--- Begin forwarded message:

From: "Montag Beeblebrox"
To: [group:everybody]
Subject: URGENT Do Not Delete!!! You WILL be SORRY!!!!
Date: Thu, 31 Jan 2008 21:34:38 -0800

Read all the way to the bottom of this letter, where you will find VERY IMPORTANT instructions in how to have a VIRTUOUS LIFE!

"Certainly virtue is like precious odors, most fragrant when they are incensed, or crushed: for prosperity doth best discover vice, but adversity doth best discover virtue." ---Sir Francis Bacon

"Destiny is but a phrase of the weak human heart - the dark apology for every error. The strong and virtuous admit no destiny. On earth conscience guides; in heaven God watches. And destiny is but the phantom we invoke to silence the one and dethrone the other." ---Edward Bulwer-Lytton

May the CREATIVE FORCES of the universe have mercy on our souls, if any.

Dalia Beard, a Kindergarten teacher from Illinois, received this message, but only forwarded it to sixteen people, rather than 57 (her favorite number.)

That day on her way home from work she picked up a fresh carton of milk. Later that evening she endeavored to prepare some macaroni and cheese for her children’s dinner. Requiring milk, she opened up the new carton to discover THE MILK HAD ALREADY CURDLED.

Undaunted, Dalia made the macaroni adding ONLY BUTTER and NO MILK, but her kids would COMPLAIN INCESSANTLY that it DIDN’T TASTE RIGHT. They REFUSED to eat it despite Dalia’s insistence that the existence of children SUFFERING FROM STARVATION in Africa should compel them to gratitude.

Disheartened by the situation yet determined to educate her children properly, Dalia, took them to spend the summer in Africa volunteering, bringing food aid to communities struggling from famine. While there, her kids would be afflicted with CRIPPLING DIARRHEA AND DEHYDRATION for most of their stay, an UNFORTUNATE eventuality for which they would swear to NEVER forget nor forgive their mother.

Dalia would continue to return and volunteer ALONE each summer, and live ESTRANGED from her own children for FIFTEEN YEARS, until her kids had children of their own and realized how DIFFICULT it could be to get them to eat sometimes.

Drake Carrington, a Systems Engineer from Washington state, received this message while he was away from his office on vacation. An auto responder sent an email notification to the sender but DID NOT FORWARD the message to ANYONE else.

It was the first of June. Drake had just departed for six weeks of traveling in Europe with his wife and three kids. Meanwhile, a courier was attempting to deliver a parcel at their home.

A helpful neighbor spoke to the courier who told him that the delivery was one grain of rice, but there were MORE on the way. The delivery for the second would be two grains, four on the third, eight on the fourth and so on, doubling the number each subsequent day for a month.

By some TRICK OF FATE, the helpful neighbor thought that this was an exceedingly reasonable arrangement, and signed for the deliveries.

The delivery on the 30th, and final day, brought the total number of grains to 1,073,741,823. (That's in THE BILLIONS!!!)

Drake Carrington NEVER ORDERED ANY RICE.

The Carringtons returned home two weeks later to discover their community, now a sea of humanity, suffering from DROUGHT, due to the amazing ABSORBANT PROPERTIES of the now SLUDGE-LIKE rice. Their own once green lawn had become a WASTELAND, their vegetable garden BARREN, their well BONE DRY.

After MONTHS battling insurance companies and assisting neighbors in any way he could to relocate, before relocating his own family, Drake, having learned a hard lesson about the importance of potable water, REDEDICATED HIS LIFE to providing water filters to underprivileged people in developing countries and DISASTER ZONES. He also sought to invent cheaper, more efficient, seawater desalination and filtering technologies to help his DOOMED species adapt to a HARSHER, more POISONOUS world.

It was a lifestyle and career change that brought Drake to FINANCIAL RUIN and his marriage to a BITTER END. But he was rich in conscience and adored by his children, (though they opted to live at their mother's home, enjoying its relative comforts.)

Mindy Malaprop, an actress from Santa Monica and a FORMER child star, received this message on her twenty-first birthday. It was a day in which she was too busy preparing for the lavish party that was being thrown in her honor, sponsored by American & Finch. Having lived a pampered and decadent Hollywood lifestyle, and been taught such trivialities as so-called “chain letters” were BENEATH her, she DELETED IT before forwarding it, and WITHOUT EVEN READING IT.

It was a BRAZEN ACT, of PURE CYNICISM.

That evening she would have a SINGLE SIP of Champagne in the limousine on the way to the venue. Upon her arrival, Mindy would exit the vehicle to be greeted on the red carpet by hundreds of photographers and adoring fans.

What would follow would be a DRUNKEN SPECTACLE so BIZARRE and UNEXPECTED from so innocent an American sweetheart, that it would reverberate through the annals of Young Hollywood history for YEARS.

A hundred cameras would be more than enough to document the event: EVERY MINUTE DETAIL of the event. Enough digital evidence would enter THE RECORD for “Mindy Malaprop upskirt,” and “Mindy Malaprop nipple slip,” to become PERVASIVE search terms in a FERVOR that would CRASH GOOGLE twice within 18 hours of Mindy turning 21.

Mindy Malaprop’s career was OVER INSTANTLY.

The next day, HUNG OVER and HUMILIATED, Mindy resolved to fight the objectification of women and girls at the hands of patriarchal societies. She devoted all of her resources to educating and mentoring girls to resist the systemic symptoms, the likes of which had both made her famous and fickly CAST HER ASIDE.

She would be rewarded for her efforts, after 30 long years, with a comeback on her own terms. She would earn a strong, dynamic role in a QUIRKY independent film. SADLY, it would STRUGGLE to gain wide distribution.

There is an EASY WAY and a HARD WAY to a virtuous life.

THIS is the easy way. (Don’t scroll down yet!!!)

First, think of your FAVORITE NUMBER. (Ok, begin scrolling.)

Keep scrolling!

Have you thought of your favorite number yet?

Good. Now forward this message to YOUR FAVORITE NUMBER of people and you will have A VIRTUOUS LIFE!!!