ASCII and Ye Shall Receive

I'm worried about whoever did the ASCII Star Wars. I'm also worried about sequels to David Lynch movies. Barry Gifford needs to just fart on himself. Jennifer Tilly's sexy anyway. She wants my bod.

What Thanksgiving Means To Me, by Rusty W. Spell: It means the first day of the Christmas season, when you put up the tree and start listening to Christmas music as much as you possibly can. You might also use the opportunity to take lots of naps.

Your mama?

Hope everyone had fun enjoying the turkeys and what not. I, myself, had a pretty good time. Perhaps things are looking up after all. I was looking forward to a weekend of Lately David rocking, but instead, I got leftovers and Galactice Gigilos. But, all in all, it was fun. Sleep can be a good thing when properly utilized. For all those Crispin Glover fans out there, have a look at this little movie that's being made. A: Clearly not.
Tommy The Burton

Gobble Gobble

I hope everybody enjoyed a happy Thanksgiving.

On the George Lucas thing, one of the best pieces of advice I've gotten from one of my art professors is to not rework something too much, and know when to just stop. You can work a piece of art to death, taking a good idea and mucking it up to the point where it's too busy, too muddied, too refined, too overworked. I thought there were a lot of good things about the Star Wars Special Editions. Then again there was some completely unnecessary stuff.

Was there such a bad problem with people wondering how Vader got from Cloud City to his Star Destroyer, that they had to create the scene of Vader asking to prepare his shuttle for launch and cheaply borrow a scene of the Death Star hangar in Jedi to make us think the shuttle had landed on the destroyer? Were people so confused by the blast doors closing automatically as our heroes were being chased through the Death Star in the first movie, that they had to dub a Stormtrooper saying "Close the blast doors!"? Why on earth would they dub in a cowardly scream as Luke falls inside Cloud City after jumping to escape from Vader? (All of these made worse by the fact that the voices they used didn't sound much like Vader, Luke, or the typical Stormtroopers) And I don't think I even need to mention Greedo & Han...

At least Spielberg is going to release both the original and the new gun-less "we'll threaten them with these walkie-talkies" versions of E.T. on DVD.

Maybe George should just re-do all the movies in ASCII.

IT

In case anyone's wondering what they were making fun of on tonight's South Park with Mr. Garrison's super-vehicle, it's this super-secret invention that will allegedly revolutionize the lives of every man, woman, and child on earth. Amazon.com has IT listed, even though they don't know what IT is yet. I've been following the ridiculously unbelievable hype for months now with curiosity. While I suppose there's a possibility IT might live up to some tiny amount of the hype, I expect IT is more likely to give us all a small bit of amusement for a while before we go on with our completely unchanged lives. (Though, as I told Tommy, it would be cool if IT turned out to be an anti-gravity skateboard like the one Michael J. Fox uses in the future.)

Welcome, Tommy

The heading isn't as funny as "Welcome, Matt," but Matt doesn't seem to want to be part of the bloggy fun trick.

Everyone who wants Dr. Sbaitso should ask me to send it to them (it's a small program). I'm sure SoundBlaster wouldn't mind. He's a psychiatrist robot voice who will help you with your problems, though everyone I know just ends up cussing at him and making him say cuss words after about twenty minutes of legitimate therapy.

Everyone should, indeed, listen to their Lynch movies extra loud, no matter what it is and no matter where you watch them. I just watched his "Dumbland" two and a half minute cartoons, the first of which kinda scared me at one point. You should listen to this loud, too.

Some wag once said that art is never finished, just let go (or something like that), but apparently it's not true for George Lucas. I assume one of his reasons for revising is to make the six parts more like a whole and maybe to fix plot discrepancies. Though, from a technological standpoint, he should have just made the new ones look crappy, instead of making the old ones look new.

I think you should do the crush thing, even if it's just crumbling to the advert idiots.

Some guy on the radio just sang the lyric, "George Lucas... THX... Dolby sound... special effects." Hm.

My Thanksgiving plans, for the stalkers out there: going to folks' house Wednesday night and staying through weekend. Good clean family fun. Anyone want to watch Harry Potter with me? As you all know, I'm hype boy. I somehow escaped the Planet of the Apes hype, but I'll probably rent the movie tomorrow. I've seen every other Tim Burton movie, so why not? I rented Osmosis Jones this week just because it was done by the Farrelly boys. It wasn't too bad. Better than anything Disney's done is several years. It was also more live action that I expected (I expected it to sandwich the movie basically).

Um. Gummy Bears. I don't know. I'm just writing. Rusty.

Obsessive Behavior

To look at that David Lynch note, you need to copy and paste the following URL in your browser:
http://davidlynch.topcities.com/mdrive/pics/prodept.jpg
(It's one of those free website providers that won't let other websites use direct links to images they host.)

Holy fricking crap. George is worrying me. I was expecting some kind of tinkering, but whole new scenes...???

Okay, there are apparently some websites out there for people who have crushes on other people, but are too chicken to do anything about it. The person with the crush can go sign up and provide the email address of the person they like. The site then sends an anonymous message to the recipient of the crush telling them that someone's got the hots for them. The recipient can then sign up at the site themselves, and have anonymous messages sent to people they have crushes on. If the site detects a match, both people are notified that they've made a love connection.

So, what does this have to do with me, you ask? No, I haven't used any of these sites, but I did get a message from one this weekend, telling me that someone has a crush on me. Now, I'm incredibly obsessive-compusive when presented with a mystery. I have to understand and solve things. It's why I've been known to work calculus problems for fun. After going through everyone I know in my mind who could have sent it, and ranking them according to likelyhood, another depressing possibility crossed my mind. There was something in the email that looked suspicious to me. The URL it gave for signing up looked like this:

http://www.SecretlyKissed.com/ukissed.asp?xs=kisses

That parameter at the end could be some kind of referral code or somesuch, meaning that this could have actually been a spam message, sent to lure people into thinking that someone had sent them this, when it was really just an ad. (The part of me trained in advertising and marketing techniques admired the tricky cleverness of such a possible scheme, evil as it may be.)

Searches of the web and usenet didn't provide any evidence that the site was a known spammer, and people do seem to be using it legitimately.

To eliminate this possibility, a test had to be performed. I signed up at the site using one of my alternate email addresses that I use for signing up for things, not caring about having them put on junk mail lists. I then had a secret crush message sent to another email address of mine. The message I sent did not have that ?xs=kisses or any other parameter on the url, and included an additional url to have the email address blocked from future mailings. Evidence (but still not solid proof) that something was up with that original email I got. I suppose there's a slim possibility that in the day that passed from the time I received the original to when I sent my test message, that they may have tweaked their automated message-sender thingy. If they were thoughtful enough to include address removal instructions on the emails sent from the site, you'd think they would do so on their actual advertisements, to conform to anti-spam legislation requirements or whatever.

Now I have a dilemma. Do I assume the original email was spam, and ignore it? If someone I am actually interested in did actually send that message (and there is at least one lady friend of mine I would be absolutely ecstatic to discover it was from, and another I would be pretty flattered by as well), then I risk them thinking I'm not interested when they never get a response. (Anybody wanna fess up?) If I do sign up and try the thing, then I risk being a pawn of some sick marketing scheme designed to capitalize on lonely people's need to feel loved. I may try it. I may not. I may have already, but am cleverly acting like I haven't so no one will know. I dunno. Maybe I have no idea what I'm talking about. Probably not. I think about these things way too much. My brain hurts.

I'm sure you're all wondering who the two women I referred to in the last paragraph are, so I'll confess. Here they are:

THANK YOU VERY MUCH
YOUR FRIEND
JASON BELL

Fun Blogs. Here's a note David Lynch sent to the theaters showing Mulholland Drive. I thought it was funny. Man knocks on the door, and I ask who it was. Man says, "Freddie." I ask, "Freddie who?" he says, "Freddie or not here I come..." Thank you very much. Your Friend,
Tommy Burton

It's time to get Bloggy with it. Tommy, like The Prodigal Son, has indeed returned to the famous robot. he knows that he has been missed and is extremely glad to be blogging away like the madman he is. Now that the cheers have settled down, I can share my thoughts on each Blogger present and absent:
Rusty W. Spell--Rusty has been my best friend since high school. I almost feel lucky and nonored to have him as a friend. I always wondered why he hung around me, but I guess after all these years he really does like me. That's good, because I like him pretty good too. We set trends only to smash them down once they catch on as true trendsetters do. And he's still more talented than both me and Jack Halford.
Jason Bell--We took art classes together. He and Chris Ball used to always draw better than me, preventing me from becoming the king of the class and always regulating to me to the third-rate banana. This, in turn, led me to a career in music instead of art, so it all worked for good (I think anyway). He tends to hang out with me quite a bit, which is cool. He also stayed up with all night watching me IM my stalker and going hungry. He also gets to watch me fall asleep during every movie we rent, but then again, all my friends get to do that. I'm pretty sure that he likes me alright (It might be in sick, demented sort of way, in that I entertain him with my small brain).
Danny McGreger--he is the guy that I've chosen as my musical partner. I respect and admire him and his talents. He does make great hamburgers. He's truly the brother I never had. After going through all this divorce business, I discovered that he too, does like me.
Stephanie Tai--She said that I looked like Bill Murray. She came to hear Lately David play twice. I could easily fall in love with her. She might like me, but I'm not very sure. She did talk to me and Jason quite late night, so she might...
Todd Townsend--Todd's got all the ladies these days, so he's too busy to mess with our boring selves. We also met in art class when I pointed out his Van Halen symbol he was drawing on his portfolio. Jason and Chris weren't in this class, so I was the king...Todd likes me sometimes.
Dr. Sbaitso--He's this dillhole that I always cuss at. I don;t like him at all...

Dream Weaver

The show went nice. I'm sorry everyone in the world is sick.

I had a dream the other night that I was watching Mulholland Drive, only it wasn't really the movie, only it was a series of images that bothered me in some way, not necessarily in a bad way. One of them was a man whose face I think I saw on The Human Face special on TLC, which was deformed so much that he had three lumps of skin hanging below his eyes. He also somewhat resembled a mask I've seen in a movie, maybe from Amadeus or Eyes Wide Shut. He had on a crown or something. I keep having that stuck in my head.

I also dreamed about the end of the world last night, and it wasn't so bad. Everything was in perspective finally.

I'm ready for Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. I teach Monday morning and Tuesday morning, and the rest of my time is off. Liza and I want to play poker. I have three weeks of class left and finals week.

I'm not Dead yet

Sorry I couldn't make it to the show, Rusty. I've been having to keep myself doped up on sinus medicine to keep from feeling like my head was going to explode, so I haven't been going out much. Just sitting around in bed watching my new funny Monty Python and the Holy Grail Ultimate Definitive Final Special Edition DVD and reading comic books. I did make it to Tommy's show at Fenian's tuesday night, where he got off to a rocky start (I'm afraid the Rusty song he played didn't go too well, but there's probably not anyone left here who either wasn't there or hasn't been told about it by Tommy on the phone in the past week, so why am I even talking about this, other than to just keep the robot going).

In case Tommy didn't mention what that movie he was looking for was, Rusty, it was Matewan, which he did eventually find, and said was good.

The Tenacious D episode of Space Ghost airs this week. It seems it was originally delayed at the last minute because of complications securing the rights to play a whole song of theirs on the show, so they had to do some creative re-editing. And I was looking forward to a few minutes of nothing but words being bleeped out...

My Fans Are Killing Me

As it turns out, I've been asked to also play a music show at Tals Friday night, so those who feel bad for having to miss Tuesday can make up for it here on a nice weekend show.

I didn't like The Family Guy at first either. And, although I still like The Simpsons, I kinda agree about it lacking something now. I think maybe it's just too wacky and nothing else, where when it first started it was more "heartfelt" and nothing else... they hit the middle in the middle, so they just need to backpedal. Or something. It's been twelve years, so...

Liza and I had the same double feature when Shadow of the Vampire came out. Now I wanna know what movie Tommy was looking for.

Tommy? Apparently, Tommy's back on the Bulky Mail Robot, so he can answer. I told him to read all the archives from everything me missed and make a big robot response.

RUSTY DUSTY

I'll try to make it to the big show tomorrow if I can (though that's looking kinda unlikely). Hope you're feeling better, Rusty

I finally saw High Fidelity this weekend. Why on earth did it take so long for me to see this? (Well, I can partially blame Tommy's convoluted movie-selecting processes for a few instances I wanted to see it but didn't...)

Top 1 thing that bugged me about High Fidelity
1. The part where they mention Evil Dead II, but seem to be confusing it with Army of Darkness, which is actually the third Evil Dead movie.

Top 5 uncool things I saw when I went to a big flea market in Tupelo this weekend:
5. Grocery items that were months past the expiration dates
4. Air in a can
3. Various T-shirts with thinly-veiled in-your-face sexual innuendo and jokes so bad that I felt ashamed to be standing within sight of them
2. Rectangular clocks whose faces were nice little paintings of Jesus, Mary, and angels. They had little red LED lights in lines of varying lengths imbedded into the pictures in seemingly random locations, not outlining anything in particular, and blinking in random intervals.
1. T-shirt depicting the US Capitol building flying a Confederate flag, with the words "I have a dream" printed in big bold letters (being worn by some guy)

Top 5 cool things I saw when I went to a big flea market in Tupelo this weekend:

5. A dead lizard (the lizard itself was cool, not the fact that it was dead)
4. Old vinyl rock LPs
3. Puppies and birds
2. Sugar gliders (little flying-squirrel-like marsupials, the size of your average hamster or gerbil)
1. Amanda (my friend who I was there with, and who spending time with really made up for the lack of cool stuff at the flea market)

The following is a Blog I typed up offline intended to post Friday afternoon, but couldn't post until today, because of the stupid phone company letting the static on our line get worse and worse, and not bothering to listen to our complaints and check it out until it became completely impossible to dial out. Enjoy!

Spam

Well, I check my email today, and wow... I got a message from former Baywatch babe Geena Lee Nolin! I'm like, gee, what is this Hollywood hottie writing to me about? Could she be the mysterious stranger who reads the Blog every day, and want to comment on some anecdote she found amusing? Could she have visited my website? Is she perchance a LunchBots fan? Unfortunately, it turned out to be an advertisement for her syndicated TV show, Sheena, and it wasn't even sent by her at all. I was really disappointed, but then I got an email from CDNOW with a special 15% discount for me, and only me. (It said so in the subject line... "Jason, Just For YOU -- a 15% Discount at CDNOW!" Geena Lee Nolin may not love me, but at least CDNOW does.)

The Smurf web translator is one of the least-impressive ones I've seen, unfortunately. My favorite is The T'inator. The pictures and links to audioclips it randomly inserts place it head and shoulders above other webpage translators in my book. Unfortunately, it refuses to pity Blogspot webpages, so we'll never know how badly the robot here could be pitied.

The Tick: Well, Rusty, you saw the best part of the show, so be glad you turned it off when you did. It was just the pilot episode, so maybe things will improve as the season goes on. And maybe X-Files will be really good this year. And maybe Iron Chef USA will be just as good as the original. And maybe Lone Gunmen will get better... oh, wait.

Family Guy is pretty good stuff. Didn't impress me much early on, but it's really grown on me. It's like it's picking up the creativity and originality that the Simpsons writers have slowly lost over the last few years. I wish Fox would just make up their minds about whether they want the show or not... I mean, it's been cancelled and renewed like a dozen times already.

I first noticed Family Guy creator Seth McFarlane's name in the credits of the early episodes of Johnny Bravo, which had a lot of that same style of humor (though understandably lacking the more adult-oriented jokes) and comedic timing, before Cartoon Network got rid of the whole creative team and replaced them with a bunch of people who completely revamped the show (and not for the better). McFarlane's a lucky guy. According to a news report I read, if his travel agent hadn't goofed up his itenerary for September 11th, causing him to get to the airport too late to board the ill-fated flight from Boston he was booked on, he wouldn't be here now.

Last night, Tommy came over and helped me and my dad replace my vehicle's alternator. (My dad handled all the actual doing of stuff. Tommy held the light, and I supervised and said useful stuff like "Wait, we should put the belt back on before tightening that bolt.") Then Tommy and I went off on a quest to find that movie he's been trying to find whose title escapes me at the moment. Didn't find it, but we did discover the huge DVD section at Hollywood Video, where he rented some other movies. We watched a highly satisfying double feature of Nosferatu and Shadow of the Vampire, saving Cannibal! The Musical for some other time.

To Those Who Hate Rock and Love Gimmicks

Rusty = playing at Thirsty Hippo at about 8:00 pm Tuesday night. Only one musical repeat! The rest is new, baby! Rusty gets bored with music easy, and you get the benefits!

Coincidences

First: Re: Smurf Grammar: It would be "by smurfing here," not "by clicksmurf" which would make no sense in the Smurf world. I should make my millions by writing the Smurf grammar book.

Second: The Family Guy tonight featured their versions of Smurfs. They used correct grammar, using "smurf" mostly as verbs and curse words.

Third: The Family Guy made several jokes that I make most every day of my life, namely "That's what she said."

Fourth: The Family Guy is hilarious, and maybe even more funny (dare I say) than recent Simpsons. Wallace Shawn was a guest star tonight, or something who sounded exactly like him. Someone who sounds like Wallace Shawn? Inconceivable!

Fifth: After The Family Guy, I watched the pre-credits opening to The Tick and said, "Well, that's all of that I need to see." I was only a slight enjoyer of the cartoon to begin with. I imagine the real fans will just think this version sucks. I nicknamed the show, in my head (the only place where my opinion counts), "Another Barry Sonnenfeld piece of poo." Remember Maximum Bob? Yikes!

In other news: I'm sick. Fever sick... at least sometimes. I thought the best way to recover today would be to not do any work and watch the commentary for Snow White and Star Wars which seemed to have worked OK. Also, I'm playing another live show Tuesday, though I don't know what time yet. I'm not making a big deal out of this one (even though the show itself is probably a bigger deal, since it's a "multimedia convention"), mainly because I'm not looking forward to it since I'm too sick/busy to prepare anything smart, but I'd still love for anyone to come that wansta. I'll post/email info when I get it. I don't want to do the same old songs (and jokes, since I think of these things as musical stand-up... sitting down), so you won't be bored... more damn work for me, I'm afraid. All to please my eager fans.

Finally: I'm renaming this thing "Rusty and Jason's Post-It Notes: At Least We Like It."

I'm having car trouble. It must be Thursday.


Note to self, re: Smurf pictures - Don't tempt Rusty like that again.


Kenny Rogers Smurf is no match for the Tick! (But Smurfette could probably take Arthur.)

Continuing the cavalcade of discussion about blue cartoon characters, does anyone think the new live-action Tick series starting tonight will last long? I loved the big blue guy in comic and cartoon form, but I don't know if they can pull this off, even with Seinfeld's "Puddy" in the Tick suit. All the reviews seem to indicate it's a love-it-or-hate-it thing. I'll probably love it even if it does suck. Spoon!

Rusty's Smurfy Post-it-notes

Smurf Grammar

Of course, I think that Smurfs have their own grammar. You always kinda knew what they were saying, how to translate to English: mostly because "smurf" was used as a verb. Seldom nouns, or at least not in places where you didn't know what the noun might be. So a typical sentence would be "Everysmurf needs to smurf together to build this bridge" and not "Everyone needs to work smurf to build this smurf."


Wow, Smurfette, Wow!


More Male Fantasy Costumed Smurfette

Terrorists r dum.

Yes, the picture is real.

Speaking of disturbing imagery of beloved children's show characters--but disturbing in a totally different way--that picture of Smurfette Rusty posted is really bothering me. I can't sleep because of it. (Well, that's not really the reason I can't sleep, but I'm attempting to be humorous or witty or something here, and now I'm probably failing to do so by explaining my attempt. Oh well. Now I'm just expanding this parenthetical comment so that you'll forget what I was rambling about. Have you been distracted enough yet? Good.) Smurfs shouldn't look like that. They shouldn't have sexy bare midriffs. It's just wrong. Of course, if Smurfette had really looked like that, then the thing with that old Colecovision Smurfs videogame with the secret easter egg where you could make Smurfette get nekkid would have been less disturbing. (I've never played the game in question, have only read articles about it and seen censored pictures, and have no desire to find the actual thing.)

A thought just occured to me. If you speak like a Smurf and substitute random words with "smurf," you could go around saying horrible things to people, but as long as you kept a smile on your face, they'd be none the wiser. Maybe that's why Smurf society is so peaceful and idyllic. Everysmurfy thinks everysmurf is smurfy even if it's really a smurfy smurf of smurf smurf.

Smurf!

What's Wrong With This Picture?



My hour hand is screwy while my minute hand is not. Mystery solved. Or is it? What caused the hour hand to be screwy? Obviously goblins.

Just got finished watching ep. 2 of Twin Peaks with Kristina not too long ago. I only watch the show now with new peeps who haven't seen it; that's the best way to watch it. She'll probably have to watch Fire Walk With Me by herself since I get uneccessarily emotional.

Got the new Rheostatics album today. Not sure what I think yet. It's a rock album.

I've been barley sick for about two months now, well enough to still get around and do everything but sick enough to feel bad. Lukewarm sick--it's almost as bad as the real thing. More annoying.

New name for a band: 7 Cases of Plagiarism.

I still wonder if there's someone, some stranger, who reads this blog everyday. That person should write me and let me know.

R U S T I

Flux Capacitor

Rusty, didn't you get the memo? Daylight Savings Time has been expanded so that you change your clocks every three days (except for every third Saturday of the month and dates that are prime numbers). It's all part of the "Make Daylight Savings Time Even More Unecessary and Harder to Adjust to" program the government has established. See, the oft-mentioned Amanda and I had a big conversation the other day about how much we hate switching to and from Daylight Savings Time, and how it's all so pointless nowadays, since who needs sunlight anymore, what with electricity and all. So I'm all up in my Daylight Savings-bashing mood.

Seriously though, is your watch digital or analog? If the latter, it could be something physically jamming the works, causing the hour hand to stick. Probably one of those little gremlins that like to climb in there to lay their eggs. Those are tough to exorcise. If it's a digital watch, then you might have caught that Y2K bug thingy.

Maybe your glasses are acting like Tommy's theoretical dinosaur-viewing telescope, and you're actually looking at your watch as it appeared in the past...

-----

Tommy tells me that Lately David is getting ready to play the Hard Rock Cafe soon, which is a definite step up from grandpa's backyard, and we don't have to feel so sorry for them anymore.

-----

Here's a better picture of me than the one Rusty posted:


And here I am as a ghost haunting my old apartment:


I agree that Lori Berkemeyer is very cute and tall. She was always very nice.

I met Tommy Burton in high school where we were in art class (a.k.a. Mr. Box has us draw posters to enter into contests class) and band together. He's a crazy and fun guy, who's always complimenting me on my art (which is why I keep him around). Nowadays I go with him on trips to Memphis to hang out with him and Danny McGreger (who, as Rusty noted, is a genuinely nice and funny guy, who does make good hamburgers) and their band.

I've never met Nyleva Corley, but I'm sure she's a cool person, because Rusty says she is, and she likes Buffy the Vampire Slayer. (And I wasn't trying to steal away your Buffy connection with Liza, honest! It was all Rusty's misguided idea!)

I've only met Liza Marshall a couple of times, first when we went to see that movie with the funny robot teddy bear, and then when Rusty played at the Thirsty, Thirsty Hippo. She's gonna let me borrow some episodes of Buffy and Angel I missed, so she's a great gal in my book.

The Ninja who attacked Jeff is a mysterious figure. I was lucky to be there when the Ninja attacked Jeff. I believe it was my destiny to take this photograph:


I met Noby Nobriga when we were in the PHS drumline together. Didn't see much of him after high school until this past summer, when he, Tommy, and I got together for a long marathon of DVD and home video watching. He's a funny and creative guy. He and Rusty recently introduced me to the evils of the game of Honopoly, and drew me into participating in the playtesting process for it.

Optimus Prime isn't part of the Happy Fun Blog, but he's got the touch. He's got the power. When all hell's breakin' loose he'll be right in the eye of the storm. He's got the heart. He's got the motion. You know that when things get too tough, he's got the touch.

You know what's scary? I wrote those lyrics all from memory...

Rusty Spell--who's he?

Seriously though, Rusty was a good roommate. Even if we didn't talk a whole lot then--of course, anyone who knows me knows I never have anything to say. Except for rare occasions like right now, when I'm online and write for hours and hours about nothing.

As Rusty explained, I met Steph Tai way back in elementary school, where I discovered she was the cutest and smartest girl in the world. We pretended to be time travelers and she taught me about the signs of the Chinese zodiac, and we'd rollerskate together at Funtime Skateland. The other kids would occasionally sing the "____ and ____ sittin' in a tree..." song with our names in the blanks, while we ignored them and continued to sit at the lunch table eating our sloppy joes and talking to each other. She said she didn't remember that last part, which made me very sad.

Then Steph's family moved to the far-away land of Tennessee, and we lost touch, until years later when I discovered this internet thingy and found her website. (She and her brother had tried looking for me, but with all the Jason Bells out there, it was impossible to find the right one.) Now we correspond by email fairly regularly (except for a few occasions--like right now--when I get behind because I can be lazy and dumb--I'm sorry for being so lazy and dumb, Steph!), and finally saw each other again a few times this summer.

Introducing the Bloggy Fun Club

As almost promised, everyone who's currently signed up on the Bloggy Email Dump Truck, whether they've written or not. With photos. Basically, the amount of space devoted to your name is determined by how big a picture you happen to have.

Jason Bell

Jason and I met in high school when we were percussion people together. We roomed together at school for several semesters. We now make long trips together while listening to Sifl and Olly compilations created during the glory days of Napster. Jason Bell is a very common name, but this Jason Bell is not a common person. No ho ho! No indeed! No one else I know managed to be at the right place at the right time to capture the exact moment when a ninja attacked Jeff.

Lori Berkemeyer

Lori and I met in eighth grade in art class, because I was cool and she was cute (and she still is cute). We talked about Narnia, and we haven't been able to get rid of each other ever since, even though we've tried several times. I have a box of Lori letters that is a priceless literary posession; our correspondence shall be made into a book one day. Lori is very tall, and with special shoes and hair, she looks even taller than me, though she's not -- barely. She maybe could have been a sports star, but she had trouble picking up a bat one day when we were playing sofball. Lori lives in strange countries so I don't get to see her much. I'm still waiting for the day that Lori and I have all the time in the world together. Maybe in Narnia.

Tommy Burton

I met Tommy in eighth grade on the set of a play we did in drama, where he was doing Jesse Jackson impressions and saying "poof poof" when he invisibly applied my makeup for my scenes. Tommy's a really loud guy, and I'm the quiet one. We don't have a straight man and comedy man, we have loud and quiet; that's our comedy. Tommy and I talk about music and David Lynch and the best way to store CDs and how I'm an idiot for filing my DVDs by director. This picture is me and Tommy being Robert Brenton, which is the name of our band in which we perform classics like "Bumper Stickers" and "I'm 100% Sure I'm Not That Baby's Daddy." Tommy and I like to get under the warm covers together.

Nyleva Corley

I met Nyleva in my second year in the graduate program where she was being an English person along with me. She walked me to my on-campus mailbox to pick up a delivery of The Magnetic Fields' 69 Love Songs which made me cool and her cool. She knew my girlfriend Liza from undergraduate school, and Nyleva introduced us, though she doesn't profess to be a matchmaker in case anything goes wrong. Nyleva is one of the last true riot grrrrrls and she's a really good dancer and has a cute voice and we like similar music, though the girls in her music could kick the guys in my music's butt. Nyleva lives in Texas, which is a long way from here, so we write email or talk on the phone or just pine for each other. Nyleva's a perty gal.

Carrie Hoffman

I met Carrie this semester in the graduate program where we make up stories together. If I never had a sister, Carrie would be the sister I never had. I remind her of her brother, and she reminds me of everyone I know (that I like) rolled into one person. Carrie and I sat on the couch tonight at the English party and told each other each other's life stories, which she was better at doing than me -- and then I got shat on, but not by Carrie. Carrie and I were separated at birth. Oh, and that's her in the picture as a robot singing to the robot audience in my next music show. If I had a non robotic picture, I would put that up because (a) Carrie's a cute girl with glasses and a pony tail who needs to be seen and (b) because she's over robots now.

Kristina Lucenko

I met Kristina this semester in the graduate program where she writes poetry while I'm writing stories, although she can also write stories and everything else because she's all talented. She really doesn't look like Thom Yorke, but she's going to marry him or something. I actually have a picture of Kristina as a little girl, but I haven't scanned it in yet. But I shall, because she was a cute little girl, and she is a cute older girl as well. All of my friends are cute, at least the gals. I have something against ugly people, which is a problem I have. Kristina and I are watching Twin Peaks together, since she digs cool movies and David Lynch and stuff. She's in a band called More Dead Cats which will record an album anyday now at the famous Love and Letters Studios to be produced by me. Kristina rides a bike.

Liza Marshall

I met Liza on 1 Nov 1999, which was two years and two days ago, which means we've both broken our records for keeping boyfriends/girlfriends. Liza is my foil, aluminum and otherwise. We're Sonny and Cher. We're Belle and Sebastian. We're Stephin and Claudia. Our favorite word is "diggy." Liza can paint and draw and manipulate photos and take pictures and cross-stitch and figure out mind-twisting puzzles and she would be the vampire slayer if it weren't for Sarah Michelle Gellar. She's smarter than me, which is saying a lot since I'm brilliant. She's hot: a "hottie," if you will. She allows me to be a beacon of hope for skinny losers everywhere, like Drew Barrymore to Tom Green. That's a picture of us with a poster of Fire Walk With Me above our heads. Judy's gonna get us. Liza makes me feel like a kitten purr.

Danny McGreger

I met Danny sometime as an undergraduate when Tommy introduced us, but my first experience of Danny was seeing him on videotape acting like he was laughing for about ten minutes at a silly little magazine. Around here, most of us see each other one tape before we meet in person. It's not quite screening, but it could be. Danny is a music man. He writes songs of the goodly persuasion. He can play guitar better than me. He can play keyboard better than me. He can play trumpet better than me. I must kill him now. Danny can be really funny while being nice, which is a hard thing to pull off, since most people, to be funny, need to be assholes. Danny keeps a very clean house and cooks good hamburgers. He enjoys a Spree from time to time.

Noby Nobriga

I met Noby in sixth grade when we were in the drumline together, and we were actually in the same class together in fifth grade (though we didn't really meet somehow, only knew of each other) and we had an art class together in third grade, though we barely knew of each other then too. At any rate, Noby is easily my oldest pal that's still around. He taught me everything I needed to know about computers and electronics and music recording and videotaping and editing and things of that nature to help me become the genius I am today. Noby makes games and plays games and knows 48 different languages and he was once known to be in a van. Noby carried the big bass drum in high school. He is 1/3 of our oldest band, 'nikcuS, which we invented and recorded the first album for when we were mere fifteen year olds... but well after we were professionals in the world of recording fake radio shows and video productions. Noby has a hockey stick.

Ray Romano

I never met Ray Romano, except through this blog, but he's a very funny comedian who has a mediocre sit-com. This is a picture of him and his family with Little Billy Cosby. Ray Romano was funny on Dr. Katz a lot, when he was a cartoon. Todd Townsend does a good impression of Ray Romano, and he's the only person I know who does an impression of Ray Romano. Who impersonates Ray Romano? Of course, now Tommy and me and even Liza do impressions, all thanks to Todd. But little thanks to Ray Romano himself, since he's never come up to me and introduced himself, the bastard.

Rusty Spell

I met myself when I was born, but I really came into my own when I was about 3 1/2. I'm trying to get back to that state again. I picked this picture because Liza likes it. It's me and my first keyboard, which I am hugging because it is so dear. When you turn it on, it goes "dinga dinga dinga ding!" That shows how good it is. I'm 26 years old, which is still a rather young age for someone who's been around so long and done so many famously great things. I write stories and make music and my music is so good that people book me for "Conventions" without my even knowing much about it. I make movies and take pictures and make sure that my books are exactly one inch from the edge of the bookshelves. I do things sometimes without thinking and get shat upon. I teach, which is what some people know me as soley: the guy who comes in and teaches them English. Which is an odd thing to think, because it wasn't until minutes after typing this that "teacher" even came to mind, even though it's how I make my money, and how people make money is typically how people are recognized. I have goofy things happen to my watch, which makes me believe in hobgoblins.

Steph Tai

I met Steph in Memphis at a Lately David show when Jason introduced us after he not having seen her since elementary school, which is where she is in this picture (along with Jason himself, or "me"). Since then, Steph and I have been writing emails... about what I can't remember, but we did it pretty regular for a while until Steph started jet-setting all over the place, which I think she's settling down from now. Steph is a fancy lawyer person. She's another cute gal. She likes similar music to me, and likes the fact that I re-made 69 Love Songs. Steph is the reason I'm blogging today. I might not recognize her if I saw her for time #2, since apparently she keeps reinventing/hiding herself.

Todd Townsend

I met Todd at some point in high school, though I should remember the exact day since Todd is the funniest guy I know. Pound-per-pound the funniest, though he claims that Tommy and I are the funniest guys he knows and that he learned everything he knows from us, which I find hard to believe. I watched Cannibal! The Musical at Todd's house, which was an experience. Remember the Ray Romano guy? That was Todd. Todd and I share similar opinions that I won't go into, but which we discussed late nights at Tommy's house. Whenever Todd's name is mentioned, I say, "Whoah... Todd..."

Amy Wilkinson

I met Amy this semester in the graduate program where we write stories about characters that should hook up. Amy isn't really a swanked-up Smurfette, but I don't have a picture of her either, so I looked for a blonde and came across this swanky Smurfette. Amy's as cute as Smurfette, and as nice. People are suspicious of Amy for being so nice. "Why's she so nice? What's she up to?" Some people call Amy "Kim." In fact, I called her Kim once in my head, I think because there are so many Kims around, so why not one more? Amy was one of the first of the new batch of grad folks I met in the English department, and she soon won my respect by volunteering to sing in my show. Luckily, by the time she chickened out, I already thought she was cool -- so her plan worked. Amy is a computer nerd, but she's a tall hip skinny attractive female, so she's all about defying stereotypes.

That's all she (I) wrote. Feel free now to write about each other in a similar way. Avoid looking for photos and links, though, if you want to save time.

Michael J. Fox

I'm getting scared. Here's the situation:

About two weeks ago, I was in my office area of the English department, and I look at my watch (that was correct all day long because I was using it to know when to get out of class, etc.) and I go, "This doesn't look right." So I find other clocks in the department and learn that my watch is exactly one hour behind. Not "about" an hour, but precisely one hour. Weird.

Then about last week I was eating with my dad and he reminds me to set my watch back for daylight savings time. So I look down to set it, and it's already set exactly an hour back. Kind freakin' out.

Then tonight I'm at the English party and I look to see what time it is, and it's exactly one hour ahead. Boing?

So it's not a battery problem, because if it were it would just be all over the face, not exactly one hour behind or ahead. And it's not like some prank either, since it's always on my arm when it changes. It's usually sudden: like I look at my watch to say, "Well, it's about time to let out class," and then an hour or two later I look down and it's changed.

Unless someone can figure this out for me, I'll jump to what I always jump to as explanation: some sort of hobgoblin.

Misunderstood Rusty Tries To Explain

Nay, nay, nay, lovely Nyleva. Just saying that she finally has someone within an hour and a half that also likes Buffy, so that she can feel slayer energy in Mississippi as well as Texas. I should have said "in addition to Austin, TX." In fact, Liza even said the long distance tape-relay was "working just fine" even with the new developments of Jason the Vampire Slayer. We know that Nyleva and Liza are Good Willow and Evil Willow (I won't say who's who) and we'd never want to break that up.

This is Nyleva, a visual. When I have time, I'll stick visuals up of everyone I have visuals of (or make some). She's rad. To her right is Liza, but I cut her out when I cropped this picture because I didn't know she would be my full-time lady (or who she was) at the time.

Squiggle.

She Felt Compelled, Or the BtVS Comment Riled Her Up

My dearest Rusty: My heart is broken in twain. Has something gone awry in my long-distance Buffy affair with Liza that she has to go elsewhere to satiate her desire to discuss the latest developments on BtVS? It hurts that much more that I had to read about it on the daily blog. I can't go on. I won't go on. Surrendering to despair in Austin, TX.