People still fall for this?

I got this e-mail the other day.

I am surprised this is still out there and that people are still falling for it.

The e-mail said:

From the desk of Mr Samba Ibrahim

Bill and exchange manager

African development bank

Ouagadougou Burkina Faso

Dear friend,

I crave your indulgence for the unsolicited nature of this letter, but it was borne out of desperation and current development. Please bear with me. My name is Mr Samba Ibrahim an auditor of African development bank. I discovered existing dormant account for 5 years.

When I discovered that there had been neither continuation nor withdrawals from this account for this long period and our banking law stipulates that any unserviceable account for more than 5 years will gointo the bank revenue as an unclaimed fund.

I have made personal inquiries about the depositor and his next of kin but sadly, the depositor and his next of kin died in motor accident while the rest of the family died in Iraq during the crisis, I only made this investigation just to be double sure of this fact and since I have been unsuccessful in locating the relatives.

I seek your consent to present yourself as the next of kin of the deceased. as an auditor in the bank I will use my position in the bank to help you becoming thenext of kin to the estate, so that the proceeds of this account valued at $25.6 million dollars can be transferred to you, this is the story in a nutshell.

Now I want an account over seas where the bank will transfer this fund. Thereafter, I will come for the sharing and investment, also to use part of the money to help the iranians, it is a careful network and for the past eleven months i have worked out everything to ensure a hitch-free operation.

[Blah blah blah, more about how this guy is trustworthy.]

This message is respectfully yours,

Mr Samba Ibrahim

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In case you didn't catch on, this is a SCAM!

All this guy wants is my bank account information so he can clean it out and keep it for himself. And I am sure he is not even African. He is probably some 30 something bald dude living in his Mom's basement.

There is another common one where some guy mails you a check for $5000 and asks you to deposit it in your account because he doesn't have access to a safe account. He says just send him back a money order for $2500 and you can keep the rest. So people fall for this, they send the money order, go buy a big screen tv with this windfall and then find out that the original $5000 check was fake and they have just given away $2500 dollars that they don't have.

This is a warning to my blogging friends, just in case you haven't heard of these. Please don't fall for this stuff.

Don't give anybody your bank account information. I never give out my bank account info to anybody unless I was the one who called them. I don't care who they are.

Even people that I legitimately owe money to can send me a paper bill. They don't need my info over the phone.

I once got a phone call that said I had won a cruise. All I had to do was give them my bank account information to "verify my identity". When I wouldn't give it to them, they tried to make feel stupid for not trusting them.

Some times they call you to ask for donations for a good cause, but they are not legitimate. If you are not sure, hang up the phone.

Please be careful.

These fleecers are out there trying to take advantage of you.

Good, intelligent people fall for this stuff all the time.

Be good, be intelligent, but don't get screwed.

-Della

A Puzzle

Mike sent me an e-mail that contained the following puzzle:

A man wanted to get into his work building, but he had forgotten his code.

However, he did remember five clues. These are what those clues were:

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The fifth number plus the third number equals fourteen.

The fourth number is one more than the second number.

The first number is one less than twice the second number.

The second number plus the third number equals ten.

The sum of all five numbers is 30.

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What were the five numbers and in what order?

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The cool thing about the e-mail was that there was an attachment which was coded. The code had to be entered in order to open the attachment.

The code to the attachment was the answer to the puzzle.

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I couldn't figure out how to put the coded attachment in the blog, but if you think you know the answer leave a comment and I will forward the e-mail to you. Assuming, of course, that I know your e-mail address.

Have fun. I know several of you will get it.

-Della

Wordless Wednesday

Memorial Day- again

I didn't get around to posting yesterday, but I did want to pay more homage to our soldiers and veterans.

So here are some Memorial Day cartoons. (Thanks again, Grandpa).

I guess I ended up doing this a day late after all. But I think that's ok. We need to remember these guys every day.

-Della

Sunday Post, Memorial Day

This time I am going to be a day ahead instead of behind and post for Memorial Day today.

I had to pick what to post since I get a lot of great patriotic e-mails from my Grandpa (who is a veteran himself).

I am going with simplicity.

Chances are you have seen this before, but it is true everytime.

It is the VETERAN, not the preacher,

who has given us freedom of religion.

It is the VETERAN, not the reporter,

who has given us freedom of the press.

It is the VETERAN, not the poet,

who has given us freedom of speech.

It is the VETERAN, not the campus organizer,

who has given us freedom to assemble.

It is the VETERAN, not the lawyer,

who has given us the right to a fair trial.

It is the VETERAN, not the politician,

Who has given us the right to vote.

A lot of people trash our government, but have never lived in communism or under tyranny.

People complain about taxes, but drive on the roads their taxes pay for.

They protest wars, but don't take thought for their freedom of speech that allows them to protest.

They outrage about the economy, but buy products made overseas.

They denounce the president, but have never had to pay homage to a king or emperor.

I love my country.

I love the USA.

I thank God I was born here and have the freedoms, privileges and opportunities I have.

I thank the Veterans, who have fought, served, and been buried under our flag, for preserving my quality of life.

GOD bless the USA!

Don't Road Rage the Grandma

Another cool Grannie, making sure that sonny shows her the respect she deserves.

My sense of humor

Sometimes I think some of my viewers must look at some of the things I post and present as funny and cock their heads to the side wondering what I was thinking and if they really want to continue association with someone like me.

I know there are a few of you out there who share my sense of humor (thanks for the support Liz) and appreciate my sometimes odd posts.

Lucky for me I also have a brother who agrees with my ideas of what is funny, (at least most of the time). And he not only agrees with me, he sometimes e-mails me things that end up on the blog.

He sent me a few e-mails yesterday that probably had over a hundred hilarious pictures.

I could probably start a blog just for the funny pictures I get in e-mails, but instead, you guys are stuck with them.

I will only post a couple today, but be prepared to see a lot of the "motivational" pics in the future.

To save any confusion let me add that there is nothing remotely motivational about these pics. They are simply interesting pictures that someone added a black frame and funny caption to.

I will save you all from the many off color, tasteless, and otherwise unpleasant ones here on the blog, (but if you are interested in those anyway I can e-mail them to you), and only post the ones that seemed funny -but safe- to me. Sorry for the occasional curse word.

I hope you enjoy these as much as I did.

Thanks Mike for the blog fodder.

Oh, @#$%!!

I'm pretty good about not cursing in front of my boys. Really, I am.

But I think there are some occasions when a swear word or two is forgiveable.

I had one of those when T and I were driving home yesterday.

We were less than a mile away from home, (isn't that where all accidents happen?), going straight, when a little green jetta pulled right out in front of us.

I slammed on the brakes and uttered an expletive that would otherwise never cross my lips when in the company of, well, pretty much anyone, except maybe Chris.

Little Green Jetta saw me coming and tried to accelerate out of my trajectory. While this was the smartest course of action at that point, given that I would have fully broadsided him otherwise, it nevertheless failed to remove him completely from my path in time to save our vehicles from a collision course and thereby any damage.

Gratefully, no one was injured. And, surprisingly the airbags didn't even deploy. Probably because the impact point was on the corner of the car rather than directly in front.

Little Green Jetta took about the same amount of damage, but we have yet to see who gets the bigger repair bill.

Gratefully again, Little Green Jetta was insured and completely accountable for the accident.

It was a nice afternoon and several locals were outside enjoying the day, so we had several witnesses, as well as helpful bystanders who made the call to 911 and assisted us in trading information.

Really, it sucked to be in the accident, but it could have been a $%## of a lot worse.

*Grandma, if you see this, we really are okay. No one got so much as a bruise or a scratch. So don't worry.

-Della

Wordless Wednesday

Shismaref, Alaska

Happy Birthday T!

Yesterday was T's birthday!

Mike called from Iraq before school to tell him happy birthday.

Nana sent him a quilt.

Chet called from Alaska to tell him happy birthday too.

He wanted Chinese for dinner so we went to a chinese buffet. They had sushi too and I convinced several of my boys to try some.

Later T and I were playing World of Warcraft on separate computers. This is an online game where you interact with other people who are playing online. I knew T's character, Fireicenigh, was in Storwind City. Stormwind City, along with all the other areas. has a chat where you can type in something and eveyone who is in the city at that time will see it. This may be 100 people or more easily.

So I went to Stormwind and typed in the City's chat that it was his birthday. I wished Fireicenigh happy birthday several times over the city chat.

Other people joined in and told him happy birthday too. He even got offers to give him birthday spankings.

After several minutes of this he typed in "Ok, I get it Mom".

Everyone thought that was pretty funny too, and I got a good laugh out of it.

Happy Birthday T. I hope it's a good year and you get everything you want out of it.

-Della

3 Monkeys

Our elementary school had a carnival last weekend.

I volunteered to help out and was one of over 100 volunteers. I was very impressed with the volunteer support and organization.

They ended up needing all of the volunteers as they had over 40 games. There was also Domino's Pizza, Coldstone ice cream, a magician, a face painting clown, a balloon animal guy and half a dozen or so inflateables.

I was on the cotton candy.

The balloon guy was especially impressive. I wish I had had my camera with me to take pictures of his creations. He was the best balloon animal guy I have ever seen. He made a lot of hats that included jewelled crowns, butterflys with antennae, a goalpost with football in action, aliens with bubble helmets and lots of other things.

One of my favorites was a hat that had a ballon baseball hanging down about 18 inches in front of the little boy's face. The boy had a balloon bat to swat the ball with.

If I had taken the time to wait in line I would have asked for a carrot-on-a-stick hat.

Here is a picture of little Chris with his balloon hat and facepaint after the carnival.

We had a lot of fun. CJ particularly enjoyed the magician as he is developing an interest in Magic.

Mark spent most of his time playing on the playground with his friends. But he got what he wanted out of the day.

-Della

Out Today!! (Product pick)

2 things are being released today that I have been waiting for!

The first, Wii Fit, I have had reserved with a deposit at Game Stop since January.

The second, Odd Hours, I didn't even know was coming out until a few days ago, but I was excited about imediately.

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Wii Fit is a really cool game/ exercise console that you use with your Wii.

The Wii Fit board is a wireless exercise board. This nifty board can weigh you, check your balance, calculate your BMI (Body Mass Index), and teach you yoga.

No kidding. (If I could just get it to do bathrooms).

You use the Wii Fit board for all of the games and exercises that Wii Fit offers. Some of which include initial body test, balance games such as ski slalom and soccer, strength training exercises like push-ups, side plank, and lunges, plus aerobic exercises like hula hoop and running.

The Wii Fit sold out completely in Japan in less than a week when they released it there.

This game/ exercise tool a little more expensive than most games. Standard new Wii games run about 5o bucks. The Wii Fit is $89.99.

The price makes sense considering the additional hardware, ie. the wireless board. And I'm sure Nintendo figures America will pay, especially since this product crosses 2 of our favorite things to spend money on, video games, and health and weight loss tools/ gimmicks.

And the Wii Fit sold out completely in Japan in less than a week when they released it there.

I think they are right though, when I checked the Game Stop website this morning it said they were already sold out. I am only counting on getting mine because I reserved it.

You can check it out more at the >>>Nintendo Wii Fit<<< site.

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So the next thing I am excited about today: Odd Hours by Dean Koontz

This is the 4th book in the Odd Thomas series.

They are about a unique and interesting young man who can see the dead.

"The dead don't talk, I don't know why."

The first book, Odd Thomas is my favorite in the series, but I have enjoyed all of them immensely. I even suggested Odd Thomas for my book club and they loved it.

I will be downloading the audiobook today so Chris and I can listen to it on our ipods.

(We don't share books well and have had to buy 2 copies of every Harry Potter book. We have learned that audio books we can buy once, but both use at the same time.)

So maybe I can listen to Odd Hours while doing yoga or running on my Wii Fit.

Sunday Post

I AM THANKFUL:

FOR THE WIFE WHO SAYS IT'S HOT DOGS TONIGHT,BECAUSE SHE IS HOME WITH ME,AND NOT OUT WITH SOMEONE ELSE.

FOR THE HUSBAND WHO IS ON THE SOFA BEING A COUCH POTATO, BECAUSE HE IS HOME WITH ME AND NOT OUT AT THE BARS.

FOR THE TEENAGER WHO IS COMPLAINING ABOUT DOING DISHES BECAUSE IT MEANS SHE IS AT HOME, NOT ON THE STREETS.

FOR THE TAXES I PAY BECAUSE IT MEANS I AM EMPLOYED.

FOR THE MESS TO CLEAN AFTER A PARTY BECAUSE IT MEANS I HAVE BEEN SURROUNDED BY FRIENDS.

FOR THE CLOTHES THAT FIT A LITTLE TOO SNUG BECAUSE IT MEANS I HAVE ENOUGH TO EAT.

FOR MY SHADOW THAT WATCHES ME WORK BECAUSE IT MEANS I AM OUT IN THE SUNSHINE.

FOR A LAWN THAT NEEDS MOWING, WINDOWS THAT NEED CLEANING, AND GUTTERS THAT NEED FIXING BECAUSE IT MEANS I HAVE A HOME.

FOR ALL THE COMPLAINING I HEAR ABOUT THE GOVERNMENT BECAUSE IT MEANS WE HAVE FREEDOM OF SPEECH.

FOR THE PARKING SPOT I FIND AT THE FAR END OF THE PARKING LOT BECAUSE IT MEANS I AM CAPABLE OF WALKING AND I HAVE BEEN BLESSED WITH TRANSPORTATION.

FOR MY HUGE HEATING BILL BECAUSE IT MEANS I AM WARM.

FOR THE LADY BEHIND ME IN CHURCH WHO SINGS OFF KEY BECAUSE IT MEANS I CAN HEAR.

FOR THE PILE OF LAUNDRY AND IRONING BECAUSE IT MEANS I HAVE CLOTHES TO WEAR.

FOR WEARINESS AND ACHING MUSCLES AT THE END OF THE DAY BECAUSE IT MEANS I HAVE BEEN CAPABLE OF WORKING HARD.

FOR THE ALARM THAT GOES OFF IN THE EARLY MORNING HOURS BECAUSE IT MEANS I AM ALIVE.

And I am thankful for friends who read my blog because I know they care about me.

Talking about Dave Barry...

Sixteen Things it Took Me Fifty Years to Learn

By: Dave Barry, Nationally Syndicated Columnist

1. Never, under any circumstances, take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night.

2. If you had to identify, in one word, the reason why the human race has not achieved, and never will achieve, its full potential, that word would be "meetings."

3. There is a very fine line between "hobby" and "mental illness."

4. People who want to share their religious views with you almost never want you to share yours with them.

5. You should not confuse your career with your life.

6. Nobody cares if you can't dance well. Just get up and dance. (This one is very important)

7. Never lick a steak knife.

8. The most destructive force in the universe is gossip.

9. You will never find anybody who can give you a clear and compelling reason why we observe daylight savings time.

10. You should never say anything to a woman that even remotely suggests that you think she's pregnant unless you can see an actual baby emerging from her at that moment.

11. There comes a time when you should stop expecting other people to make a big deal about your birthday. That time is age 11.

12. The one thing that unites all human beings, regardless of age, gender, religion, economic status or ethnic background, is that, deep down inside, we ALL believe that we are above average drivers.

13. A person, who is nice to you, but rude to a waiter, is not a nice person. (This is very important. Pay attention. It never fails.)

14. Your friends love you anyway.

15. Never be afraid to try something new. Remember that a lone amateur built the Ark. A large group of professionals built the Titanic.

16. Thought for the day: Men are like fine wine . . They start out as grapes; and it's up to the women to stomp the crap out of them until they turn into something acceptable to have dinner with.

Floating Frogs, Dave Barry style

Some of you are already familiar with my fascination with Frogs.

So when I found a hilarious article about them by Dave Barry I had to share it.

I hope you laugh as hard as I did.

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Get ready to dance naked in the streets, because scientists have finally done something that humanity has long dreamed about, but most of us thought would never happen within our lifetimes.

That's right: They have levitated a frog.

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I swear I am not making this up. According to an Associated Press article sent in by a number of alert readers, British and Dutch scientists "have succeeded in floating a frog in air.''

They did this by using magnetism, which, as you recall from physics class, is a powerful force that causes certain items to be attracted to refrigerators.

Magnetism is one of the Six Fundamental Forces of the Universe, with the other five being Gravity, Duct Tape, Whining, Remote Control and The Force That Pulls Dogs Toward The Groins Of Strangers.

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The AP article states that the scientists levitated the frog by subjecting it to "a magnetic field a million times stronger than that of the Earth.'' According to scientists, the frog "showed no signs of distress after floating in the air inside a magnetic cylinder.''

. I am not a trained scientist, but my reaction to that last statement is -- and I quote -- "Duh.'' I mean, of course the frog "showed no signs of distress'': It's a frog. Frogs are not known for their ability to show emotions; they are limited to essentially one facial expression, very much like Jean-Claude Van Damme.

What did these scientists expect the frog to do? Cry? Hop around on their computer keyboard and spell out the words "I AM EXPERIENCING DISTRESS''?

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No, we don't really know what the frog was feeling; this is why we should be skeptical about the scientists' claim, as reported in the AP story, that "there is no reason'' why this same magnetic technique could not be used on "larger creatures, even humans.''

Before we start exposing human beings to extremely powerful magnetic fields, we should conduct extensive laboratory tests on Richard Simmons.

But if magnetic levitation really turns out to be safe, I think it could have some important "real world'' applications:

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1. GETTING CHILDREN OUT OF BED ON SCHOOL MORNINGS.

Scientists calculate that the attraction between a child and his or her bed on a school morning can be up to 75 times as strong as mere gravity.

Most parents try to overcome this attraction by pounding on the door and shouting ineffective threats, the most popular one being: "YOU'RE GOING TO BE LATE FOR SCHOOL!''

The problem with this threat is that it's based on the idiotic premise that the child wants to be in school and be forced to sit on a hard chair and figure out how many times 7 goes into 56; naturally, the child prefers the bed.

Think, parents, how much easier it would be if, at 6:30 a.m. on school mornings, you could simply press a button, thereby activating gigantic magnets under your child's bed that would cause the child to float upward, along with any frogs that happened to be in bed with the child.

Then, instead of wasting your time yelling "YOU'RE GOING TO BE LATE FOR SCHOOL!'' you could waste your time yelling "STOP DRAWING WITH THAT MARKING PEN ON THE CEILING!''

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So perhaps this is not such a good use for magnetic levitation after all. Perhaps a better one would be:

2. COPING WITH PEOPLE WHO "SAVE'' SEATS.

I don't know about you, but it makes me nuts when I enter a self-service restaurant, airport gate area, movie theater, etc., and there are people "saving'' seats -- sometimes lots of seats -- for people who are not there, and who sometimes do not ever actually show up, which does not stop the savers from vigilantly guarding their seats, often by placing items such as shopping bags on them.

My feeling is, if an actual person was physically there and had to go to the bathroom or something, fine, you can "save'' that person's seat until he or she returns; but if you're "saving'' a seat for a hypothetical person who is not there, then the seat should go to real people who ARE there.

The concept of "saving'' seats should be restricted to junior high school, where "frontsy-backsy'' is still considered a legal technique for butting into line.

So my idea is that public seating areas would be monitored via cameras; if a "seat-saver'' was observed denying seats to real people, the appropriate magnets would be activated, and the seat-saver, along with the shopping bags, would vacate the "saved'' seats, very much the way a Poseidon missile vacates a submarine.

Granted, the magnetic field would also prevent everybody else from using the seats, but I think the overall effect would be worth it.

3. IMPROVING THE QUALITY OF MEDICAL CARE.

I recently had my annual physical examination, which I get once every seven years, and when the nurse weighed me, I was shocked to discover how much stronger the Earth's gravitational pull has become since 1990.

There should be magnets -- very powerful magnets -- under doctors' scales to compensate for the gravitational increase, much the way economists adjust dollar amounts for inflation. I'm sure I could come up with other practical uses for magnetic human levitation, but I have to go. It's been an hour since lunch, and, as a resident of the Earth's magnetic field, I find myself powerfully attracted to the refrigerator.