Awesome weather!/Comparing Hot Summers/My Experience--Internet Scam

HURRICANES AND WEATHER
The tropical Atlantic is fairly quiet with only 2 areas in the Atlantic with a 10% chance of developing in the next 48 hours.

Tropical Pacific has no disturbances.

Hot spot in the country with be the desert southwest with some highs in the 80s. There will be showers and thunderstorms over the Rockies and in the northeast and Mid-Atlantic. A thunderstorm or two for Miami. Most of the country will have highs in the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s with low humidity...enjoy!

Houston, this will be the coolest week yet with lows in the 50s and highs in the upper 70s to low 80s most of the week--and low humidity...yay!!! Dry weather should last into at least the early part of next week.

SPANISH WORD OF THE DAY
Let's do scam or estafa, pronounced ehs-TAH-fah. Find out about my personal experience with a common estafa in the AND MORE section.

Volume 3 DVD of my award winning education series, Let's Learn Spanish with Frank & Paco, will be released soon. A CD of music from volumes 1 through 3 will be released at the same time. Volume 3 will cover the alphabet (with words beginning with those letters), numbers 1 through 20 and colors. Until it's ready for release, Let's Learn Spanish with Frank & Paco Volumes 1 and 2 on the shelf (in the education section) at Barnes & Noble stores or you can order them from http://www.frankandpaco.com, http://www.amazon.com, http://www.bn.com, http://www.bestbuy.com, or http://www.ebay.com/. Our ESL (English as a Second Language) version can be found at http://www.frankypaco.com.

AND MORE
COMPARISON OF HOT SUMMERS
So, now that cooler weather has descended on most of the country (including Houston), I thought it would be interesting to compare Houston's summer to previous summers. This year's summer seemed particularly hot to me.

Well, August was very hot in Houston--in fact it was the hottest month ever on record. Now, this means that if you average all of the highs and lows for the month, that average was higher than that found in any other month. It was 87.7 degrees. In comparison, 1980 had the 6th hottest August with an average of 86.6 and 2009 (just last year) was the 8th hottest with an average of 86.2.

Those 2 years, 1980 amd 2009 show up again in the top 10 July's and June's. 1980 had the hottest July with an average of 87.5. Notice that is below this year's hottest ever month (August) with the average of 87.7. 2009 had the second hottest July ever with an average of 87.4. 2010's July did not make the top 10 hottest list.

For Junes, 2009 had the 2nd hottest June with an average of 85.6. 1980 had the 4th hottest June with and average of 85.1 and this year, 2010, had the 6th hottest June with an average of 84.7.

MY PERSONAL INTERNET SELLING SCAM EXPERIENCE
I am trying to sell a wedding dress either on Craig's List of Yesbride.com for $100. Don't worry--it's not the dress for Gordy and me. Anyway, the original price was $600. Well, I got a couple of earnest replies. One was not very suspicious at first as the guy asked lots of detailed questions about the dress...looked like he was very interested. But then, he talked about wiring money--immediate red flags. I had worked at a bank years ago as a teller, and I am aware of lots of tricks that people try to pull.

But a 2nd lady had me a bit more convinced as she never mentioned wiring money. In fact, she talked about her upcoming wedding and how she would send me a check and I could make sure it cleared and then she would have someone pick it up. Check out this email stream:

I was checking through Yesbride and i saw the wedding dress posted for sale. please i will like to know if its still available, its present condition and the last asking price you re willing to let go of it. Email me if its still available and also a new pictures of it, if you have any.

(So I thought well errors in her grammar but ok...maybe this is a prospect. Here is her next message).

Sorry for the late response, i have been very busy with shopping and planning for my wedding but anyway thanks for the response I am okay with the condition and price of it. I want you to know that i am really interested in wedding dress and I would really not want to lose the sale. I want you to remove the advert from web and consider it sold to me, I'll have my secretary send you a Bank Certified Check and the check payment will deliver to you as soon as possible via Courier service. I will need you to send the following information needed below in other to make/send payment ASAP.

1. Name to be on the check
2. Contact Address(street,apt #,City,State,Zip code):
3. Contact telephone number:(home,cell or work...)

***Note*** I want you to know that i would be responsible for the pickup. When you confirm that you received, cleared and cashed the Check, I will have my someone or my shipping agent come for the pickup at your location. I'm out of town right now but do not worry I'll handle things myself,I will be waiting to read from you as soon as possible so that the payment can be issued out and this transaction can come to an end.

(So I'm thinking she must be a foreigner but that's not a problem and as long as I can make sure the check is cleared, then no problem. So here's the next message).

How are you doing? I have sent out the payment i think the delay is from the UPS ..i will try and find out, why the payment hasn't gotten to your place yet. i will get back to you. enjoy your weekend.

(so at this point, it had been a couple weeks. I saw a red flag with UPS...why not just mail it? Here is her next message).

I think it might have gotten lost in the mail. because the tracking information given to me did not track am confused at the moment . please bear with me. am very much interested in buying the dress from you. I have resend the payment again. kindly bear with me.

Thanks for your time and understanding.

(okay...she's a busy bride. here is her next message).
Hello Cecilia,

How are you today? I want you to know that the check will be delivered to you today via Ups , Am very sorry for the delay .

Here is the Ups tracking number for the Payment: J-174-992-815-5

Upon receipt of the payment today you are to take it to your bank for cashing, after cashing at your bank you deduct your own money from the fund cashed and proceed to the nearest western union agent location close to you and have the excess of the fund sent to my shipping agent using the information below.

Name: Paula Scapicchio
Address: 3150 Plaza Blanca,
Santa Fe, NM 87507

After you have sent the money for shipment through western union , i will require the following details from you :

1. Sender's name and address (your full name and address used in wiring the funds )
2. Receiver's name (Paula Scapicchio)
3. MTCN ( money transfer control number ).
4. Test question and answer(E.g : THE WORLDS GREATEST ).Answer ( AMERICA )
5. Total Amount sent..........
6. A scanned copy of the western union receipt..............

Note: I want you to know that there will be some charges for getting the funds transferred by western union to the shipper , that should be deducted from the funds you will be sending down to her, So the western union charges should be deducted from the excess funds that you will be sending to her.

I await your soonest response, this is because my shipper has to be in your location for the pickup in the next 24 hours upon the receipt of the funds via western union.

I look forward to your email as soon as you have sent the funds today.

Thank you.

Okay, it's me again. I immediately knew this was trouble. You never ever cash a check on your account and then immediately send money. And get this, the check that arrived was $1830 via UPS worldwide overnight express.

So, I would be wiring about $1700 back to her with the fund in my checking account the backup in case the check bounced. No way!!! Run, run like the wind. She has sent a couple more emails which of course I am not responding to.

So, be careful everyone!!! If you ever take a check...always, always make sure it clears first.

Have a great week everyone!
Cecilia Sinclair
Wonder Weather Woman