HELP!!

I am sorry for this odd request because it might get to you too urgent but it is because of the situation of things right now, I am stuck in London with family right now, we came down here on family vacation, we were robbed, worse of it is that bags, cash and cards and our cell phone were stolen at GUN POINT, and it is hard to get hold of a phone here in London it is such a crazy experience for us. We need help flying back home, the authorities are not being 100% supportive but the good thing is we still have our passport but do not have enough money to get our flight ticket back home, please I need you to loan us some money, will refund you as soon as we are back home, I promise.

—Lost in London

Aberrant in Allentown says: I’d love to help you out but I have all my money invested right now with assisting the widow of a Nigerian oil tycoon on some confidential business. I tried to get some extra cash for gold on a trade but the unhelpful chaps there are telling me my designer Rolex watch isn’t worth anything! The nerve. Not to worry, I’ll forward this along to my Russian fiance. We haven’t met yet, but she sounds like a caring soul. Sending over some Wal Mart gift cards in the mean time to help tide you over. Best wishes!

Ruthless says: Coincidentally, this exact same misfortune seems to have befallen a number of my friends and acquaintances recently. After sending all my extra cash to the first of these, I have to say I am simply tapped out. But here’s what I will do: I will forward you all each other’s emails, so that you may form a support group, or a small army of crime victims, or otherwise assist each other. Perhaps, if you all put your heads together, these perpetrators can eventually be caught!

The Straight Skinny: I am so glad to hear from you, because I recently ordered some low-priced Viagra from an online pharmacy based in London, and for some reason they have not managed to get it to me. Can you please, while you’re there, pick it up?

The Sales Guy says: This is really a horrific story of man’s inhumanity to his fellow man. It’s really a shame that what you’re implying is that you have no friends or family who are willing to help you.

What’s really startling is that the American Consulate in London is refusing you any assistance as well. I’m also terribly disappointed in the British government’s lack of compassion. The UK is not exactly a banana republic.

Let’s review the situation. Your friends, family, and the government agencies of two countries have just turned their backs on you.

It saddens me to tell you that I can’t help you, either. You’re basically, as they say in the world of con men and sociopathic scammers, shit out of luck, pal.

The Practical Cogitator says: Dear Lost in London: Please check snopes.com. You are not in London, nor are you lost.

The Phoenician Sailor says: London is lovely during the holidays, is it not? Ice skating beneath the Tower of London (those sharp blades!), the lights on Bond Street and in Covent Garden and Hyde Park. Have you found a good place for glühwein? The archduke, my cousin, mulled wine with cherries and nutmeg...he took me out on a sled, and I was frightened...

Unreal City...under the brown fog of a winter dawn, a crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many...

Forgive me. My nerves are bad tonight. My mind was somewhere else. What was the question?

Oh yes, money. You don’t have any, and that’s unfortunate. But believe me, there’s no going home again in any case. Worlds change and fade into the past, no matter how we cling to them, memorialize them. Think not on your lost wallet, for it is lost. Your present is your new home. Datta. Dayadhvam. Damyata. Shantih shantih shantih.

Who are you, anyway, and how did you get my email address?

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