Ever have one of THOSE days? So this all started sometime in the middle of last week, when I received an email and a text from a couple of my facebook friends (thank you, Lynn & John!) letting me know that some devious, black-hearted sonofabitch had hacked into my Facebook account and posted an unbelievably good job offer...as if it came from or was recommended by me!

Hell, I can barely keep my own self employed!

Don't need to go into all the gory details, but it seems you--yes, YOU!--could be earning a whopping $26.oo/hour doing something-or-other easy and important but not exactly specified, and moreover do it in your available free time from the comfort of your own home, apartment or even a blessed cardboard refrigerator box down by the river. Think it had something to do with cars and/or racing, too.

Hey, I'd like that job myself (if only as a side hustle from my incredibly lucrative position as a self-published author and occasional motoring journalist).

Unfortunately (and predictably), it's all 100% bullshit, and what these miscreants, whomever they may be, REALLY want is for gullible folks like you to forward them, as part of your "job application," a copy of your drivers' license and your social security card and something about your bank account and...well, you get the idea.

So, whatever you do, DO NOT RESPOND to these assholes.

The ensuing, chain-reaction series of disasters, wasted time and inconveniences that followed, whilst trying to straighten this mess out, were (and are) the stuff of a Kafka novel. Because the jerk(s) involved somehow managed to change the email address, phone number and password associated with my facebook page, so I couldn't access it any more. And the first thing the faceless folks at facebook want to know, if you want to change your password, is what your "old" password was. Which I of course no longer know, since this creature from cyber hell threw a spanner in the works.

I should also mention that an old, analog, right-brain, "why do I need a damn computer, I've still got a perfectly good typewriter" mossback like myself is the last person who should be doing any sort of internet interface stuff. I'm just ill-equipped for it.

See, if I can't see or talk to an actual human being and, if I don't get the sort of polite, straightforward, rational and informative answers I'm looking for, I'd like the option of grabbing the effing bastids by the collar, gold chain or necktie (as the case may be) and pull/twist until their face turns the color of a pickled beet and their eyes are about ready to pop out of their heads...

You may sense a little built-up frustration there, I think.

What I really need is some 14-year-old kid--a do-gooder, tech-whiz Eagle Scout would be nice--to guide this old soul through the fire swamp of the internet.

Failing that sort of assistance, I did manage to get the page shut down temporarily until all is straightened out.

Don't hold your breath.

I'll keep you pasted.

And, as if that wasn't enough, I had my email program sieze up like a race motor straining for the redline with no oil in the sump. It happened at exactly 10:21 AM on Thursday. Took me until late last night to get it rebuilt, up and running again. It seems OK now.

Thank goodness.

We'll have a follow-up email with more fun, news and personal disasters in a couple days. Coming events. More trivia, too.

All the best to all of you & thanks for letting me vent.

Burt