STRANGER THAN FICTION: CHAIN, CHAIN, CHAIN LETTERS FROM E-MAILING FOOLS

Does anyone truly believe that Disney's CEO is looking for an excuse to give millions of people free trips to Orlando?

There was another one waiting on my computer the other day -- an e-mail claiming that, if I'd only send it on to 10 other people, all of us would win a free trip to Disneyworld. It was the third of its kind that I've received in the past year.

Like the other two, it had a catch. The e-mail had to make it all the way around the world and get back to Disney's chief executive officer. And THEN everyone whose name was attached to the e-mail would get the free trip.

Which brings me to the theme of today's diatribe -- The Chain Letter, a Centuries Old, Bad Idea that Refuses to Die.

The idea probably began in Biblical times, when people who were flung far and wide after the whole Tower of Babel language confusion thing wanted a way to reach friends in other places.

I'll bet two teen girls got together one afternoon to study their slabs of rock for homework.

"There is a lack of girls with nice-looking brethren in this land," one said. "Thou and I shalt never find a decent date."

"Hark! We shalt send letters across the face of the Earth," the other said. "And we shalt order those receiving the letters to send more letters and also write us letters in return, or they shalt be stricken with God's wrath. We shalt tell them they will be plagued with the acne of Hell on prom night."

"Cool!" the first one said.

Thus, the first chain letter was written.

They were kind of fun in my youth, before I had a car (read: a life). They'd always have the same message, something like, "Write letters to these two people and send this on to five of your friends. The last girl to break this chain went bald, lost her boyfriend and ended up in a nuthouse after her dog died."

I didn't have a boyfriend, but I hated the thought of going bald and dealing with the death of Nosy, so I'd usually send the chain letter along. And, of course, nobody ever wrote me back.

A couple decades older and considerably wiser, I now immediately break any chain.

Think about it. Is it likely that Disney's CEO is thinking, "You know what'd be really cool? I could start this chain e-mail and try to send it around the world. Then, if it comes back to me, I could spend billions flying people to Disneyworld."

Or is it more likely that he's thinking, "You know, now that I've got the bathroom papered in hundred-dollar bills, I think I'll have the living room done the same way."

My most recent chain e-mail was a little more believable. It begged me to help lower gas prices by refusing to go to the pumps on April 30. If everyone would simply not go to the pumps on one day, it said, gas prices would drop dramatically.

Let's do my little exercise in reason again. If oil companies lost a day of profit, what is more likely? Will the CEOs all call each other and say, "Let's lower prices before this gets any worse!" Or will they call each other and say, "They've got to get gas sometime. And when they do -- POW! We're sticking it to them."

I'd bet on the second option.

At least someone is sticking to the old-fashioned, paper-and-envelope chain letter. My mother-in-law sent me a very nice one the other day. It asked me to mail dishtowels to the two names on the list, then send the letter, adding my name and the second original name, to six of my friends.

I love my mother-in-law and would gladly buy her $20 in brand-new dishtowels tomorrow. But I don't think she realizes how lazy young people have become and how little they'd want to purchase and mail dishtowels to people. I can't imagine the number of friends I'd lose by sending that letter along. They'd gather at a party where I wasn't invited.

"Uh, did you see that whole dishtowel thing from Heidi?" one would start. "Does anyone else think that's a LIT-tle weird?"

Everyone would nod, and I'd be called "Dishtowel Queen" behind my back for the next several years.

Maybe there's a way to use this whole resurgence of chain e-mails to my advantage. I should start composing one right now.

"Send Heidi $10 and mail this to 10 of your friends. The last woman who disregarded this message has PMS three weeks out of the month and found out her husband was gay ..."