Sometimes e-mails can be so annoying!

There are those “chain letter” messages, which promise something dire will happen if you don’t forward them to 25 friends. Then there are those sugary-sweet missives, complete with “awww” pictures, that you’ve got to pass on. And don’t get me started on e-cards or spam about cheap meds, hot chicks, or free I-pods.

But e-mail has its good points, too. Take today, when I received a forwarded message from a friend telling me of the new “bottle bombs” kids are planting.

Never heard of a “bottle bomb”?

Me, neither.

Turns out, it’s a pretty scary thing, and I can’t imagine having so much time on my hands to stir up mischief.

Nor can I imagine anybody thinking this would be funny.

Apparently, the perpetrators take an empty 20 oz. soda bottle and add Drano and tin foil, then leave it on somebody’s lawn, in somebody’s mailbox, etc. The gases combine in a chemical reaction, exploding the bottle (and leaving the finder with blindness, loss of fingers, and 2nd and 3rd degree chemical burns).

Not so funny, is it?

Nor are the penalties if one is caught:

• Possession without causing damage, 15-year felony
• Possession causing damage, 20-year felony
• Possession causing physical injury, 25-year felony
• Possession causing serious injury, up to life in prison
• Possession causing death, mandatory life without possibility of parole

I know kids will be kids. I know kids decry many towns because there’s nothing to do.

But when I was a kid, moping around complaining just earned me unnecessary work — like moving a pile of bricks from one side of the yard to another, or washing windows, or pulling weeds. . . .

Ah, the good ole days!