The Rebirth of Leesa's Mailbag: Issue 7

As you may know, I started a feature called Leesa's Mailbag. Well, Leesa's Mailbag was not a huge success because perhaps my readers are not twisted psycho types.

Hi “Leesa”:

You are welcome to post part of this, if you wish, for your mailbag episodes, but I wonder if you can offer some advice. I believe you have suffered stalkers on your blog. I have “attracted” a couple of anonymous haters to mine. I already moderate comments, so the blog does not get cluttered with irrelevant bile. Have you any “geeky” tips for divining their identity? Making it more restricted simply drives them to create null Google accounts.

Thanks
acuity todos

Leesa's Answer: You are correct; I have had a few stalkers. At first, I was horrified that people would stalk me. I felt violated and angry. I think that is how stalkers want us to feel. I answered in anger, and the stalking continued. In short, the stalker was controlling me; she was winning.

I then took a different approach. I decided to not really care too terribly much. But by me not caring, I was actually making fun of the stalker, giving the stalker lines in my blog. I think that was a mistake as well. I think she enjoyed the attention.

In one case, I knew who the stalker was and I sort of called her out. I mentioned a few facts particular to the stalker. She did not read that post. Eventually I think she read it and it scared her and she left.

With another stalker, as soon as I ignored him, he left. Well, it took a week or two, but he left. He got bored with my blog and my non-answering his comments. That is probably the best approach to take, but it is not as much fun as antagonizing the stalker.

Oh, and I can understand you wanting to stop blogging, wondering what the point to the whole thing is. I have been there myself, and I don't know if you are doing the right thing. I always enjoyed your blog, thinking I was living in your little paradise when I visited the blog. I blog for myself and I am fortunate to have a few people reading me. If no one read, perhaps I would pull up stakes myself (I hope not, but you never know).

Dear Leesa,

I keep getting messages from MyLife (formerly Classmates.com) saying that I am popular, but when I open the email, they say that no one has sent me a message in more than a year. What is going on here?

Sign me,
Confused but Popular

Leesa's Answer:
Dear Confused but Popular,

Did it ever occur to you that you are confused but not popular with loser former classmates? I mean, I believe the site gets paid when you sign up for the site. Perhaps they are also suggesting that you become a gold member in order to retrieve your non-messages or connect with the former classmates who similarly sign up for the service. I signed up for it once and noticed three types of people active on the site: (1) Guys that did not fuck me in high school but want the chance now that we are 20 years older, and not in as good of shape, (2) People who just like people; bubbly personalities who want to re-live the high school experience, and (3) Divorced women who are looking for husband number 2.

Yeah, I want to know what my first boyfriend is doing now. But if he is married, I don't want to upset his wife by asking about him. My husband had his first girlfriend contact him, and I went a bit ballistic. I said I was never the jealous type, and sometimes you don't know until you are tested.

If you have a spare $15 or $100 for the year, you can sign up (I am guessing about the prices). Otherwise, I would delete the message. People you think about will be cooler when you don't know what really happened to them.

Write Me
Please contribute to the questions asked on "Leesa's Mailbag." Over the last few years, people have emailed me with questions, and I have answered them on an individual basis. Now, I think I will answer them on a blog entry. I will do it on Fridays when I have enough questions to cobble together a post. Sort of an Ann Landers with attitude. Just write to the following email address:

Also, let me know if you want to be acknowledged or anonymous. Makes no difference to me. For those who use the comments section to ask a question, I will assume those are public posts.