Why do you torment me like this?!

The other day, in an effort to fulfill my blog-friend duties, I was in the process of leaving a comment on my friend's post only to be met with the most challenging task of my whole week. I guess as a measure to keep spam comments off her blog, my friend set up the word verification option; requiring every commenter to solve a wavy word puzzle before posting their comment. Usually this is not a huge deal and the letters are easy to decipher. But not this time. This thing was cryptic. I really did not think I was up for the task and was prepared to try one more time if I botched it the first time. Luckily for me, by some miracle, I guessed the letters correctly and was permitted to post my stupid comment. (Below is the actual brain teaser I was faced with. Yea, feel my pain.)It did get me thinking though. Why do they make those word verifications so hard sometimes? They are so annoying and when all you want to do is leave a comment or register for something, they are almost too much to handle. I remember trying to register for a hotmail account years ago and I couldn't get past the dumb word verification! I tried over and over again and kept getting it wrong. In the end I gave up and to this day I don't have a hotmail account. Which, in hindsight, is a true blessing. Honestly, who uses hotmail anymore? I think it is definitely the dorkiest email provider of all time.



Am I just bitter because I wasn't smart enough to solve the dumb word verification and get an account?

Maybe I am. So what?