Make Money Fast!
I had a friend some years ago who was a raging socialist, but also one of the more money obsessed people I have known.

It seemed that he knew that people could make money, but that people who had it had obtained it unfairly somehow (EXPLOITING the WORKERS, because the BOSSES only care about MONEY) , and the way to get more of it was to cheat THE SYSTEM.

This meant things like buying a camcorder, returning the box with a packet of sugar to make up the weight and pocketing the cash. He also ran a scam on his insurance company, claiming his camera gear had been stolen in order to get an upgrade.

In a daring act of idiocy, he modified a cheque won in a radio competition from let's say $104.20 (frequency of the station) to $1104.20. Amazingly they never clued in. They must have awful bookkeepers.

One day I was visiting him, and carelessly left my wallet behind. It was a couple of days before I could get back there, and I only noticed that I was a bit light on cash a few days later. Where the hell was the $60.00 I had?

I dropped around to ask him about it.

Yes, he admitted, he had `borrowed' the money, but he would be flush with cash soon enough, and would be happy to pay me back! Heck, he'd even give me an extra twenty to make up for it.

I asked him what he had used the money for.

As it turns out, he had invested it.

He had invested it in stamps and envelopes, and what he was doing was mailing out this letter, see, and you put your name on the top of the list!

Then you get the list of people already on the letter, and you send them five dollars each (chewing up the rest of my money), and then you send it out to as many people as you can, and then they put their name on the top of the list, send $5.00 to each person on the list, move your name down one and delete the name of the person on the bottom.

It was so simple! He was going to be rich! And quick!

I could not explain to him why this wouldn't work. It had nothing to do with my powers of explanation, he was just too busy mentally working out what he would do with all this money that would soon be his.

He never got a cent from the letter, and I never saw that money again of course. I considered it a lesson.
(Tomble Underground, overground, Tombling free., Mon 4 Aug 2008, 4:46, 1 reply)

Hmm
That is deemed a 'smack in the mouth' moment in my books for even daring to touch my wallet let alone raid it.
(oneinthepink is at your cervix m'lady, Mon 4 Aug 2008, 14:53, closed)