Donald's Blog

  This old house was only a few blocks from the state Capitol in Madison, Wisconsin. All the neighborhood cats lived in the basement during the winter. The house has long since been torn down, but in 1972 there were AR2ax speakers in the front room, and a lot of good music was heard there.

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In the 21st century I am just as opinionated as ever, and I now have an outlet. I shall pontificate here about anything that catches my fancy; I hope I will not make too great a fool of myself. You may comment yea or nay about anything on the site; I may quote you here, or I may not. Send brickbats etc. to: dmclarke78@icloud.com.

 

April 18, 2018

Don't click on anything in a strange email!


On 2 April I received an email from PayPal saying that someone called Michael Caruana had donated $660 to my website, which is absurd. That email disappeared before I could copy it. (How is an email disappeared from my inbox?) The same day another message from Paypal: a Keyanna Bulluck charged my account $980. I reported the scam to Paypal immediately, they took one day to investigate and decided that the charge was authorized. By whom? I have never heard of her, him or it, and never purchased anything online for that kind of money. Fortunately our bank is cooperating but we have already had to shell out for blocking the payment.

After nearly a week we finally got through to the right person at Paypal and the whole business got scrubbed. The jerk who thought a $980 claim was consistent with my history of transactions (hardly any over $25) hadn't even looked at it, hadn't followed his own training. As soon as we were talking to a grownup the problem was solved. Moral: don't click on links in emails!!

(The same week there were minor attempts on my wallet from Nigeria and Amsterdam. The bank and Apple were on the ball. Apparently if a scammer gets useful bits of your identity he sells it to all the other scammers. Had to cancel a credit card, change a bunch of passwords...)

Update: It happened again on 5 May. Same phony name (Michael Caruana), slightly different amount. This time I didn't click on "more information". (See, you can teach an old dog new tricks.) I forwarded the phony email to spoof@paypal.com. 

 

April 18, 2018

How can I forget our anniversary?

Three times now Ethne and I have forgot our own wedding anniversary. The first time was ten years or so ago; we were at a garden and crafts affair in north Chicago, and I saw something I wanted to buy for her, and tried to think of an occasion...and realized that our anniversary had just gone by. Much more recently, we were in Monterery; she was looking at gardens and interviewing an architect and I was pawing through second-hand classical vinyl in a shop on Lighthouse; I remembered what day it was and texted her HAPPY ANNIVERSARY! She texted back WE FORGOT AGAIN! And the third time was last Saturday, our 39th.

Okay, we've had a lot on our plates lately, and anyway I can understand why she would want to forget our anniversary, but how could I forget it? I love her so much, and I owe her everything... But then, as we always say, what's hers is hers, and what's mine is hers!