I received an email the other day as follows, with the subject line "Are you still alive? Please reply":
Headquarters: Valley National Bank
Address: 1455 Valley Rd, Wayne, New Jersey, United States
Phone: +1 (973) 223 6098
Congratulations! This is the third email I am sending to you. You have been randomly selected to receive US18,400,000,000 and the latest Tesla Cyber Truck from the ongoing Elon Musk raffle draw. Many people around the world have benefited from this raffle. This bank has been entrusted by Elon Musk to process and deliver your winnings to you, therefore, don't sleep on this opportunity.
Kindly provide the following information to proceed:
- Full Name
- Residential Address
- Contact Number
- Email Address
- Occupation
- Date of Birth
- ID or Driver’s License
As of March 2026, Elon Musk, the CEO and owner of Tesla, SpaceX, and Twitter, is the richest person in the world, with a net worth frequently exceeding US600–800 billion. He leads billionaires like Larry Page and Bernard Arnault by a significant margin. According to scripture, blessings are given not to encourage greed but to empower us to help others kindly and generously. Those who give with a joyful heart receive even greater blessings.
Additionally, please confirm if you have authorised Mr. Gordon Williams, an attorney claiming to be your close friend, to pay the US500.00 fee for paperwork, shipping, and customs clearance. He also claims you gave him the power of attorney to receive delivery of this money and the Tesla Cyber truck to his address.
Please respond promptly to clarify this matter.
Mr. Ira D. Robbins
CEO and President
Valley National Bank
Golly. I'd better not "sleep on this opportunity"! Think what kind of farm we could buy with this kind of money! Think how much this "blessing" would "empower" us to "help others kindly and generously"! Think how stylish we would look, driving around our dirt roads in a Tesla cyber truck! Elon Musk is certainly generous to bestow $18 billion on "randomly selected" plebeians like myself.
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I see a lot of those cyber trucks here in the Hamptons. SO so stupid looking.
ReplyDeleteEven more stupid with lumber sticking out of the truck bed. I previously had never seen one used as a truck! We had a good giggle at that.
DeleteScams...reminds me of a Bruce Dern movie where he sets out on foot as an old man going to receive his prize. It turns into a father and son film. Not bad, rough but real about life and family.
We laugh, but many elderly folks get confused and scammed by emails and texts and calls that are better than this one. It causes a lot of damage and heartbreak to those most vulnerable. Extremely tragic and honestly enraging when someone you care about gets scammed out of their life savings. So there’s that.
ReplyDeleteSaw a cyber truck without a driver on the interstate a couple of weeks ago. It looked creepy weird.
ReplyDeleteSadly, there are many who will respond.
ReplyDeleteWith that kind of money, and the cyber-truck you can finally realize your dream of being a liberal.
ReplyDeleteLooking at the classic caricature you included in your column, I hafta ask: Is that you when you discover the deer got into your garden in spite of your best efforts? Or is it Older Daughter, taken in the midst of her last, great tankard order? Or, perhaps, Younger Daughter when she was learning the ins and outs of driving in Italy?
ReplyDeleteAsking for a friend.
All of the above?
Delete- Patrice