No big deal, Lenny: the fact that my brother is part of the Special Forces contingent guarding the Baghdad Airport for the next year SHOULD make me look for another meme to cancel the fear, his and mine. Barring that, laughter just might help, especially since Eric always appreciated gallows humor, so I think he'd be better off with the (disturbingly accurate) assessment that our Prez should be playing frog baseball than toy soldier.
And what's so bad about associating Wagner with Bugs Bunny? This whole venture has produced one flashback after another of Bush in a poorly fitting breastplate and helmet, jamming his spear down a rabbit hole while singing "Kill the wabbit! Kill the wabbit!"
And considering that our Prez is pretty much a cartoon character anyway, I look forward to the day when we can send him home, and he can watch MTV videos with his best friend Beavis all he wants.
Scott, you missed the point of the tirade. I wasn't so much complaining about Jeter's writing "Star Trek" novels (although they _were_ pretty bad), as the idea of someone adding "Doc" Smith to a list of new and edgy writers. That's like someone discussing the latest hip-hop bands and an interloper adding "Oh, and don't forget Chuck Berry!" Without eternal vigilance, it could happen here.
Oh, that comment brought back memories, and not good ones.
About ten years ago, when I honestly believed that "Science Fiction Eye" was going to change the genre (and when I was equally deluded in thinking that anyone was reading my pointless little column in it), I crashed a Dallas SF/comics convention's dead dog party. As was my wont back then, I ended up starting a conversation-slash-tirade on how the genre kept looking back instead of looking forward. When someone asked about the writers I thought they should be reading, I started shouting them out: Ernest Hogan. K.W. Jeter (this was before he started writing "Star Trek" novels, by the way, and I'm still delightfully horrified by _Dr. Adder_). Stepan Chapman. I went into freeform word association, and a couple of people were taking notes because they'd never even HEARD of these writers and were deathly sick of the lousy selection of SF in the local bookstores.
One of those in the center of my own personal hurricane was a guy known in the area as "The Mouthbreather". I personally knew him as "The Creature from the Black Latrine", and he was the holotype for the cliche of the science fiction geek. Personality of a lump of lignite, the charm of a dead rat, and the odor of an open grave. He's listening in, and suddenly he spouts, "Don't forget 'Doc' Smith."
The whole area suddenly went quiet for a time, and then sound was replaced by a stirring full-orchestral rendition of "Springtime For Hitler". For about five minutes. I think I was the first to prop my jaw up from where it had crashed (about four floors down) and asked "Beg pardon?"
"Don't forget 'Doc' Smith."
I had forgotten that this was the same man who to this day continues to fight AOL's and CompuServe's erroneous decision to cut service support for users of the Apple 2E.
Therefore, when people wonder why I quit writing, why I haven't been to a convention in nearly three years, and why I have ninterest in returning, I just like to tell them about that individual Cat Piss Man, and how he damaged my fragile little mind. It works out well for everyone, don't you think?
Whoo boy. Oh, what I could say if I had the time. Let's just say that while it's possible to be saved from such a nutcase thanks to avid readers, it's also possible to get targeted by a nutcase who _is_ an avid reader. I had one such nutjob calling for six months when I was editing SciFiNow.com back in 2000, and the only reason I escaped was because she was in New York and I was in Dallas. Oh yeah, and she couldn't drive and she had a morbid fear of flying. (And people wonder why I quit writing...)
Mary Kay, it's like the Molly Ivins joke making the rounds: you know that the price of gas has gotten bad when rich Texas women who want to run over their husbands have to carpool. (My wife, a native Texan, laughed her ass off when she heard that one. Should I be worried?)
Seriously, in an attempt to keep the discussion at an intelligent level, I'd like to suggest an old theory of mine: out of the entire Bill of Rights, the two most important are the first two, and the Second Amendment is worthless without the First and vice versa. It's not just knowing how to use a weapon to fight tyranny, but knowing the names and faces of the targets and having enough wisdom and knowledge to know when to shoot. Guns aren't as effective as a good piece of satire, and when you consider that wit is the sniper rifle of humor (used effectively, it's more deadly than tactical nukes), the true totalitarian does his best to keep his vassals from having the opportunity to use it. Without a free press, the patriots that might want to organize have no idea where to go or what to do when they get there.
Which brings us to the Canada/Iraq situation. I'm not saying that Canada's media are as free as those in the States (you should see the bluenoses running Customs these days), but the level of wit running free in the papers and the CBC is enough to slap down the obvious targets. With wit and a venue widespread enough to disseminate it, why do you need firearms?
Teresa: true, but I join the masses in agreeing that it's better to pretend that I never wrote in the first place. Besides, considering my output, deleting all of it will be no great loss.
So do you think it's time I contacted them and had them update my Author listing? Or delete it, which is the preferable option?
| Year | Number of comments posted |
|---|---|
| 2003 | 10 |
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