How do you tell someone you know and like that they’re being a pest?

I’m speaking, of course, about those annoying forwarded e-mails. Stuff that someone else things is funny, or sentimental, or political. Those people must believe that they’re doing the rest of us a favor by forwarding along messages. They think that they’re keeping in touch. But it can be a damn pain.

First let me address those of you who forward junk: Basically, STOP.

Second, if you’re going to forward an e-mail, for goodness sake please clean it up! Remove those endless forwards, the lists of e-mail names, and all the indents. Just get to the meat of the matter.

I got an e-mail message yesterday that was 200 lines long. At the very end, after reading hundreds of forwards and carbon copies, I finally got to the one pitiful link being forwarded. I didn’t even bother clicking it.

Finally, if you perpetuate this type of e-mail bomb on your “friends,” then do us all a favor. Ask us if we really want to keep getting your crap — I mean stuff. Unlike advertising or e-mail lists, there is no way for us to “unsubscribe” without fear of hurting your feelings or offending you somehow. (I’m speaking from experience here.)

I’m certain that those who abuse our inboxes with forwarded crap aren’t sending those messages with the intent to annoy us. But just in case: Every so often when you spam (yes, it’s spam) out your friends another message, why not just ask them if they still want to be on your little list?

For example, “jbyrd” who e-mails me often, occasionally asks if I want to keep receiving stuff. I said it was okay, as he cleans up the messages and sends stuff that I don’t find sappy or that hasn’t been floating around the Internet since Moses. Thank you.

To the rest of you: someday I’ll get the nerve up to ask you to remove me from your list. Or else I can just chicken out like others have, and change my e-mail address without telling you.