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The Danger of Forwarding Emails by Pete Nicely My aunt recently told me that she got an email account in a way that suggested I should be impressed like she was going to a Laker game with Jack Nicholson or replacing Rik Rok as Shaggy's main collaborator. She took to the net like a Jew to Laughlin. And she immediately disregarded my advice and signed up for every mailing list possible. As a result, on a recent Tuesday she got 342 emails in her inbox. She told me this like I should be proud of her. As soon as she could, my aunt began forwarding me things. She would forward me humorous asides about kids on Ritalin, like I had been. She would even send me humorous riffs at heavy drug users, as I had been. Her favorite things to forward, of course, were lists of things about farts or cuss words. The worst thing was that every time she sent out a list another one of my awful distant relatives figured out my email and decided to write me to see if I could get them tickets to Disneyland where I'm working as an accountant. My tolerance ran out when my aunt sent me a list of what every religion is about in relationship to the word "shit" (Like you don't know: Judiasm= Why does shit always happen to me; Hindu = This shit has happened before) . I tightened with frustration; She thought I hadn't seen that embarrassing bit of glib philosophy by 2002. Hadn't she ever been inside a T-shirt shop, a car wash gift shop? It made me want to kill her. But I didn't. After that every time my aunt forwarded me, I wrote back the exact same thing: Aunt (I love simply calling her aunt like I am in the Joy Luck Club), Please do not forward me anything you did not write. I love to hear from you but I don't have time to read the email I get for work as it is. Thanks, Nephew. I think this upset her because my Mom would vaguely ask me about it and I would repeat the idea of my response and try to move on. Nothing worked. The forwards kept coming at an increasing pace. I decided to retaliate. I forwarded everything I got, including junk email, including the junkmail that said "Pete Nicely, finally there is a simple solution to your small penis". In one week I think I forwarded her over 500 pieces of mail. I worked about five hours of overtime to fit it all in. Then it stopped. For a whole week I didn't get one email from her. I hoped I would never hear from her again. I imagined not speaking to her for the next fifty Thanksgiving. I had fought back in the only way I could. Then my mom called, "Pete, you gave your aunt a computer virus." I did not. It was impossible. "She wants you to come over her house and fix it," my mom told me. I wouldn't. Two days later my Mom called again and threatened me. She told me what was at stake: her Hanukkah present, my aunt's Hanukkah present maybe even my Grandma's. I didn't give a fuck about the presents but the idea of my Grandma withholding her generous present thinking that I did some purposeful evil and dirty like sending my aunt a virus angered me. I decided that on that Saturday I would waste an entire day driving to my Grandma's house to explain my side. Even though that would take several hours longer than walking to my aunts and reinstalling her whole system. My grandma was sick like she's been for a while when I found her. She always pretends that she's ok and makes me tear-up knowing the whole charade won't last much longer. We spent the day together and I actually left forgetting why I had driven six hours to see her. I walked back in and sat next to her and tried to explain the whole scenario. She shook her head as I explained my aunt's pitiful net-iquette. She didn't understand email but the concept of being annoyed by her family was familiar. I summed it all up and said, "So her computer is broken and she and my mom want me to fix it. And I won't, I just won't." I couldn't tell if she was just proud or just gassy but she smiled as she summed up her religious philosophy with, "Shit happens." According to the chart, she's a Taoist. |
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