Internet Personals

One of the interesting things about using internet personals is seeing just how stupid the scam-artists trying to fool people are. I should say stupid or ignorant as it seems that America's continued refusal to switch to the metric system helps one pick out the foreign scammers who are unable to do simple conversion math. Thus, I get a lot of emails from women who are 6'2" and weigh 80 pounds.

At times, these 6'2" women will also have photos of themselves next to something that helps you estimate their height such as a picture of themselves standing next to a sedan, and their head barely comes over the roof of the car.

Oftentimes, the system itself helps you out as several of them will now give you an option to look at a list of people who have looked at your profile. Oftentimes, I have an email or 'wink" from someone who is not in my list of people who have viewed me. And 9 times out of 10, they're from 6'2", 80-pound women.

For the non-English-As-a-Native-Speaker scammers, it seems that many of them are using the same translation software as I am constantly told by "Russian Women" that they like my, "structure." It also helps when they apparently just randomly click when it comes to their various physical attributes (choosing hair/eye color, etc.) because their written profile will often contradict what they say.

In the same vein, color-blindness or inability to distinguish basic races is another pitfall as I often get messages from very attractive and very dark African women who call themselves Caucasian as well as women born in other countries listing themselves as Native American.

My most recent scammer is apparently another very attractive African lady whose profile goes on and on about how God-fearing she is, and how she wishes to find a man just as God-fearing as she is, etc. Her first two pictures are normal portrait shots where she's wearing what looks like a suit jacket. The third picture is more of a 3/4's pose with her hand inside the jacket cupping her breast (can't see anything) while she stares seductively at the camera. Message: When I think of Jesus, I touch myself.

Several of the sites have a chat feature, and every now and then, I'll get a chat request from someone I've never talked to before, and I can check her profile. Depending on the profile, I will greet them with, "Hi, I'll talk with you but only if you don't have a sick mom in Africa who needs my help." I've had 3 people automatically disconnect after that.

The scammers apparently know to only go after men. I have an IM buddy that I met through one of the sites (hopefully she's really a woman), who was shocked to learn about stuff like this.

One thing that I like to do is mess with them back because number 1, I just like messing with people, and number 2, it wastes their time. I carried on an email conversation with an "attractive African woman" who had been living close to me (what a coincidence) but was back home in Ghana taking care of her sick mother (of course). After a few emails back and forth, we had declared our mutual love for each other and decided we should meet right away. So I sent "her" an email, once again declaring my love and stating I would be on the next plane to Ghana to meet her just as soon as she helped me out by sending me money for a plane ticket as I was going through some financial difficulties at the time.

I never heard from her again.

Bitch broke my heart.