"I just received this spectacular collection of important English silver": This Is The Quality of Spam I Expect From Now On

I’ve been getting occasional updates on celebrity estate sales and silver auctions from 1st Dibs ever since I wrote about the Gore Vidal walnut desk this fall. While I didn’t sign up for these updates, they are without question the highest-quality spam messages I’ve ever received in my life. Having recently decided to stop fighting spam messages, resigning myself to having to screen and delete multiple calls, texts, and emails every day from various ghosts, my only request now is that they all rise to the same caliber as this one:

Hello Daniel,¹

How are you?² I just received this spectacular collection³ of important⁴ English silver⁵ for private sale⁶ and thought you might like to see it.⁷ Many of the pieces have important⁸ and well-documented provenance.⁹ Also, these impressive pieces would make wonderful gifts¹⁰ or great additions to your own table.¹¹

[Link to ‘Important English Silver Collection’]¹²

Can I tell you more about any of the wonderful pieces in this collection?¹³

Warm Regards,¹⁴

Catherine

If you’d like me to stop sending you emails, please click here.¹⁵

1. Now I call this being addressed! None of this “Hi I just wanted to follow up” or “Don’t miss” or “Hi [Danny M]” or “_Congrat$ [amzn_user]” business – the full “Hello Daniel.” Makes a man feel like he’s just walked into a glove shop!

2. Well, thank you! We might as well be friends, chatting amiably at our city club, seated in our usual banquette by the window, with all the time and conversation in the world spread before us. And how are you? See how I return courtesies as easily as I receive them, as befits a gentleman addressing another gentleman.

3. How exciting! No one else ever opens their spam messages with personal news — it’s always a vulgar rush to the sale. But you — you’ve recently come into possession of a spectacular collection! How exciting! I know you have been eagerly concerned with the fate of your many trading-vessels and international interests. This is a grand day indeed! Shall I call for champagne?

4. !!!

5. The best kind, I’m sure!

6. I understand. You’re sharing this information with me, your close friend Hello Daniel, out of the deep love and trust we’ve forged together after an intimacy of many years, not trumpeting your good fortune in the streets for any common ear to hear, like WaistShaperz.com and pedision246793.

7. You were thinking about me!

8. I like how much this word is coming up! This isn’t just any silver collection.

9. The provenance of the silver, I’ll tell a select and handpicked group of my own intimate friends, is not merely important. Its provenance is also well-documented, should you require more than my good word in assurance.

10. Because Catherine understands that generosity derives from generósus, meaning “of noble birth,” and that my high status means nothing if not accompanied by nobility of spirit, gallantry, and largesse — a close-handed gentleman is no gentleman at all. Hospitality, that virtue of the great soul, who cares for the whole world through the ties of man! Bring my arrows of desire — bring me my spear, O clouds unfold, bring me my chariot of fire! And while you are at it, my pipe, and my bowl, and my fiddlers three — Come in, man, and know me better! All who cross my threshold enjoy the protection of Old Man Willow and a meal they will not soon forget.

11. Merely additions to an already-great table. Catherine is careful not to imply that my board at present lacks anything a great man ought to have. But if, once I have selected suitable gifts for my numerous friends, well-wishers, dependents, charges, wards, and hangers-on, I should choose a bauble or two for myself, to further adorn my feast-table and enlarge the perfection of my home, no one would call it amiss!

12. I appreciate that this line reads “Link to important silver collection” instead of “SOORTY Launches newest denim collection” or “You haveWON A*WalmarTReward*” or “Calvin, want to MELT OFF 45 POUNDS?”

13. Respectful!!

14. One demerit for capitalizing “regards.”

15. Respectful!! But I don’t want you to stop sending me emails. I want everyone else to send me emails more like yours, discreetly informing me of any recent silver hoards that have arrived in town, and whether I’d care to examine them.