Terribly delinquent, I know

I thought when I started this blog that it would be a pretty simple proposition: report on the email (mostly spam) I was getting, and advise people what to do and not to do (mostly not) when looking at "easy" ways to make money on the internet. Little did I know what I was getting into!!! The sheer quantities of email - not spam, just email that I apparently asked for - has been overwhelming. Some senders I have learned to delete, because they just say the same thing over and over again. Some I have to read a little more carefully to see if they actually have a semi-legitimate offer in them or not. Some I spend a good deal of time on, puzzling out what website exactly I logged onto to get on that particular mailing list (I usually don't succeed in this). And then there are the email that actually do pay me money (usually about $.05 each) to click on a link and pretend to read the website. More on those later. I'd say I average about 30 a day, which is actually a slow-down since I've become much more discriminating (lol) about how many times I give out my email.

This doesn't even BEGIN to touch the volume of spam that hits my inbox. I'd say that since I started, I've gotten over 6000 total...I had no idea how many companies and individuals had so much time on their hands or so many products they want me to buy!!! This wouldn't be a problem if I could mass delete them, but I tend to sift through them because occasionally something I really want (as much as I "want" any of this crap) gets stuck there by the filters. I've currently got about 1700 in there waiting for my brief perusal.

And the cell phone...gods, the cell phone. I may have briefly lost my mind when I started this whole adventure, but I did have enough sense not to give out my home number. Husband hates it when the phone rings, and I knew he'd go nuts with the number of calls I suspected I'd get. SO. I gave out my cell phone number, which was, to be honest, pathetically uncalled 99% of the time. All I can say is...DAMN. That phone rings off the hook now; I have to keep it on vibrate just to keep myself sane (even a ringtone you like can drive you nuts if you hear it enough, and I don't particularly like mine). The new rule is that if I don't recognize the number I sure as hell am not going to answer it, so if you happen to actually be a friend of mine, don't call me from a strange number or you're going straight to voicemail. Fortunately, most of the marketers don't bother to leave a voicemail. Unfortunately, enough of them do that I've started to ignore voicemail, which has gotten me in trouble a few times when it was actually someone important. Blech.

Over the past couple of days, however, I've been compiling a few helpful hints for anyone else out there who might, in a moment of weakness, fall for the promise of easy money, and I'll be posting those soon. Not that anyone is actually reading this blog at this point (LMAO) but perhaps someday someone will :)