Insomnia

When you can't sleep and it's 3 a.m., what else is there to do but surf the web? That's what I've been doing all night, and I came across this site: www.thatgirlemily.blogspot.com

Anyone hear of it? This woman, Emily, was happily married to her husband, Steven, until she finds out (through a PI hired by her brother) that he is cheating on her with her best friend (who suggested she start a blog because Emily and Steven weren't having much sex and Emily was frustrated). And she proceeds to go on a 14-day rampage, taking revenge by doing things like taking out a billboard saying he is a cheater, printing flyers a la Samantha on Sex and the City, giving away his most prized possessions, spray painting his BMW and sending his porn collection to his parents.

When I first started reading the blog (I started reading at the post where she finds out about the cheating, then moved ahead in chronology to the end of her 14-day revenge period, then went back and started from the beginning), I felt really sorry for her, but was impressed that she was getting it out of her system and moving on. As I continued, I started feeling like maybe therapy would be a better option for Emily.

But then things started getting fishy. As part of her revenge she packed up all of Steven's stuff and drove into the city, unloading it--giving it away to whoever wanted it. And somehow some bystander just happened to be on the street with a video camera and taped the whole thing, uploading it onto YouTube. Which maybe isn't so crazy, except that the film started with Emily driving up and opening the trunk of her SUV. Why would someone be taping her before things got interesting? I have watched enough Murder, She Wrote to know that something wasn't quite right.

Then I started reading the posts prior to when she found out her husband was cheating. And they were all about how wonderful her husband and marriage were, and how happy she was. But there were hints throughout--her sex life had gone south; her husband would leave for work at 7 a.m. and wouldn't return until 11 p.m.; when friend Laura came over for dinner, husband managed to make it home in time as well, something he never did; allusions to her husband's lack of endowment (which ended up coming up again, as an aspect of her revenge).

Everything fit a little too well. Every post from before she found out about the cheating ended up coming up again in some way after she found out. There were no dropped storylines.

Turns out the whole thing is fake. But it isn't just some random person screwing around on the internet. Nope--it's an advertising effort. But oddly enough, no one knows who is doing the advertising. Or what they are advertising for. One guess I saw was that Court TV is behind it (Emily mentions that her PI is someone who works on that channel), but no one is owning up to it.

I really dislike the idea that I'm being duped (at least I figured it out on my own as I was reading the blog and before posting about it, others were initially taken in and published how crazy this woman's revenge was). This is like an extended Energizer Bunny commercial (you remember--when they would start off with a fake commercial and then the bunny would come out, and you would realize the first commercial was really a joke), except many readers of the blog might never find out that it is phony. Which just seems wrong. And could this really be effective? After all, I still don't even know what they were advertising! And after reading the entire blog, I can't think of one thing I am more likely to purchase or watch now than I was before reading it.

Anyway, check out the blog while you still can if you're interested. Since at least one site points out this violates blogger's terms and conditions because it is all a scam, it's possible it could come down soon.