No Longer Feeling the Love After Opening E-Mail

It’s official. I’m a loser. I opened the e-mail carrying the ILOVEYOU computer virus that spread across the globe Thursday and sneaked in under my radar. (Yeah, yeah, it was on the news. Apparently, I’m the only one who missed it.)

The idea of a secret admirer sending me a love note was so exciting that I had to click on the attachment immediately. Considering the e-mail I usually get from readers, I should have known anything addressed to me with “I Love You” in the subject line had to be a phony.

Our tech department freaked out when I fessed up.

“We’re sending a SWAT team up,” said the panicked voice on the other end of my phone. “This is serious business.”

Two hours later, the disk-toting tech informed me that I had escaped infection. He updated my virus scan software and took off. I feel a little dumb that I opened the e-mail, but at least I got it. . . . My editor didn’t. Loser.

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Looking for love in all the wrong places? L.A.’s Robert Rosebrock used to be a happy-hour bar-scene regular. After staying too late and having a few too many for too long, he burned out. A year ago, he came up with “healthy hours,” meet-and-greets for singles sans alcohol. Now he hosts them several times a month. (Info: [310] 472-2717.)

“Healthy hours are about meeting people on a different level,” he said. “But we are not an anti-drinking campaign.”

Still, I decided against ordering my usual Chardonnay at Wednesday’s healthy hour at McCormick & Schmick’s in Beverly Hills.

Rosebrock is tight with the non-alcoholic beverage companies (who sponsor his events), so the event seemed more like a trade show than a happy hour. (Lots of regional managers.)

But the selection of drinks was impressive: Ariel “de-alcoholized” wine, Lorina French Lemonade and Reed’s Ginger Brew. By the time I left, I swear, I had some kind of buzz going. Must have been the Rhino’s vitamin- and mineral-rich “energy shots.”

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Here’s a great way to while away a hot afternoon: Laugh at old episodes of “I Love Lucy” with a friend in the library of the Museum of Television & Radio in Beverly Hills. You sit at a console with a headset, watching your very own little TV. Through the museum’s “Adopt-a-Program” program, you can select any show from the archives and underwrite the cost of its preservation and cataloging. (A half-hour show is $325; an hour is $650.) Your name (or the name of the person you want to honor) will be listed alongside the show’s description and credits in the museum’s data base.

I would love to adopt an episode of “Murphy Brown.” Candice Bergen’s tough-but-lovable reporter has been my idol since high school. I even wrote a college application essay on my favorite Murphy quote: “Don’t let the buttbrains take over.”

(And don’t open any e-mails from them either.)

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Booth Moore can be reached at booth.moore@latimes.com.