I know, I promised not to publish any of the mass of scam e-mails asking for Christmas help that I receive every year on the off-chance that I might accidentally have picked out one of the 2% legit appeals. But this one is too good to let go.

[Name Withheld] writes:

I wanted to know if my kids can be sponsored to get Christmas gifts I know it's late notice but it's because I had money put away for Christmas but mouse came and ate part of the money and the banks do not want to change it because the mouse ate the number that they match it with thank you for your time

-----------------------------------------

Dear [Name Withheld],

You win the award for the most original appeal of the season, and there have been some corkers. After receiving your request, I looked at a $1, a $5, a $10, and a $20, and verified that each bill has the number 1, 5, 10, or 20 respectively printed on both sides of every corner and spelled out on the face and back. If your mouse was able to chew all TEN of those numbers off each bill and leave the rest, you have the most amazing mouse I have ever heard of. Catch him and take him to the nearest university for further study. If you show them the bills with ALL the amounts so carefully chewed off, they may even recompense you for a chance to study such a unique specimen.

Otherwise, if the mouse did not really manage to chew every amount indicator off of every bill, march those bills to the nearest federal bank - they are obligated by law to exchange any bill that you have more than half of and they can tell the amount.

I hope this solves your Christmas problem. I don't really know how to solve your other problems, say, how to expunge the criminal record I accidentally stumbled when trying to verify your address.

Thanks again for the laugh, and I hope you get the help you need (even if it's not the unexamined cash outlay you were hoping for).

Paul

[Note: I did NOT actually reply to this e-mail. It would have been tasteless, and - in light of the sender's criminal record - potentially dangerous.]

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Dear Mr, (Or Madam) Cruises,

Thank you for your kind offer. But I deliberately block pictures on my incoming e-mail and I never view the images unless I know they're from someone I trust. So I don't know what I'm supposed to be looking at and "oohing and aahing" over.

The apparently drug-induced last two lines of your communication make me hesitant to trust you enough to view the image, so I don't plan to.

Someone has suggested that that the last couple of lines are supposed to be tiny white text on a white background so they're invisible to the reader, but they're added in the hope that one of the random words will help you fool someone's spam software into letting the message through.

They're still disturbing.

That said, if you have shipping of any kind in the Carribbean, I may have a friend who may use your services. At the moment he is just north of the Mexico/Belize border, having sneaked through an abandoned smuggling tunnel with seven recyclable cloth grocery bags filled with hundred dollar bills. His plan was to travel up the coast of Mexico and sneak into the United States. Obviously this is a dangerous plan, however. If you have a boat, you can easily take a thousand hard miles off his journey. For this he would be willing to pay you handsomely. Would $1,250,000 be enough to divert one of your ships to pick him up and drop him off with the rest of its passengers at its normal disembarking port? He can pay you one-half in direct bank deposit now and the other half in cash when he disembarks.

Unfortunately I must keep your passenger's identity secret for now. However, if this plan is of interest to you, please go to http://exilednigerianprince.com and enter the bank account number and routing code where you would like the money to be deposited. As soon as the passenger receives your information, he will contact you with his identity and location.

Happy Travels!

Another correspondent writes:

God has been good to us and we thankful for everything some how since 2008, things have been extreme difficult and very hard for our family since few years after we lost business I be came ill got cancer, Lost employment, be come home less, this year 2015 around Christmas I am unemployment again because of my sickness,collection unemployment contract with apartment is expired so need to move out from where we live and have not found place yet and all these issue we got another our car coil head gasket blown and no money to fix no money to move in other apartment praying every single moment for blessing please anyone read this pray for us at this wonderful Christmas time...
[Name Withheld]
P.O BOX [Number Withheld]
[City withheld], Idaho [Zip Withheld]

--------------------------------

Dear [Name Withheld],

I am very sorry to hear about your hardships. I am especially sad to hear that you ARE unemployment. I'm also distressed to hear that the coil head gasket on your car has blown. That said, none of the sixteen or so cars I've owned in my lifetime have even HAD a coil head gasket, so I suspect you might be able to get by without it.

You've also apparently been on the move a lot, since a quick glance at your Internet footprint puts you in Tennessee, Utah, and California, all within the last several years, alternatively trying to sue a former employer for unlawful termination and inquiring about real estate that is well out of my price range. So to say you've had ups and downs would be an understatement.

The other hardship - which you do not report - is your apparent inability to read, since the contact page you used to send this e-mail clearly explains that we automatically delete every e-mail asking for money, due to the high proportion that are from career criminals and scammers.

I have to be the "bigger person," though, and assume that you are the rare exception and that the manifold discrepancies in your story are due to your tragic emotional state.

I also must assume that the P.O. Box is because you don't know where you'll be living after this weekend, and not really a way to collect mail - like checks - without anyone knowing where - or even who - you really are. According to Google, at least four other people are using the same mailbox, which is another hardship you have not reported. Having to share a P.O. box with other families must be at least as difficult as having a coil head gasket blown on your car.

So on the off chance that at least one of the hardships related in your letter is true, I will put you in contact with a friend who may be able to help you. The Exiled Nigerian Prince has lots of money and loves helping people. At the moment he is on a cruise ship somewhere near Cancun, hiding with several large bags of cash in a cargo hold from the Mexican Coast Guard who heard a rumor that he was aboard the ship. Since the same cruise line also serves the human smuggling industry, he should have no trouble finding a good hiding place

In the meantime, if you use his contact page - http://exilednigerianprince.com - to enter your bank account information and the amount of money you think will get you out of your current hardships, he will be glad to deposit that amount directly into your account the next time he has internet access, probably when the Mexican Coast Guard determines that he is not on-board and departs for the mainland.

Here's hoping you get exactly the reward your efforts deserve!

Someone calling himself Joel Fleming writes:
Hi,
If you'd like an easy way to earn part-time income by doing something FUN, go check this out now:
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But managed to made $9000 per month as a one-person business within the FIRST year!
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Act on this quickly before the door shuts as the offer may be taken down very soon...
P.S: The *one-on-one* coaching Jim provides is worth much more than the entire package. I think he's crazy to offer that at the price but go check it out and judge for yourself: [web link deleted]
Hope this helps
Joel Fleming
woodworkingbusiness@[web link deleted]

-------------------------
Joel,

Thanks for getting in touch. I enjoyed your note, but I ESPECIALLY enjoyed the THREE fake reviews I found when I googled your domain name - you know, the ones that read EXACTLY like paid advertising, complete with the same links and much of the same verbiage as the e-mail you sent me. Obviously, you are a person who believes in your products.

That said, I think you could afford better fake reviews, er get more exposure, if you had a cash infusion, and I know just the investor who can help you. The Exiled Nigerian Prince would be glad to deposit enough money into your company accounts to give your business a real shot in the arm. Unfortunately, he is currently hiding from Mexican authorities on a cruise ship just north of Cancun. The last I heard, he is playing the djembe in one of the musical shows on the ship, so he can blend in with the performers. He says he is enjoying the djembe very much. In fact, he sent me a link to a YouTube of him playing "Jingle Bells" on the djembe for Christmas. Then Warner Brothers filed a cease-and-desist warning claiming that they own the song "Jingle Bells" because it was once featured in a movie they own the rights to, even though the song was written in the 1800s. So, unfortunately, I can't send you the link. I'm sure you would find it very entertaining.

At any rate, the ENP (as we call him for short) only has intermittent access to the internet, but as soon as he gets back online, he will certainly make the investment we are discussing. Would $180,000 be enough to get you a "leg up" in your chosen industry? If so, please go to his contact page (http://www.exilednigerianprince.com) and enter the requested information about your company bank accounts. I am certain your fortunes will change overnight.

Someone name No Reply writes:

FWD: Notification of Registration
Domain Name: [Domain name withheld]
Bill To: Invoice # DEC-2-121-677900
Invoice Date 12/26/2015
Terms Net 15
Due Date 12/31/2015

SECURE ONLINE PAYMENT [Link withheld]
Domain Name [Domain name withheld]
Date Range 12/26/2015 - 12/26/2016
Price $75.00
Term 1 Year
Don't miss out on this offer which includes search engine submissions for [Domain name withheld] for 12 months. There is no obligation to pay for this order unless you complete your payment by 12/31/2015. Our services provide submission and search engine ranking for domain owners. This offer for submission services is not required to renew your domain registration.

Failure to complete your search engine registration by 12/31/2015 may result in the cancellation of this order (making it difficult for your customers to locate you using search engines on the web).

You are under no obligation to pay the amount stated above unless you accept this offer by 12/31/2015. This is a courtesy reminder for [Domain name withheld].
This offer for [Domain name withheld] will expire on 12/31/2015. Act today!
SECURE ONLINE PAYMENT [Link withheld]
noreply@orderack4820.com

-----------------------------------------------
Dear Mr. (or Ms) Reply,

Thank you for your offer to keep submitting my domain name to search engines for 12 months. Unfortunately, the domain name in question is ONLY a domain name. It points to one of my sites that DOES show up on the first page of Google for every relevant term. The domain name you contacted me about is a "soundalike" name I registered to discourage a fellow who was setting up copycat sites with "soundalike" names to steal my traffic. So having it submitted to search engines every month for a year would be totally useless.

It IS clever how you use the term registration over and over again, as though I would be registering the domain name itself (something my domain name registrar's autoregistration feature does for ~$15 a year). The thinly-veiled scam attempt causes me to wonder whether you are planning to:

Take my money and go ahead and provide the offered, but useless service,
Take my money and do nothing,
Take my money, then use my credit card information to buy big-screen TVs, or
Use the web link labeled SECURE ONLINE PAYMENT to load my computer with redirect
viruses that some third party is paying you proliferate.

Unfortunately for you, my curiousity is not piqued enough to really care which way the scam goes once you have my money and or credit card information.

However, I've talked over your offer with a friend who has a domain name and no web site (yet), and he thinks it would be interesting to discover if paying someone to boost the SEO rankings of a domain name by itself really does any good.

It's not that my friend, the Exiled Nigerian Prince doesn't WANT a web site. But according to him, he has transferred a great deal of money into the bank accounts of web developers who simply turn around and buy fancy cars or whatever and never give him what he's paid for.

Unfortunately, his credit card accounts have all been shut down, due to minor misunderstandings with the authorities in Nigeria, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Belize, and Mexico. But he does have online access to his bank accounts, when he can get to a computer during breaks from his gig as the djembe player for a Carribean cruise ship. So he could deposit his fees directly into your bank account. He is willing to pay a premium for operating outside of your normal business plan, say, $100,000. If this is acceptable to you please enter the requested information at the Ex-Prince's contact page: http://www.exilednigerianprince.com.

Once you enter your information, he will get back to you when he can. Unfortunately, it might not be for a day or so because his djembe playing has made the show so popular that the management company has requested them to double up on shows for the balance of the tour. In fact, his inspirational rendition of the centuries-old Nigerian folk song "Otuto Ugo" ("Ode to an Eagle") is the talk of the ship. He sent me a link to a YouTube video of him performing the song, in a traditional West African mask (since he's still wanted in at least five countries), but Warner Brothers once used this song in a movie, so they are claiming copyright, and they issued a cease and desist order to have the video removed.

I sincerely hope that your business arrangements with the fugitive formerly known as "Prince" will bring you all the reward you deserve for your efforts.

Someone calling himself or herself Caleigh Colburn writes

Hi there!
My name is Caleigh Colburn and I'm helping out a home and garden client who has expressed interest in advertising with a text link on your site, [web name withheld]. Because I don't have the largest of budgets to work with, would you accept $75.00 to merely place a single text on an existing page? The page I am interested in can be found here: [web page withheld]
Please give it some thought and get back to me whenever you have a moment or two.
Thank you,
Caleigh
Client Rep
Outsourced Content Today
caleigh@outsourcedcontenttoday.com

-----------------------------

Dear Caleigh,

Thank you for your kind proposal to give me a one-time fee of $75 to buy thousands of dollars worth of advertising ad infinitum on one of my most popular pages. And, better still - since I know how you work from past contacts - to bury the link in a text line somewhere so my readers think they're jumping to another one of my pages, but are really going to your client's advertising page. And better still, knowing that your client's business has nothing to do with the content of this page, despite your assurances (again, this is based on previous contacts). Or if the client's core business is related today, there's nothing to stop you from pointing that link to another client a week from now.

I barely make enough money on the site in question to keep it going, but it comes up on the first page of Google for most relevant search terms, because my readers trust me. Embedding links that take them to a hair loss reversal company or something when they think they're going to read more about some topic I discuss will break that trust.

If you have an actual ad for a reputable product related to the page's contact (with graphics and copy) that you want me to place somewhere for a reasonable fee, I be glad to place it. "Reasonable" in the context of the high-traffic page you contacted me about would be somewhere between $100 and $1000 a month, depending on the size and placement of the ad.

In case you wondered, I have turned down $1000-a-month ad offers for products that I thought would be a bad match for the site. I CAN be bought, but not for a one-time $75 fee.

All that aside, I have an acquaintance who has no such scruples and who would be glad to accept any kind of advertising on his web page, if and when it gets developed. The Exiled Nigerian Prince has been trying to get a web page started for months, but without any luck. I will forward your e-mail to him and see what he thinks. Currently he's out of touch, since the Caribbean cruise ship he's traveling/working on has experienced engine trouble and had to anchor near an uncharted island. As a quasi-member of the ship's workforce, he's been drafted into a small crew checking out the island to see if it would make a good investment for the company. As far as I know, the group was suppose to have returned to the ship several hours ago, but the ship has lost contact with them. They did report seeing the tops of trees swaying erratically as if something huge was shoving them around, and heard faint screams and cries for help, but they're still hoping it's just a technical glitch and contact will be reestablished soon.

I'll keep you updated.

Some calling himself Life Advisor writes:

Obama and Church Leaders PRAYED you’d never see this… from Life Advisor
This short documentary has been banned in all Catholic European countries.
And some guys have hacked YouTube servers trying to take it down
Visit here to watch what has united the Catholic Church for one sinister purpose...
[Image Withheld] [Link Withheld]
Just make sure you watch it with the door locked and with the sound turned down...
I must admit, as a true Christian and Patriot this video really sent shivers down my spine...
Stay safe. Stay prepared.
Life Advisor
P.S.: 24 seconds in the movie really starts blowing out of all proportions...
Visit here to see why... [link removed]
specialist@45tube.com
info@45tube.com
SDOVrrFVZgoizdnEYVGbLSjUVVpqLdzCkKTiPJQe
If you no longer want to receive email from this service, please visit here to be moved. [link removed]
or Visit here. [link removed] 2885 Sanford Ave SW #21110, Grandville, MI 49418

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NMkyvdFGuSbUfBZJCjfGJrDqnjkJpECoABMdmChVKvpqFRNGjMazeOZOh

------------------------------------------------

Dear Mr (or Ms) Advisor,

You say you are a Christian and a patriot, two denominators that have to be earned, not just claimed. I am a Christian and a patriot, but I don't see how either has to do with spreading sickening falsehoods across the internet in the name of Jesus OR the United States of America.

The facts that your IP address is used primarily by spammers, that you fail to identify yourelf or your organization but expect me to blindly click on your site, that you allude to this video being on YouTube while you are actually hosting it on a spam server, and the fact that you include several strings of nonsense characters (in white lettering) in your message - a common spammer technique - all tell me that you do not represent any legitimate cause or interest and that you have no interest either in my wellbeing nor in truth of any kind.

Either that or you are seriously underfunded. If that is the problem, I know someone who can help you, assuming he gets back in touch with me before long. The Exiled Nigerian Prince is currently stranded on an uncharted tropical island where strange, unusually large creatures have been seen near the water's edge. But as soon as he gets back in touch, I'm sure he would gladly give you the funding you need to start a proper web site and to identify yourselves and your organization as any legitimate cause would surely wish to do. Would $375,000 get you started? If so, just enter the requested information on the ex-Prince's contact page - http://www.exilednigerianprince.com - and he will be glad to transfer that sum into your bank account.

Paul,

Thank goodness I can get through to you. I am currently hiding out with four crew members at an abandoned IT center in some sort of broken-down amusement park.

I should probably start back a little. The cruise ship's coxswain thought I was really part of the ship's crew and ordered me to help the other crew members check out this island. When we got here, it was lovely for about five minutes and we strolled until we reached the treeline. Then there was this terrible noise, and a crashing sound in the trees. When we turned around, we could see that the dingy we had come in was ripped to shreds. We could also hear something near us in the jungle. So we ran from the sound. Then we found a road and decided to follow it. We were all running as hard as we could, not looking back. Apparently my recent adventures have given me more strength and stamina than I realized, because I soon outstripped the others. Then I heard a crunching sound behind me, and glanced back. Something huge and covered with scales had stooped down and picked up the slowest member of our party in its teeth. I ran even faster, ignoring the crunching and trampling sounds behind me.

Finally the road led to a door set in a hillside, apparently some sort of access tunnel. The door was open, and I ran in and turned around. Six of the other crew ran past me. I tried to close the door, but it wouldn't budge. I asked for the others to help me close the door, but they just kept running deeper into the tunnel. When a huge shadow blocked the light coming into the doorway, I followed them, and passed them up. Then I stumbled into some sort of maintenance room and five of the men followed me. "Where's Miguel?" I shouted. But the only answer was a crunching sound in the hallway. This time the others helped me close the door.

Carlos, a smoker, had a lighter, and with its light, we found some flashlights whose batteries still had a little life in them. We also found a generator. Once Saide got it running, we could see another doorway that would take us further down the tunnel. The lights in that tunnel were now on. In the meantime, there were a lot of clawing and scratching sounds at the door we had closed, so we decided to keep going.

Eventually we found our way here. Saide found another generator and powered it up so we have electricity, but no food or water. Saide also figured out how to connect to the internet through a satellite phone he found, which is how I'm talking to you. We're each taking turns contacting people we think can help.

So if you get this message, HELP!

Your friend, the Exiled Nigerian Prince

P.S. What in the world is a "coxswain," anyhow?

Someone calling himself Emily Ryan writes:

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| 8721 Santa Monica Blvd, Suite 521 Los Angeles, CA 90069-4507, USA |

-------------------------------------------------

Dear Mr. Ryan,

Thank you for your kind offer to give me a bunch of useless web templates for $9. As a web site developer, I know far better than to think someone giving me a free template in ANY format is all I need to set up my web page.

On the other hand, having your business located IN a private P.O. box famed worldwide for hosting scammers and spammers of all kinds shows a kind of hutzpa that I have to respect.

And linking to a shortened URL that is a favorite of scammers who want to upload noxious viruses into my computer makes a statement of its own.

Having a return address and unsubscribe link go to a Turkish server that is famous for hosting scammers is another remarkable choice.

But where I began to really lose my trust in you was when I realized that your ENTIRE e-mail, including the subject, message, and fake name was downloaded from a site that sells templates for scammers to use.

I sincerely hope you didn't pay much for the privilege of using this combination fake ID, e-mail content, and dangerous links, because the combination would put off anyone with a brain. If you spent more than a few cents on the package, I would say you've been scammed yourself.

Of course, a lot of people on the internet don't have brains, so it may work out for you.

Also, do you suppose the server in Turkey would be willing to host a site for my friend the Exiled Nigerian Prince? He doesn't seem to have any luck getting people to host sites for him. Apparently he is still considered a criminal in some circles. Well, most circles, to be honest. Also, he has no active credit cards because of a series of minor, almost humorous mixups with the authorities in six, no, seven countries. But he has money in the bank that he can have deposited directly into other folks' accounts.

If you'd be willing to be a go-between for him with the Turkish server, he would gladly deposit $165,000 into your business' bank account. If you actually do know anything about web site development and will help him get his web site online, he could add another $350,000.

If this sounds like an equitable arrangement to you, please enter the requested banking information at the ENP's contact page: http://www.exilednigerianprince.com. He'll deposit the money for you as soon as he has reliable internet access.

Unfortunately, that may take a few days. Currently, he is pinned down in the IT center of an abandoned amusement park at a tropical island with four crew members of a cruise ship he was hiding out on. There were six others, but something big and scaley with a lot of teeth seems to be trimming down the crew's size, one chomping sound at a time.

He is able to get on the internet for a few minutes every sixteen hours, because that's when the satellite they're uploading to goes overhead, but, frankly, he has other things on his mind besides web site development at this time.

I should probably be worried about him, but this isn't the worst fix he's been in.

No, actually, it is. Time to dust off those "Save the Prince Posters" that artist Aaron Miller was kind enough to create.



P.S., if you like Aaron's art, he has bunch of stunning fantasy art here: http://www.aaronbmiller.com/

Paul,

Since we only have a few minutes each day to use the Internet, I'm typing my notes up so I can just cut-and-paste them when I have access.

We have solved the water problem, more or less. It rains and the roof leaks. We caught water in everything we could, but Saide said not to drink it. He figured out how to make a hotplate out of an old overclocked 286 PC and used it to boil water. Saide says that those machines were more-or-less hotplates out of the box.

About the same time the fear of dying of thirst was allayed, it got dark outside, and - hungry as we are - nobody saw fit to open the locked door to the computer room we are hiding in.

But there was time to express another kind of fear. Saide started it. He said, "Mutabe, I'm worried about you and me." (I've been using the name "Mutabe" on the ship.)

"Why's that?" I asked.

"My mother has always warned me about places like this. In fact, she once saw a documentary on them."

Carlos said, "I've seen it, too. I thought it was just a movie."

Saide continued. "My mother told me all about them and what to watch out for if I ever find myself in one."

I said, "So why are you worried about the two of us in particular?"

"Well, according to my mother, someone from the Middle East or the Indian Subcontinent always dies first, then somebody black. I'm from the Middle East, and you're black. We're marked men."

Carlos interrupted, "No, that's not true. A Latino always dies first. You forget that because the Latino never has a name or says anything important. Sometimes it's two Latinos."

Saide said, "So you're safe, Carlos. We've already lost two Latinos."

Carlos shook his head, "Actually we only lost one Latino. Jose was from Bangalore. We just called him Jose because it was easier than saying his Indian name. Come to think of it, Saide, that makes you safe, because an Indian has already died. Besides, that person is also supposed to be watching over the kids, and there aren't any kids on this trip."

Saide said, "I'm feeling better, already. I guess that means you're next, Mutabe."

Carlos said, "No, it could still be one of us. Being a Latino on one of these islands is like wearing a red shirt."

I said, "What's wrong with red shirts? Do they make the monsters angry?"

Both Saide and Carlos looked at me like I had said something stupid, but they wouldn't explain what.

I just got the chance to copy and past the above into this forum. Now it is light again, and we may try exploring to see if we can find some food. In the meantime, Saide looked back over the record of my adventures, and he thinks he knows which drug lord put out the wanted poster. He thinks if he sends him our coordinates, he might come over to the island and rescue the rest of the crew. I said, "But you'll protect me, right?" and he said "Right." So I feel better about that.

Your friend the former Prince of Nigeria, Mutabe to his friends.