do not pass go. do not collect $200.

(Elisabeth Shue, behind bars)

Already I have had reader complaints about the absence of any posts yesterday. So, here. I did get this e-mail yesterday from a reader of unknown location, which leaps to first place on my list of weird inbox arrivals resulting from my weblog.

-----Original Message-----
From: JD [fakename] [dointimejd @ [domain].com]
Sent: Saturday, February 28, 2004 2:29 PM
To: [my sbcglobal address]
Subject: hAya

Deeer doct or profss or Freese

?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

iDont no u but I like you I get special compter prileges here in jail an I find yur wblg thingy i reed it when I can,, donnt you worry none cause I aint no crazy stalker kinda feller, no I done sole drugs an stole stuff nuttin violent an al. Pluz I am turnen me life around C we got lots incommon) Im now in the educatshon biznes like you now)) Im fixn toget my GED degreee - I wanna go to colag.e I cannt make up my mind what /i shuld studee - weldentruckdrven ora hairweeveng or preeschen scool bnutt 1ist I half ta passt this here gedbs witch why I writ uyo.> U beeng s mrt an all culld hep Me wit thes Ged stuf ; I dunnknow thee math stuf 2 wel an u alwys taklen buot number stuf to Bee tellen the truef, i donnrt reely under stand much wht you bee talken bout, butt Im lik en ya"" Yu r good 2 yur MAMA liken i Is> I tel mi MaMAA boot you win she cu m seee me| SHe say i schuld writ you an, all so i Is.

Thss writen stufhard tha gurdd telen me I gots ta huryy UPCuld you hlp me wit mie gED stuf/???/ Iam heer in jaile en [place]. I sniched on sum peepal an tha lwyerss ay tht i cannt goto the state pen cauuse so thy send me heer 4 myn own saftee

Gob hald you en his hendlikeMe!!!!!!!!!!

JD

Pee sss yioculd yuo pleez putt sum piks off chiks on yourn welblog thngy THe jayl half A filtrr thingy n wil not leten me luuk ayt gurlzx.,I licke y urne frend hteh abraacrambee chik

Okay, so, no offense to my burgeoning incarcerated readership, but presumably we can all agree that this message is a prank. However, it seems a pretty elaborate (if peculiar and sophmoric) prank. I mean, did the person get an e-mail address especially for this? The message itself seems like it took awhile to compose, especially to work in the various references to actual content of my weblog. I mean, somebody couldn't have composed this and then sent it to a whole bunch of different bloggers. Emily thinks it's a high school student who stumbled across my weblog somehow. Or she wondered if it might be a friend of hers who has read my weblog and is, in her words, "clearly a sociopath." Or, apropos of nothing, she suggested it might be Elisabeth Shue (star of Adventures in Babysitting and Leaving Las Vegas; ex-girlfriend of Freaktoastt J and the late Alan Thicke; here, I'll include a picture of her above, especially since Emily agreed with JD's suggestion that I include more photos of attractive women on the weblog). All of these plausible enough, I suppose. In any event, the question is whether the prank is by (a) someone I know, (b) someone who I don't know but has come to read my weblog via referral from someone I know, or (c) someone I don't know at all. Any guesses or math tips for JD, pass them along.