Glurge.
May 27, 2002 2:03 PM Subscribe
Glurge. We're all familiar with glurge. It's that sickly-sweet inspirational message forwarded by someone who wants you to know they're "thinking of you", or the chain-letter story of the little girl with cancer who supposedly gets three cents for treatment every time you forward the message.
I prefer anti-glurge for snappy writing like this: "Dear world, My name is Jessica Miller and I am 7 years old. When I was born, my mother left me with my father, who locked me in the trunk of his Lumina for 7 years without food and water. While there, I got head cancer and second hand smoke. And fetal alcohol syndrome. And the flu." Via memepool and my mother.
I prefer anti-glurge for snappy writing like this: "Dear world, My name is Jessica Miller and I am 7 years old. When I was born, my mother left me with my father, who locked me in the trunk of his Lumina for 7 years without food and water. While there, I got head cancer and second hand smoke. And fetal alcohol syndrome. And the flu." Via memepool and my mother.
I am a very sick little boy. My mother is typing this for me, because I can't. She is crying. Don't cry, Mommy!
Mommy is always sad, but she says it's not my fault. I asked her if it was God's fault, but she didn't answer, and only started crying harder, so I don't ask her that anymore. The reason she is so sad is that I'm so sick. I was born without a body. It doesn't hurt, except when I go to sleep.
The doctors gave me an artificial body. My body is a burlap bag filled with leaves. The doctors said that was the best they could do on account of us havin' no money or insurance. I would like to have a body transplant, but we need more money. Mommy doesn't work because she said employers don't hire crying people.
I said, "Don't cry, Mommy," and she hugged my burlap body. Mommy always gives me hugs, even though she's allergic to burlap, and it chafes her real bad.
I hope you will help me. You can help me if you forward this e-mail. Dr. Johansen said if you foward this e-mail then Bill Gates will team up with AOL and do a survey with NASA.
Then the astronauts will collect prayers from school children all over America and take them up to space so that the angels can hear them better. Then they will go to the Pope, and he will take up a collection in church and send the money to the doctors. The doctors could help me better then.
Maybe one day I will be able to play baseball. Or maybe just use my lungs and heart, when the doctors make them. The doctors said that every time you foward this letter, the astronauts can take another prayer to the angels. Please help me. Mommy is so sad, and I want a body. I don't want my leaves to rot before I turn 10.
If you don't foward this e-mail, that's OK. Mommy says you're a mean heartless person who doesn't care about a poor little boy with only a head. She says that she hopes that you stew in the raw pit of your own guilt-ridden stomach. What kind of wretched person are you that you can't take five lousy minutes to forward this to all your friends so that they can feel guilt and shame for the rest of their day, and then maybe help a poor, bodiless nine-year-old boy?
Please help me. This really sucks. I try to be happy but it's hard. I wish
I had a puppy. I wish I could hold a puppy.
Thank You.
Billy 'Smiles' Evans,
The boy with just a head.
And a burlap sack for a body.
posted by Spoon at 2:46 PM on May 27, 2002 [16 favorites]
Mommy is always sad, but she says it's not my fault. I asked her if it was God's fault, but she didn't answer, and only started crying harder, so I don't ask her that anymore. The reason she is so sad is that I'm so sick. I was born without a body. It doesn't hurt, except when I go to sleep.
The doctors gave me an artificial body. My body is a burlap bag filled with leaves. The doctors said that was the best they could do on account of us havin' no money or insurance. I would like to have a body transplant, but we need more money. Mommy doesn't work because she said employers don't hire crying people.
I said, "Don't cry, Mommy," and she hugged my burlap body. Mommy always gives me hugs, even though she's allergic to burlap, and it chafes her real bad.
I hope you will help me. You can help me if you forward this e-mail. Dr. Johansen said if you foward this e-mail then Bill Gates will team up with AOL and do a survey with NASA.
Then the astronauts will collect prayers from school children all over America and take them up to space so that the angels can hear them better. Then they will go to the Pope, and he will take up a collection in church and send the money to the doctors. The doctors could help me better then.
Maybe one day I will be able to play baseball. Or maybe just use my lungs and heart, when the doctors make them. The doctors said that every time you foward this letter, the astronauts can take another prayer to the angels. Please help me. Mommy is so sad, and I want a body. I don't want my leaves to rot before I turn 10.
If you don't foward this e-mail, that's OK. Mommy says you're a mean heartless person who doesn't care about a poor little boy with only a head. She says that she hopes that you stew in the raw pit of your own guilt-ridden stomach. What kind of wretched person are you that you can't take five lousy minutes to forward this to all your friends so that they can feel guilt and shame for the rest of their day, and then maybe help a poor, bodiless nine-year-old boy?
Please help me. This really sucks. I try to be happy but it's hard. I wish
I had a puppy. I wish I could hold a puppy.
Thank You.
Billy 'Smiles' Evans,
The boy with just a head.
And a burlap sack for a body.
posted by Spoon at 2:46 PM on May 27, 2002 [16 favorites]
ROFL Spoon
posted by ajbattrick at 3:05 PM on May 27, 2002
posted by ajbattrick at 3:05 PM on May 27, 2002
Bobby and other fine glurge can also be found at the Urban Legends Reference Pages.
posted by maudlin at 3:22 PM on May 27, 2002
posted by maudlin at 3:22 PM on May 27, 2002
Two words:
Kaycee Nicole
She's dying! Oh, boo hoo hoo! What a sweetheart! What confidence in the face of death! She's a candidate for sainthood!
posted by Erendadus at 4:55 PM on May 27, 2002
Kaycee Nicole
She's dying! Oh, boo hoo hoo! What a sweetheart! What confidence in the face of death! She's a candidate for sainthood!
posted by Erendadus at 4:55 PM on May 27, 2002
Spoon - Have you heard the new Tom Waits album, Alice? It's got this song called Tabletop joe, the man without a body that reminds me of your post...
Well his mama didn't want him
On the day he was born
Born without a body
He got nothing but scorn
But he always loved music
All he had was his hands
And he dreamed he'd be famous
And he'd work at the Sands.
posted by atom128 at 5:18 PM on May 27, 2002
Well his mama didn't want him
On the day he was born
Born without a body
He got nothing but scorn
But he always loved music
All he had was his hands
And he dreamed he'd be famous
And he'd work at the Sands.
posted by atom128 at 5:18 PM on May 27, 2002
Just realized that your post was from that site. Nevermind me.
posted by atom128 at 5:57 PM on May 27, 2002
posted by atom128 at 5:57 PM on May 27, 2002
I prefer the direct approach: anyone who forwards me this crap gets a very special Eudora filter made for them: transfer to trash. Forever. And I tell 'em as much.
posted by darukaru at 6:51 PM on May 27, 2002
posted by darukaru at 6:51 PM on May 27, 2002
From rec.humor:
"Hello, my name is Tate. I am suffering from rare and deadly diseases, poor scores on final exams, lack of sexual activity, fear of being kidnapped and executed by anal electrocution, and guilt for not sending out 50 billion fucking forwards sent to me by people who actually believe that if you send them, they will be handsomely rewarded by MicroShit. Do you honestly believe that Bill Gates is going to give you and everyone you send "his" email to $800? How fucking stupid are you? Ooooh, looky here! If I scroll down this page and make a wish, I'll get laid by every Victoria's Secret model in the catalog! What a bunch of bullshit.
So basically, this message is a big FUCK YOU to all the people out there who have nothing better to do than to send me stupid chain mail forwards. Maybe the evil chain letter leprechauns will come into my apartment and sodomize me in my sleep for not continuing the chain which was started by Jesus in 5 A.D. and was brought to this country by midget pilgrims on the Mayflower and if it makes it to the year 2000, it'll be in the Guinness Book of World Records for longest continuous streak of blatant stupidity. Fuck them.
If you're going to forward something, at least send something mildly amusing. I've seen all the "send this to 50 of your closest friends, and this poor, wretched excuse for a human being will somehow receive a nickel from some "omniscient being" forwards about 90 times. I don't fucking care.
Show a little intelligence and think about what you're actually contributing to by sending out forwards. Chances are it's your own unpopularity."
posted by five fresh fish at 9:13 PM on May 27, 2002
"Hello, my name is Tate. I am suffering from rare and deadly diseases, poor scores on final exams, lack of sexual activity, fear of being kidnapped and executed by anal electrocution, and guilt for not sending out 50 billion fucking forwards sent to me by people who actually believe that if you send them, they will be handsomely rewarded by MicroShit. Do you honestly believe that Bill Gates is going to give you and everyone you send "his" email to $800? How fucking stupid are you? Ooooh, looky here! If I scroll down this page and make a wish, I'll get laid by every Victoria's Secret model in the catalog! What a bunch of bullshit.
So basically, this message is a big FUCK YOU to all the people out there who have nothing better to do than to send me stupid chain mail forwards. Maybe the evil chain letter leprechauns will come into my apartment and sodomize me in my sleep for not continuing the chain which was started by Jesus in 5 A.D. and was brought to this country by midget pilgrims on the Mayflower and if it makes it to the year 2000, it'll be in the Guinness Book of World Records for longest continuous streak of blatant stupidity. Fuck them.
If you're going to forward something, at least send something mildly amusing. I've seen all the "send this to 50 of your closest friends, and this poor, wretched excuse for a human being will somehow receive a nickel from some "omniscient being" forwards about 90 times. I don't fucking care.
Show a little intelligence and think about what you're actually contributing to by sending out forwards. Chances are it's your own unpopularity."
posted by five fresh fish at 9:13 PM on May 27, 2002
"Glurge"? I never knew there was a word for it, but I've gotten my share of it. "Please forward this to everyone you know" always was my cue to send it to Trash.
posted by StOne at 11:04 PM on May 27, 2002
posted by StOne at 11:04 PM on May 27, 2002
I got a Dave Rhodes chain letter in the post the other day. That letter has been doing the rounds for at least 8 years, from snail-mail to email and back to snail-mail again. All over the world.
At least Dave had a goal. He wanted to make money fast. But I just don't understand these inspirational chains. These people are worse than Dave Rhodes. They're not even motivated by decent, honest human greed. They're sending these letters out with absolutely no endgame whatsoever. Scum.
If Dave's original chain letter is anything to go by, this shit will be clogging up our mail servers for the next 20 years. I've got this idea to write a filter for sendmail that looks for sentences to the effect of "please forward to everyone you know", or matches mail against glurge templates and then trashes it at source. Inspiration, filtration, expiration. Problem solved.
posted by dlewis at 2:09 AM on May 28, 2002
At least Dave had a goal. He wanted to make money fast. But I just don't understand these inspirational chains. These people are worse than Dave Rhodes. They're not even motivated by decent, honest human greed. They're sending these letters out with absolutely no endgame whatsoever. Scum.
If Dave's original chain letter is anything to go by, this shit will be clogging up our mail servers for the next 20 years. I've got this idea to write a filter for sendmail that looks for sentences to the effect of "please forward to everyone you know", or matches mail against glurge templates and then trashes it at source. Inspiration, filtration, expiration. Problem solved.
posted by dlewis at 2:09 AM on May 28, 2002
So basically, this message is a big FUCK YOU to all the people out there who have nothing better to do than to send me stupid chain mail forwards.
Eh, I've seen better.
posted by anildash at 9:47 AM on May 28, 2002
Eh, I've seen better.
posted by anildash at 9:47 AM on May 28, 2002
Eh, I've seen better.
Here's the one I use, which is a bit more family-friendly:
Anyone got any other hoax sites to add to the list?
posted by me3dia at 10:21 AM on May 28, 2002 [3 favorites]
Here's the one I use, which is a bit more family-friendly:
To: [gullible@some.com]I find the over-urgent subject line gets the gullible ones' attention every time.
From: [you@your.com]
Subject: FWD: don't open another email till you READ THIS!
Thank you for thinking of me when you read the forward you just sent, but next time, please check into such items more thoroughly. What you sent me was a hoax -- an urban myth of the Web.
[Insert details about this particular hoax/chain email here. Try not to be too mean; this person is gullible, so he/she is probably easy to take offense. You might want to specify the site you found proof of its falseness so they can read for themselves.]
For your reference, here are some handy websites where hoaxes, phony virus alerts and scams can be researched. I suggest printing this list out and keeping it handy near your computer.
http://ciac.llnl.gov/ciac/ or http://hoaxbusters.ciac.org
http://www.vmyths.com
http://www.snopes2.com
http://www.netsquirrel.com/combatkit
http://www.scambusters.org
http://www.quackwatch.com -- for health-related scams
http://www.stiller.com/hoaxes.htm
And, of course, check the veracity of *any* virus by visiting http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/ or http://vil.mcafee.com/anti-virus/ -- both pages have the most up-to-date information on viruses real or imagined.
Please, be more skeptical of the forwards you receive, and check up on any that sound suspicious.
Forward *this* email to whomever sent you the message you sent me. You'll save us a whole lot of aggravation in the future. Thanks.
Anyone got any other hoax sites to add to the list?
posted by me3dia at 10:21 AM on May 28, 2002 [3 favorites]
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BTW - how hard is it to make a site full of depressing writing? I'll answer that one, from my own experience: NOT TOO f'ing HARD.
posted by Dark Messiah at 2:11 PM on May 27, 2002