I re­ceived this email from an on­line dat­ing site.

Dear Antandre,
Please view my pro­file and see if you will like us to be com­pan­ions. Regards — xxx

Intrigued by the fact he used proper gram­mar and spelling and didn’t fall into the usual bad first-message habits, I did view his profile.

Profile Name: AprilOx

I am Mature, Resourceful, and Has Initiative.

ABOUT ME:
My name is xxx. I am a Mechanical Engineering Technologist­­­ work­ing in the Auto Industry. I im­mi­grated to Canada in 1998 from Nigeria.
REQUESTS:
I am look­ing for Long Term Companionshi­p with a fe­male Member that shares com­mon in­ter­ests and within close prox­im­ity to me for Text Messaging, Emails, Chats and Phone dis­cus­sions on per­sonal and com­mon in­ter­ests as well as fre­quent out­ings to­gether and oc­ca­sional visit and mo­tor­ing to­gether to amuse­ment and tourist places.
INTERESTS, HOBBIES, etc.:
My hob­bies are: Working on small Instruments and Gadgets, Internet, Leisure Driving, Visits to Tourist Locations and Amusement Parks, Flight Gazing and the Outdoors in General.
FAVORITE MUSIC:
Quo Sera Sera, Country and Contemporary­
FAVORITE MOVIES:
Action, Westerns, Mature and Comedy
FAVORITE TV SHOWS:
Documentarie­s and Sports
FAVORITE BOOK:
The 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People

After I stopped laugh­ing, I read some­thing that was posted by the dat­ing site af­ter his email:

Lately we’ve got­ten a hand­ful of com­plaints about Africans pre­tend­ing to be stranded American men. These scams are rare. Still, pro­tect yourself.

1. Keep your con­ver­sa­tion on [this website].

2. Don’t give money to peo­ple on the internet.

3. Don’t be­lieve peo­ple who claim to be trav­el­ing or stranded in far off places. If such a per­son con­tacts you, please click the flag icon on their profile.

Darn. Just when I thought I’ve fi­nally found my (Nigerian) prince charming.

Quo sera sera.