesn’t reward failure. The attempt to “stop the steal” wasn’t successful and made Trump look even worse than he usually does, so he’s not going to reward anyone involved with that. Anyway… having read that story about how Ryan and her rioting pals are mostly people with no money and no hope, I was left feeling pity… for Jenna’s two mini goldendoodles, who will have to be rehomed if she winds up in prison. From the Post:

Ain’t she cute in her Trump hat?

“We just stormed the Capital,” Ryan tweeted that afternoon. “It was one of the best days of my life.”

She said she realized she was in trouble only after returning to Texas. Her phone was blowing up with messages. Her social media posts briefly made her the infamous face of the riots: the smiling real estate agent who flew in a private jet to an insurrection.

Nine days later, she turned herself in to the FBI. She was charged with two federal misdemeanors related to entering the Capitol building and disorderly conduct. Last week, federal authorities filed similar charges against two others on her flight: Jason L. Hyland, 37, of Frisco, who federal authorities said organized the trip, and Katherine S. Schwab, 32, of Colleyville, Texas.

Ryan remained defiant at first. She clashed with people who criticized her online. She told a Dallas TV station that she deserved a presidential pardon.

Then Trump left for Florida. President Biden took office. And Ryan, at home in Texas, was left to wonder what to do with her two mini-goldendoodle dogs if she goes to prison.

“Not one patriot is standing up for me,” Ryan said recently. “I’m a complete villain. I was down there based on what my president said. ‘Stop the steal.’ Now I see that it was all over nothing. He was just having us down there for an ego boost. I was there for him.”

Poor baby. My heart is breaking for her. Sounds to me like she and Trump are birds of a feather, only he’s a more charismatic and successful con man than she is.

After I was done reading about Jenna Ryan’s legal and financial woes, and those of her fellow insurrectionists, I moved on to a trio of articles that appeared in the Washington Post and The New York Times about the benefits of double masking. I’ve already vented my spleen on how I feel about being expected to “double mask” (wear two face masks at one time). I’m not going to do it again with this post. Instead, I’m going to offer an observation.

I read some of the comments for the double masking articles on The New York Times and The Washington Post. I am now left with the impression that there are a lot more obnoxious assholes per capita in the D.C. area than in New York City. Or, at least the readers of the two papers are different. The comments for the Washington Post were mostly of the virtue signaling, shaming variety, with people getting downright rude and nasty when someone dared to even joke about this subject. Or, if someone rightly pointed out the face masks don’t stop COVID-19 (and they DON’T), people would indignantly share pro mask articles.

To be clear– face masks help slow the spread of disease by preventing some of the droplets from getting into the atmosphere. They don’t actually stop the virus. Lots of people have gotten sick while wearing a mask, gloves, or anything else. What works best is physically staying the fuck away from others, which is very difficult for most people to do. Hence the need for masks.

And, as I have pointed out many times, wearing a mask does present legitimate problems for some people. Most people can wear the mask just fine, but there are some people who can’t. They have a right to be heard, too. But God forbid you dare write that in any comment section for the WaPo. You will quickly be labeled a “Trumper” or a “COVIDIOT” or something else by perfect strangers. People will immediately pile on to tell you that whatever your issues are with the masks are 100% bullshit– or they will ask you for your “qualifications”. I dare someone to ask me that. They’re usually very surprised when I tell them that I actually have a MPH from a real and accredited university, rather than the Google School of Public Health.

By contrast, on The New York Times‘ comment sections, I noticed people were much more tolerant of those making light of the suggestion to wear two masks (as opposed to simply wearing a better fitting or better quality mask). The comments were more even-handed and some were legitimately hilarious. There weren’t a lot of anti-maskers there. Instead, it was people who were a little bit more open to having a discussion without attacking. It was kind of refreshing. But then, I have spent some time in the D.C. area and I know for a fact there are a lot of self-absorbed and self-important assholes who live there. And I have visited New York a few times and I always come away with the impression that New Yorkers are a bit more cosmopolitan and sophisticated. It’s much more of a cultural melting pot than D.C. is. D.C. is a place where narcissistic people gather to get into power, and they often do it with dirty and dishonest tactics.

And finally, just before I went to sleep, I saw this photo… Many people love it. They think it’s cute and funny. Let me go on record to say that I don’t love it. If I saw this sign, even while properly donning a face mask, I would turn around and walk the other direction. Being rude and insulting is not a good business practice, in my view. Lecturing people and calling them childish or stupid is not going to change their minds.

I hate this sign. If I saw this sign, I would NOT give this person my business. It’s not because I’m “anti-mask”. I’m “anti asshole”. I don’t think this kind of confrontational and belligerent attitude is helpful. But anyway, I don’t live where this food truck is located, so I doubt this guy misses my business. My response to him would be a hearty “Fuck off.” But I would say it with my RBF.

Anyway… I apologize for the obvious tension in this post. I am a bit angsty for a lot of reasons. Germany will stay locked down until at least March 7. I’m bored and depressed and tired of all the stupid bullshit. I’m wondering what the point of living is. I think most people are assholes, mainly because I read too many comment sections and get yucky spam scams in my messenger. And I’m just tired of all the negativity, insults, and directives from perfect strangers who know about as much as what they’ve read on CNN… as well as clueless twits like Jenna Ryan, who thinks she should get a “pass” for doing incredibly stupid and self-destructive things in the name of “patriotism”.

I probably ought to go find myself a good video game or porn site and lose myself in fantasy for awhile. Maybe that will help me cope as I fantasize about my next journey out of my neighborhood. But, as I pointed out earlier, “a man’s got to put in overtime to get me off.” It’s probably a good thing my vibrator is German.

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