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I created an email address a long time ago that was something like readrfc822@ just for these sites.

Anyone who validates email addresses by doing anything other than sending you an email is doing it wrong.

In some email systems like postfix, you can change what the + character is (like . or _ or even numbers) So you could have username_football@example.com

Underscore is not a valid character in user names. Use - instead.

You're confusing "usernames" and "email addresses". Underscores are fine in the local part of an email address. The following are also valid:

O'Reilly@example.com

"Foo@Bar"@example.com

Indeed. Sorry about this. I was confusing local part with domain name. Here is a blog note providing a detailed information on this.

http://haacked.com/archive/2007/08/21/i-knew-how-to-validate...

gmail allows you to put periods anywhere in your email address, so you can use that as a fallback. If a site's email validator pukes on youremail+mightbespam@gmail.com, you can use youremai.l@gmail.com or y.o.u.r.e.m.a.il@gmail.com or whatever combination you want to use.