Joy of the Internet, The

Google ads often feature the most bizarre websites. Some are so good I had to share them:

Single? Gloomy? Gothic? Try gothicmatch.com

Do you live the Gothic lifestyle? Does the Gothic community intrigue you? We were specifically set up to help those in the Gothic lifestyle find each other. Whether in your local community or around the world. Everyone wants to be accepted for who they are and what they believe in, many times we are judged by the way we look, the way we dress. GothicMatch allows you to find those who look and identify with who you are!

Don't give me that pap, goth-nerds. Everyone knows you want to be hated and distrusted and that you tally the number of disapproving looks each day. And now, you can gather more social opprobium by doing it in pairs. And have suicide-love pacts too! And listen to The Cure together! And be mournful, with someone who understands and can be mournful too.

It seems specialty dating sites are booming.

Ever been burned by online adult dating services? We don't blame you for being wary of all those free dating sites out there. If you believe in the time-honored principles of honesty, integrity and family and appreciate country music and what it stands for then MyCountryMatch.com can offer a safe and secure environment for meeting like-minded people ... Our adult dating services aim to promote interaction among single adults who are not scared of commitment and seek real family values. MyCountryMatch.com is dedicated to bringing together nice people, people who know how to act with kindness and maturity. There are so many free dating sites where guys pretend to be single, or married women just log on to seek friendship - all because they are lonely. We expect our members to be totally honest about their identity when they approach us for country personals. There are some ground rules for you to obey if you want access to this unique community, and we'll verify your credentials!! We capture all members' unique IP addresses each time they log in. We verify email addresses. We require credit card verification to ensure our members are over 18 and live where they say they live.

The majority of our members are drawn to today's country music - artists like Alan Jackson, Faith Hill, Martina McBride and Rascal Flatts. Country music speaks to your heart. You relate to the lyrics, you appreciate the values, and the sexuality and romance make your heart pound. Country personals can help form lasting relationships with down-to-earth people with common interests, backgrounds and values.

And when you break up, you can enjoy country music even more as you sit on your porch, shotgun in hand. Did you know that towns with dedicated country music stations have higher suicide rates? If that don't faze you, Mycountrymatch.com is for you!

But as specialty dating services take off, the run-of-the-mill dating services have to keep up. So, welcome to AmazingProfiles.com - the "Online Dating Profile Makeover Experts"

With over 40 million online personal profiles on the internet today, your ad needs to stand out. It needs to be amazing! However, equally as important, your ad needs to articulate who you are and what you're looking for. Not only do you want to stop people in their tracks, you must stop the right people in their tracks. It doesn't help you to get dozen of email messages from the wrong type of people, does it? At AmazingProfiles.com we've put together an amazing team of Photoshop gurus who will take your photograph, apply the correct color balance, tone, sharpness and crop it to amazing perfection. Even if you have a favorite photo with your ex, we can professionally remove them and, in most cases, any existence they were ever in the photo! Yes, we're that good! We didn't stop there. When it comes to your essay questions, we have an amazing team of English majors who also love poetry. After a short 45 minute phone consultation, they'll go to work to write up your profile that will not only stop people in their tracks, it will stop the right people, and send the wrong matches running for the hills! Simply amazing wouldn't you say!

Well, I'd say simply amazing. I mean, they can use Photoshop, for god's sake. And if their crack team of trained monkeys can produce gems like this sample ad, where do I sign up?

My ideal picnic is a basket filled with fruits, assorted cheese, crackers, wine and a chess board! I love a great game of chess, and there is nothing better than a picnic at the park, overlooking the beach with a great bottle of wine, cheese and a guy who knows his way around a chess board! Are you up for the challenge? I've focused on my career, have a great family and hang with the best circle of friends, now I just need to find my perfect "Average Joe". Are you him?

I really, really hope not, Cindy6. I wonder if Amazingprofiles.com would stoop to airbrushing and tweaking your picture if you slipped them a couple of extra bucks? It's a fine line between removing your ex from a photo and getting a quick digital nose job along the way.

And for my last trick, here is a non-dating site which appeals to the unreconstructed Neanderthal. Welcome, TopSecretTraining!

Are these high-level combat skills too powerful for the public? God no. Even though Congress tried to ban this 'Murder-by-Number' system, here it is, on the web, in lurid black and red. 'Murder-by-Number' is never really explained, but I'm sure it's more impressively lethal than festooning your victim in numerals and killing them with ink poisoning.

I love sites like this. Here's his intro:

From: Lieutenant X, Former Military Intelligence Officer, US Army Special Forces

Dear Friend,

Would you like to be an instantly awesome hand-to-hand combat machine, learning to quickly kick the snot out of even the biggest, meanest, and most well-trained fighters you would ever come up against- the same exact way as our nation's top CIA operatives do? Would you like to be able to humiliate anyone who ever messes with you in public? By using the same accelerated learning methods as the Secret Service, you could take them out in your first move so hard and so fast that they never even know what hit them. How would you like to be able to master any fighting style or martial art in only 3 weeks, instead of 30 years・nd be fully qualified to teach it to others- just like our Green Berets train foreign freedom fighters? You would? Good. Then I'm talking to the right person.

But things weren't so easy for Lieutenant X, poor fellow. No, somehow Washington got wind of it

I don't know where it started, but a slanderous smear campaign labeling A.B.C. as the Murder by numbers system got back to Washington. Our easily swayed government officials were quickly convinced that Accelerated Battlefield Combatives simply makes people too dangerous, too fast ... We were disbanded, and A.B.C. was safely locked away. Or so they thought.

Cue ominous music.

There is much, much more to my story, including what happened after the hearings, how Colonel K. and I were asked to leave the Army, how I fought the U.S. government for possession of our training methods, how we wound up training Private Military Corporations (mercenaries), and even why I must call myself Lt. X and hide my true identity. But now the time has come for you to make a decision. Are you ready to take the next evolutionary step in hand-to-hand combat training? Are you ready to become a living, breathing, hand-to-hand combat machine?

Yes! Yes! I'm sick of being a wimp who can't attract girls because I've never humiliated and killed a man.

Your will learn [sic - spelling is optional when you are a Killing Machine]
-Incredible military tricks・that will take you from absolute rookie to a master of hand-to-hand combat in just a few short hours!
-Insider fighting secrets that only the most elite soldiers who have faced real combat could ever share with you!
-The guaranteed, easiest, most effortless way to toss ANY man right on his head...and break his arm on the way down if you choose to do so!
-How to snatch a loaded gun right out of a "Gangsta's" hand so damn fast it will literally tear his trigger finger off! (and then how to cave his chest in without skipping a beat)

Oh, god. This will change my life. This will change my life.

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