Several years ago I got a threatening email from someone names "virusss.” It came to my work address. As best I can gather from the cryptic note, this person wanted to kill me and they wanted me to be very scared of them. I could be wrong, however, because the note was written in such a way that it could have been from a 10 year old girl whom I refused to buy a chocolate bar from - and she was throwing a quick tantrum - or something.

A few years before that, I was stalked by a former high school friend who also kept his identity secret. He wanted to braid my hair in cornrows and every time I tried to talk to him during one of his creepy phone calls, he would get scared and hang up on me.

I was thinking about this complete psychotic and cowardly behavior today when I spoke to the Team Member Service Center of my present employer. They only give out their first name when they talk to you about issues such as your paycheck, health insurance, and future with the company. The names are always generic, like Jennifer or Linda. This way, when you call back and ask for them because they have given you incorrect info and you want to clear things up - the new person who answers the phone can say, "We have eight Jennifer’s. I'm sorry; I don't know who told you that bad information before."

Anonymous people are the same people who shoplift, cheat on taxes, file bogus insurance claims, steal cars, blame everyone else for their children's problems and expect the government (other taxpayers) to rebuild their lives when something goes wrong. They are the people who say, "Woe is me." so often that they don't have time to figure out how to be responsible for themselves. But what would we do without them? After all, they do provide minor entertainment to those of us who can momentarily put aside the fact that they ultimately become our burden to bear in so many situations - building character in each of our lives via their contributions to the rising cost in health insurance, the annoyance of email spam, piss in the stairwells of public parking structures and overflowing toilets at restaurants.