THE DEMISE OF THE SUBTLE ART OF FLIRTING

It was as normal as any normal Sunday morning (circa 1 am) could be. Sleep deprived and yet unable to sleep, I was switching windows like a crazed maniac, playing Sudoku and crossword puzzles at the same time, stalking blogs and fooling around with a new project.
An inactive friendster tab lay undisturbed until I thought that I might as well close it. The laptop touchpad being what it is and my clumsy fingers being what they are I ended up on my messages page. There was something new there, I read it with eyes wide open, started laughing madly at the laptop, got somewhat freaked out and closed up everything. Haunted cyberspace?
Here's the e-mail, copied and pasted word for word. Only the e-mail address of the sender was deleted.

Hello There,

How are you my dear lady?. How's your life getting on? Hows your career, you're your job and everything at work? Is everybody treating you well? I really hope that your job gives you satisfaction and will open-up new avenues. How's your family? Hope that they are great too, just like the ay you look. I saw your profile and would love to get to know you better in person. Am working as a secondary teacher in Brunei. Im off course a Malaysian, you don't have to worry about that ya. So please, I would be extremely happy to have your private email in order for us to initiate contact and we'll see what happens thereafter. So my lady, please have your meals on time, take fruits and lots of water daily. Have vegetables and you must have good rest always. Drive safely take good care of yourself, stay free, be happy, do things you love and bye bye. Please mail me at (insert e-mail address)
Here's my imagined reply
If I was a lady, I'm sure I'd be fine... but even if I wasn't (a lady - and especially NOT your dear lady) I'm still fine. I hope.
As for your questions, here are the answers:
Q:How's your life getting on?
A:Great. But even if it wasn't I don't think I'll talk about it to a stranger unless they were a psychiatrist
Q:Hows your career, you're your job and everything at work?
A: Hmmmm... evidently you didn't read my profile before typing this out, didn't you?
Q:Is everybody treating you well?
A: For me to know - for no one else to find out. Thank you.
I know I make conclusions rather haphazardly, but I suppose it's quite safe to say that you are very career minded. For me, it's just an avenue to make $$$. Of course if you enjoy the job it's all the better.
Q:How's your family?
A: Do you know them? I doubt it, but since you asked, they're fine. If they read this, they're definitely going to laugh their heads off. We all have damaged funny bones.

Yes, I figured out that you had seen my profile, hence this e-mail. But what puzzles me is how you managed to send me the e-mail. As far as I can remember I had closed my messaging options up to 2nd degree friends. You, as far as i can tell are not in the network. Friendster has quite a bit of explaining to do.
So. you're in Brunei, eh? My friend once worked there. And seriously it doesn't matter whether you're Malaysian or Argentinian. So you don't have to worry about me worrying about that! Besides, what's wrong about not being Malaysian?
About e-mail addresses and such. It's not a particular habit of mine to go around giving my e-mail address to all and sundry. Seriously. And I'm also afraid that I'm not particularly interested in initiating contact, or seeing how it turns out. I'm a terrible e-mailer. I write a whole bunch of rubbish most of the time. You might want to poke yourself with the blunt edge of a spatula after reading what I write.
Oh well, what can I say? Thank you for the advice that I get from my mom (or Baz Luhrman) all the time? Oh, by the way... let me guess... your e-mail is a template, isn't it?
regards,
The Cynical Misanthrope
PS:
#1 - I have chosen to ignore the message in real life.
#2 - I checked my Friendster settings and apparently both my profile and message service was open to everyone - which probably explains the sudden influx of e-mails. Managed to fix it to 2nd degree friends once again.