Sure, I’ve gained a few pounds since August. Happens every year.

But I had no idea it had become so obvious, especially to Dr. James R. Goodfellow who, by the way, has a Nobel Prize in something or other.

“Our medical records indicate you have a history of weight problems,” he warned me by e-mail Wednesday.

Like I said, Doc, it’s a seasonal thing. Really.

“Mr. Rhoades,” he explained in his deep, fatherly e-mail voice, “we are encouraging all our patients to use this highly effective and safe solution, proven worldwide.”

But Doc, I still wear the same size pants I wore in high school. And girls back then referred to me as the skinny kid with no butt.

But I can still feel his stern e-mail look, his cocked eyebrow.

OK, already, Doc. Hit me with a trial box of those arm patches.

You see, most people are upset by spam, or junk e-mail. Maybe it’s because I ate so much fried Spam (yes, children, the canned meat product) growing up that I can stomach the e-mail stuff.

With a dash of Tabasco and a rapid-fire delete button, e-mail spam isn’t half bad. It expands my mind, lifts my horizons, makes me aware of the possibilities.

For instance, betcha didn’t know you can get ripped off buying a replica Rolex watch, even when you know it’s a replica. Who knew?

So says “Frankie Stout,” who is selling “genuine” replica Rolex watches. And let me tell you, there is a difference. These are quality knockoffs.

Frankie’s a good boy. Probably from the old neighborhood.

But I got this exact same e-mail offer yesterday from his associate, “Salvatore Hooker.” Weird, huh? Day before that it was from “Tommy Gallo.”

Those boys have a big operation.

I enjoyed getting “warm wishes this holiday season” via e-mail recently from Jodi at Mortage Associates. She was getting under my skin with those twice-a-day e-mail rejections of the 2.9-percent mortgage that I had never applied for.

The months of continuous rejection were hard on my self-esteem.

But not nearly as hard as the daily e-mail offers to help me with my… (gotta’ be careful here) a longitudinally challenged piece of my anatomy.

This was honestly something I had never worried about before. But, after continual ads advising me of my… (careful, again) “growth potential,” I was feeling a little … (watch the puns) “short on confidence.”

Well, at least I now know my defective “unit,” as they delicately put it, can be repaired.

Hmm. I wonder if that’s how pitcher Randy “The Big Unit” Johnson … Nah, probably not.

But, OK, say I go with that. Wouldn’t it look a little odd under a leopard-skin bikini?

“Tightening my body was never so easy,” says the young lady in the photo, the one with the extremely taut body and animal-hide bikini. No exercise required for an actual “bikini body” like hers. Just two little “MiracleBurn” pills and I’ll be “mastering the art of all natural weight loss.”

All natural? Are those capsules gelatin-free? I won’t settle for anything less than totally natural weight loss.

That doesn’t mean, though, that I’m above some chemical recreation. I’m as interested as the next guy in scoring some “narcotics in Euro doses.”

Have you ever done a Euro dose? One of those can put a Clydesdale on his can.

And they do offer a vegan version, via e-mail, of assorted “popular European pain killers.” Act fast, “Lawrence Xrigrp” (wow, I’m already spacin’ on that last name), advises.

But I hate how your lips go numb after those full Euro doses.

“Rex Rhoades,” says my next e-mail. “Get plump, full, lucky lips. Free trial offer.” Wow, help is on the way!

“Softer, fuller, younger lips.” Clinical studies – probably involving grumpy, beady-eyed, tight-lipped people (think Don Rumsfeld here) – show a 40 percent increase in “lip volume” and a whopping 351 percent increase in “collagen production.”

Huge lips! Think of the benefits.

Maybe the lip-queen herself, Julia Roberts, might go for me then.

No? Even with my taut bikini body? My Rolex?

Still no?

She into narcotics?

No, Julia’s not your typical Euro-trash bimbo.

How about a bowl of shark-fin soup? I can get a great e-mail deal on some fin.

Now she’s smilin’.

See? That’s the power of spam.

Rex Rhoades is executive editor of the Sun Journal. Readers should know that his opinions – like those of all columnists on these pages – are not intended to reflect those of the newspaper’s owners, employees or carriers. E-mail him at: [email protected]