Follodori Amoretto

NO, it’s not Italian. It’s nonsense.

And so is the internet.

I have discovered my primary email is on the dark web. What does that mean? It means that nonsense can bite you if you are not careful.

I have, of late, been barraged by messages from followers that I thought were interested in my books or my drawings. They said, “Hello.” I said the same in return. They asked where I was from. I answered, “From the Dallas suburbs. And I am here on Instagram to promote my books because Elon has made Twitter funky.” They ask, “Are you married? And do you have kids?” And I tell them I have been married for 27 years and have three grown children. And they ask if I am seeking a relationship.

Uh-oh!

Almost instantly they fall in love with me. They ask for a picture. I give them one where I look disheveled and greasy. They tell me how handsome I am.

Yes, I know I should immediately leave the conversation and block them.

But they tell interesting made-up stories about their starving children and how they recently lost their job.

And they are all young enough to be my grandchildren, and they have little-girl faces with pleading expressions. And they show me pictures with very few clothes on, and immediately start calling me “honey,” “baby,” and sometimes “sweetie.” And before the first conversation is old, they tell me they are in love with me and they need money for something.

And they have to be reminded repeatedly that I live with my wife and my daughter. And I am older than dirt. And I am not looking for a new tomato to squeeze. And I try to be polite as I tell them, “I am broke. I am a retired teacher, so of course, I have no money. And you look like a little girl to me. And please go away. Stop talking.

And then, after I make them explain how to find a WhatsApp app so we can talk encryptedly, and I made about five of them tell me that in the past week, even though I am now an expert on WhataSapp, I sometimes receive naked pictures from them to make my wife angry with, and sometimes I can see their phone number starts with 234 which routes their communications through Nigeria and firmly provides proof that the authorities told me means they are scammers. (I got that information from the time a Russian man tried to blackmail me and I turned the matter into the police who forwarded it on to… the FBI? Maybe?)

So, today I had to yell in all CAPS to one of them, “I know you are a scammer, so LEAVE ME ALONE!” And I blocked two of them before I wrote this post.

I am not paying for cancer treatments for any African princesses’ mothers.

And I know that I should not answer any more young ladies’ DMs. The email address on the dark web guarantees more of them will come my way. They think I am an easy mark. But some of them might actually be interested in books. And if they freely give me nude pictures, I can use them as models for nude illustrations to use with my nudist and naturist stories.

Geez, I am bad!!!