Despite what you might have heard from my ex-boss, I'm not an idiot. I'm not even close. If I was, I wouldn't have spent my entire childhood in the gifted program. I wouldn't have been valedictorian of my high school class. I wouldn't have graduated summa cum laude from college or with honors from law school. Do I have my fair share of dumb brunette moments? Sure, and I'll readily admit to them, but I am not an idiot.In case you couldn't tell, that smile I had from imagining my nephew at the Hannah Montana movie is totally gone. Why? Well, in catching up on my Entrecard drops, I discovered that a fellow blogger used the whole incident from my post "No Thank You, Mr. Johnson" as a learning lesson for her own readers on how not to open emails. In other words, she wrote and even video taped a post whose entire gist was, "Don't be an idiot like Staci." Those weren't her exact words, but that was clearly the message she was getting across.
I wouldn't have minded the post so much if she hadn't entirely misconstrued the situation. I did not, I repeat DID NOT, open an attachment. I simply clicked on an email from Brett Palmer a.k.a. Mr. Johnson. Did I know a Brett Palmer? No, but do you know everyone you get emails from? I doubt it.
Sure, it's safer in theory to never open an email from someone you don't know, but is it necessarily wise? I submit my resume to online job postings all the time. If the person reviewing that resume wants me to come in for an interview, he might call me, or he might send me an email. If I didn't open that email, I might miss out on that job opportunity entirely.
A few weeks ago I applied for a payment plan from my homeowners' association. The way my HOA has it set up is that you fill out a form online with its management company. The management company forwards the form to the HOA, which then meets and decides whether they'll approve the plan. If they do, a member of the HOA gets back to you by email. Once again, if I didn't open the email from that HOA board member, whose name, by the way, I didn't know ahead of time, I would have never known that I was approved.
I have a link on this blog that allows my readers and any perspective advertisers to contact me by email. Do I know all of my readers real or email names? No. Do I know the name of any perspective advertiser out there? Again no. If I never open those emails, I would never have any ads on this site. I would never have Gecko pillows and bobble heads to give away. I would never know where and who to send those gifts to.
People who have clicked on that link know that I have Yahoo mail. I tend to use the classic platform rather than New Yahoo Mail or Mail Beta or whatever it's calling itself these days because I don't like all the ads on the new version. Because I have Yahoo mail and use Yahoo Mail Classic, I don't have the advantage of seeing the sender's address or anything in the header of the email until I open it. Therefore, there is nothing to tip me off that the email would contain anything malignant, unless, of course, the regarding line says something like, "Here's a picture of my Johnson." The email never said that. If it had, obviously I wouldn't have opened it. Then again, maybe I would. I am single after all. :)
Yes, I'm perfectly aware that I can block all images from all emails, and I used to have Yahoo set up that way. However, I got tired of having to click on the red x's on all the chain emails that my mother and my former coworkers were sending me 20 times a day. Consequently, I changed my setup so that it would only block images on messages that are sent to my spam box. Once again, Mr. Johnson's Johnson did not go there. It went to my inbox; hence, the reason I opened it.
Believe it or not, I know that the other way is the more secure way. I also know that I have a anti-virus program that is set up to block viruses, worms, and other computer-related nastiness from web-based email programs. Can something get past that program? Sure. Like I said, I'm not an idiot, but it's worked for me so far.
I wouldn't have even written the post if I didn't think that the whole situation was funny. I wasn't scared of getting a virus. Heck, after I got over the initial shock, I wasn't even offended. I just thought it was funny. I still do. I often find humor in inappropriate things. Just ask me about the time that my father's hideous toupee nearly went flying across the graveyard at his father's very windy funeral. I had to bite my lip to keep from laughing during the preacher's sermon. If someone read the post and took it as anything but me making fun of the situation--hello, I put a picture of a chili dog in the beginning of the post, for crying out loud--then they missed the whole point.
Great. Now I'm kind of craving a chili dog...
