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Textification masturbation

Remember the days of Trash-80s, Apple ][s, and the piracy of BBS? Neither do I, but I just found out it’s not to late to start reliving them anyway, and learning a little about American History in the process.

I always wanted to step into the shoes of a teenage computer nerd with a modem circa 1983 (the life that could have been, if only my parents had had sex sooner) — spreading trite German-sounding humor to the world; painstakingly drawing naked ladies with nothing but the 128 basic ASCII characters as my palette; beating that damn Rom Raider to the punch on publishing the walkthrough for the new Adventure! game. Thanks to a little article in Salon, now I know how and where I can step back in time:

textfiles.com

(Note: experiencing this site to the fullest will require a radical reduction in your expecations of web-based visual stimulation.)

Metariffic

Don’t mind if I do

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In his just-begun and already half-hearted initiative to promote himself shamelessly wherever he can, and receive his justly unfair share of attention, this new guy will occasionally put appearances, words and pictures in this space.

–this new guy

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Being a Lego bastard WORKS

I read a comic book called TRANSMETROPOLITAN. It is written by Warren Ellis and illustrated by Darick Robertson and Rodney Ramos, and it is published by the Vertigo imprint of DC Comics. TRANSMETROPOLITAN is about the crusade of journalist Spider Jerusalem to find out about and expose the horrible things that the President (whom he nicknames “The Smiler”) has done while in office and while trying to get there. To celebrate this fine comic book’s final year of publication (it is now within ten issues of the story’s end) I have made Lego figures of my favorite characters.

Spider is aided by his “filthy assistants”, Channon and Yelena, who help him gather evidence and protect him when they are not trying to kill him. Spider’s offensive weapon of choice is the bowel disruptor.

Here, Spider gleefully blasts President Gary Callahan (AKA The Smiler) with the bowel disruptor. That can’t be pleasant!

The Harry Potter Lego figure was hanging around, and so Channon and Yelena are showing him how they use broomsticks.

Spider blasts Harry’s enemy Draco Malfoy with the bowel disruptor, because the little bastard’s been asking for it for four whole books now.

Tee hee!

Metariffic

Referrals, in both directions

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I have updated my page of links. Most of the links I have added are things that I have mentioned in articles past, but there are a few goodies in there which I have found in my Favorites folder and have decided to pass on to you, the viewer.

Lately I have been looking at my web stats with much interest, primarily the referrals. It seems that a good deal of my hits are coming from Google searches for all sorts of crazy things. Perhaps the most popular searched for things leading to my page are anchors for the Chicago Fox affiliate’s various news programs. This is due to the fact that I have had a tendency to go on about them, but particularly the lovely weekend anchor Nancy Pender, who still has not responded to my open invitation to take her to dinner. I can only imagine she has used and discarded far better men than I. If it is so, than that is so it shall be, as I wish her nothing but happiness, and that’s about all a body can ask for in this harsh, cruel world, isn’t it?

Another popular and possibly related search has been “girls gone wild” or variations thereof. And yes, I am aware and amused by the fact that typing them here will only lead to my site showing up higher on the list of results for these queries. It makes me feel good inside.

The most curious recent Google search leading to my site would definitely be “story erotic Aunt bus”, which leads to some articles that I wrote last February. Sadly, the word “bus” only appears on the page as part of “Juke-U-Bus”, so its position in the search results has been somewhat inflated. Another interesting query was “fuck policewoman” – the list of which turns up my site as the third result, which is peculiar because I thought I’d score much higher, what with all the talking about fucking policewomen that I do.

Of course, the referral of which I am proudest continues to be the search for the phrase “I am a total slut” (the phrase, mind you, not just the words) which, as of this moment and for the last several weeks, turns up my site as the number-one non-sponsored link. Yes! I am a total slut! I am a total slut!

Fictishy, Politicking

And Bob’s your uncle!

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All right. Let me get this straight. Yesterday, George W. Bush choked on a pretzel, fainting in the process. At around the same time, it was revealed that Prince Harry had partaken of the sweet doobage.

Am I to believe these events are unrelated?

Honestly. Reading between the lines of these two stories, it is fairly obvious that George W. and Prince Harry were hanging in W.’s crib, toking on some primo weed, when suddenly W. got a serious case of the munchies. He went into the White House pantry and opened up a box of Bavarians, but Harry was all, “Mate. I gotta bugger off home, to England. My dad, Prince Charles, will be royally peeved, pun intended, if he finds out I been out so late.” So, W.’s like all, “Later, dude,” and then he settles down in front of the tube to watch the ball game. At this point he is so wasted that he forgets he’s eating and not smoking, so he inhales the pretzel instead of chewing it, and then he chokes. Meanwhile, Prince Harry gets home, to England, and his dad, Prince Charles, is totally waiting inside the royal castle when he crosses the moat, and says, “Blimey, son. Crikey, I smell mary jane on your knickers, so I do. Wot would your poor dead mum, Princess Diana, ‘af to say about that, I wonder? Nuffin’ pleasant, ‘at’s wot!”

How easily the pieces slide together.

Media Studies, Television

Jesus has won Survivor: Africa

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Jewfro Jesus

Ha ha ha! No, that’s not really Jesus. That’s Ethan, the winner of Survivor: Africa. He’s a professional soccer player. His luxury item was a hacky sack. Isn’t that adorable? But when he won a reward challenge and visited a Kenyan village, he gave the hacky sack away to some children. He also introduced them to the term “Jewfro”. Hooray for Ethan!

Media Studies

The solution to all your problems

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Obviously, I am already in violation of my New Year’s resolution to go to bed at a somewhat earlier time each evening. I must remind any critics, however, that Rome was not built in a day. Although Venice was, from what I hear.

All too often lately I have found my mind slipping into familiar patterns – that acquiring some object or service will sort out life’s problems. For example, last week at work I got a memo about getting paid through Direct Deposit instead of picking up my paycheck at the office. My immediate reaction was, “They’ll put the money in the bank FOR me? Why, that will solve all of my problems!” My next thought was, “Why did I just think that? I can’t possibly believe that!” Clearly, life has more problems to throw my way than just those which may be solved by switching to Direct Deposit, and I am an intelligent boy and have no illusions to the contrary. However, just for that split-second, Direct Deposit seemed like the cement mixture that would transform the bumpy, awkward gravel road of life into a smooth interstate highway with no speed limit.

Now, why was this my first reaction?

I blame television. Television commercials have taught me that getting their product or service will unburden me of the undue stress of daily life. None of them actually say it, although it might make a good ad campaign: “Minute Maid Orange Juice will unburden you of the undue stress of daily life.” “Tampax tampons will unburden you of the undue stress of daily life.” “Epil Stop-N-Spray Hair Remover will unburden you of the undue stress of daily life.” “Smith & Wesson handguns will unburden you of the undue stress of daily life.” And so on.

Well, that last one might actually be true.

Health and Body, Lucacentric

Ailments

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This evening, after I came home from work, I fell asleep on my couch. This is not at all unusual, as those of you who know me well know well. However, when I woke up earlier tonight, my left shoulder was extremely tender, and in fact, it hurts a great deal to raise my arm. I figure I probably slept on my arm wrong, but it has now been several hours since I woke up, and the shoulder still hurts just as much now as it did then. Could the shoulder pain, I wonder, have anything to do with the eight-inch spike sticking out of it? I mean, I swear that was there earlier, and it didn’t hurt then. Maybe it’s one of those delayed reaction type of things, like those fireworks they shoot off on the fourth of July that just go up and kind of peter out, until everyone is no longer paying attention to them, at which time they go “KABLAM!” or something to that effect and make everyone jump and involuntarily move their bowels. Or maybe it’s less like that and more like something else. All I know is that my damned shoulder hurts.

Also afflicting me but in a different way is the fact that I am one of those poor souls who is operating with a hard drive that is 99.9% full. Only the barest minimum of system resources is available to keep my computer functioning. I actually have two computers with a total of four hard drives between them, and every single drive is nearly full. For some reason, I find myself unable to depart with, for example, those digitized episodes of “The Tick” that I haven’t watched yet and continue to keep on my hard drive no doubt in violation of some copyright law or other. So I am in the market for a new hard drive. Something like, oh, eighty gigs should suffice.

Still, it won’t make that pain in my shoulder go away. That is what whiskey is for.

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I like it!

Hey, everybody! I just went out and saw the film The Royal Tenenbaums. It is a beautiful movie, featuring great performances by its entire cast. I like it!

After receiving a Gamecube for Christmas, I have been playing Simpsons Road Rage non-stop. Although in reviews it has been slammed as a Crazy Taxi ripoff, I find that adding the characters and locales from Springfield USA has transformed the concept from a smash-em-up curiosity into a smash-em-up run-em-over and hear-em-say-their-catchphrases roller coaster ride. I like it!

Everyone has been saying reality television has lost some of its appeal after the events of September. Balls to that, I say! Well, I guess I can’t speak for all of reality television, but “Survivor: Africa” is, in my opinion, as every bit as entertaining as the first two installments of “Survivor” were. Sure, the critics are saying the contestants are not likable, and the message boards and fan sites lament the predictability of the outcome of each show. Well, let me tell you, Buster Brown: the critics are wrong. And so are the message boards. “Survivor: Africa” is pure liquid gold. I like it!

Pizza. I like it!

Funnyweird

Huh?

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I have no idea what this is, yet I find it strangely captivating. Take a look at it, will you? If you somehow discover what it is or what it means or what it is supposed to do, please let me know, because I really am floundering about on this one.

Metariffic

Good heavens!

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So. I have recently been made aware of the fact that the Blogger website was “hacked into” recently. For those of you not in the “know”, the term “hacking” is used when some hooligan or other is able to find his or her way past website security and does hilarious damage. For instance, a person “hacking” the Microsoft website might replace all the images with pictures of Bill Gates with a swastika drawn on his forehead, and replace all the text with “Macs Rule!”. A person “hacking” the Macintosh website… well, never mind, because no one would bother. Anyway, some people “hacked” into the Blogger website, and whatever hilarious and entertaining damage they caused had gone undocumented, at least to my eyes, which are all that’s really important in this scenario. One result of this “hacking”, however, is that the BlogBack feature, which I have affixed to the end of every post via the “Comment” link, is not at the moment working in a particularly reliable fashion. Many of my alert readers had readily alerted to me that the “Comments” link often does not appear, and asked me if I had finally gotten fed up with hoodlums who had been using my comments boards for their own ill-gotten gains. Or something like that. Nothing could be farther from the truth, however. I am still perfectly willing to roll over and let fictional characters run amok in my comments boards, despite my earlier protestations, because I would like to keep the comments areas and there is really nothing I can do about it. Except remove those links, which I would not do because I want to keep the comments. Get it? Anyway, the “Comments” link at the end of each post may come and go depending upon whether or not Blogger is currently being “hacked”. If the link is not there, then Blogger is being “hacked”. If this is the case, notify the police, and make no attempt to subdue the perpetrators on your own. These are dangerous men, and they are running OS X.

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2002, more of the same

My New Year’s Eve was full of drunken cheer and merriment. Now, for your drunken cheer and merriment, here are some resolutions I have made for the coming year. (For the “drunken cheer” effect, while reading these resolutions drink large quantities of bourbon.)

I resolve to make it a habit to go to bed much earlier than I generally did throughout 2001 (and most of my natural life, for that matter).

I resolve to keep my trash/dishes/laundry situations on a much tighter leash than I have in the past.

I resolve to let food go bad less frequently, or at least not feel as guilty about it when it does.

I resolve to finish unpacking from when I moved in fifteen months ago.

I resolve to decorate the walls of my bedroom with tasteful posters and prints, because them walls are lookin’ bare.

I resolve to soup up my desktop computer so that it becomes a multimedia supermonster.

I resolve to stop buying so many damned comic books.

I resolve to use various pieces of exercise equipment to give myself rock-hard abs, or something to that effect.

I resolve to go to a dentist.

I resolve that I will take the next step in figuring out what I want to do with my life and how to proceed in that general direction.

I resolve to allow people to read my novel.

I resolve that I will have read the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy before the second part hits the big screen.

I resolve to get my damned eye fixed, because it be buggin’ Sandy out.

I resolve to spend at least half an hour per day drawing.

I resolve that I will make 365 Daily Hey entries in the year 2002, even if it means I have to write 100 entries on December 31 in order to catch up.

There it is. It is all out on the table. Will I be able to keep any of these? Probably. Many of them are vague enough to be kept no matter what actually happens. I shall revisit this list at the end of the year to see which I have kept and which I have broken.

364 to go!

Edited on January 2 to add more resolutions!

Vaguely creative and artistically unfocused balderdash.