MarryOurDaughter.com

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Okay, get sick with the flu for a couple of days and what happens? One, you write a dumb blog (see below as an example) and you miss the latest news. O.J. Simpson gets busted in Las Vegas for kidnapping and armed robbery, the Fed lower interest rates, and a guy puts up a web-site called MarryOurDaughter. (See story: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20781129/site/newsweek/?GT1=10357)

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On MOD, folks listed their daughters as prospects for an arranged marriage in the Biblical tradition. Each young woman had a price tag (excuse me, dowry, that was to be paid to the parents) and most (if not all) were under sixteen years of age. Okay, the whole thing was a hoax but it brought to light the fact that several states allow marriage under the age of sixteen -- Alabama, Minnesota, Missouri, Utah, and New Hampshire (NH's minimum age is 13). Mississippi and South Carolina allow girls but not boys to marry under sixteen. At least, I think that was the reason they put up the blog.

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First -- the blog appears to be shut down. Yeah, I was curious so I Googled it. Second -- the blog was only up for a little more than a week. How did so many people find out about it so quickly? Put up a blog and a week later it's a MSNBC and Newsweek cover story. Third -- and this is the scariest part (okay, it's all scary). The blog had 60 million hits. What do you type into the subject line of Google to find something like this site?

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Finally, at my age and all I've been through, why do "some" people and the crap they do still amaze me?