Perhaps you have an older aunt or uncle, who, ever since he or she heard the first perky, “YOU’VE GOT MAIL!” is hopelessly addicted to email. This addiction manifests itself in what I like to call the “FWD: Happy Syndrome”. These emails are instantly recognizable because they contain at least 3 to 4 “FWD:” in the subject line. If you have seen this syndrom before you’ll know that whenever you see one of these in your in-box it’s likely you’ll be made to scroll a great distance down, down, DOWN… in the body of the email before you ever find out it’s dead and not worth looking at in the first place.

Ever wonder where all the bad jokes come from? (me, too!) While we may never know the answer to that question we can surmise that it’s our darling aunts and uncles who are perpetuating this blight on the existence of our email in-boxes. These are the family members that send every bad joke ever written…the stuff seems to stick to them like leaches.

This is also the relative who believes “If it’s in my email it must be true!” They forward urban legends, virus threats, consequence filled chain letters and often, any scurrilous rumor attached to the democratic party. They send all that is is sent to them to everyone on their list, thereby clogging the arteries of our already plaque infested email. Oddly enough, they immediately forget about it right after they send it out. Can you imagine any of them actually admitting they never use their cell phones near a gas pump because they are afraid of an electrical spark? Bah. It would never occur to them to check out the rumor on a website like snopes.com (Even tho they’ve many times before been sent proof of the hoodwink with a helpful link to said snopes).

If this syndrome has descended upon your family you will doubtless know they are also prone to send out the type of emails that blast away at “Those liberals!” and tend toward the stuff that either tries to save you or damn you saying “If you don’t send this out you don’t believe in Jesus!” …guilt complex is a regular on their menu. As they happily punch away at the poor worn out FWD: button they seem to have this strange notion that everyone on their email list feels the same way as they.

My in-box valiantly fights off all kinds of spam (poor thing). The last thing I want to do is be terrorised by “God Botherers”, “Jesus Thumpers”, “virus vigilanties” and last but not least, threatening chain letters. You know the kind, “Your hair will fall out and you will have bad luck for 100 years if you don’t send this out to 85 people in the next 6 seconds. If you DO send it out you will receive, FREE , a lifetime supply of M&M candies, watch what happens, you won’t be sorry, NO! It really does work!” And then there’s the, “A women in Uzbekistan broke this chain and went mad from Frog Fever and bit everyone she met with a french sounding name.” Did the “FWD: Happies” ever consider that this missive might make it’s way to someone who is prematurely bald, or lives in Paris….hmmmm?)

Ah well, the sun comes up and there is hope for the “FWD: Happyies” of the world. It’s quite simple and in the case of threatening chain letters, if you are superstitious you don’t even have worry about breaking the chain. Just cut and paste the message into another clean, fresh un-FWD’d email. If the message is a good one and you want to send on the sentiment (it DOES happen on occasion) all you have to do is take the sting out, meaning take out the part about, “You must send this to 57 people in the next 5 second or you will catch Frog Fever and die!”. It can be replaced with “Send this to as many people as you like because it’s a neat story” …and Viola! You have taken your first steps to overcoming the “FWD: Happy Syndrome.” Your grateful family will love you for it.

Just a thought I caught flying by, what do you think?