ADMINISTRATORS
ROB
Rob is from New Jersey, which more or less explains everything about him. His ability to insult someone based upon the one thing about themselves they most fear. The reason his parents abandoned him at Disneyland.* Also, his ridiculous assertion that New Jersey is a nice place to live. Also his fake tan, hair gel, and popped collars.
Actually, I don’t know if that last part is true because I have no idea whatsoever what Rob looks like. Why is this? Because I realized one day after we’d known each other for about six months that I had no idea what he looks like. Then we both decided that him sending a picture of himself to me would be gay. Then we both agreed that while there was nothing wrong with being gay, I didn’t actually care enough about what he looked like for him to send his picture to me anyway.
Interesting story? No. No it’s not. But I have white space to kill.
On a more sincere note, Rob is the sole reason this website exists. He has personally paid for the hosting since day one, and while he may be from New Jersey Rob can also be very very uncomfortably nice. Studies seem to indicate he may be the only person in New Jersey with this trait. He and another awesome person offered me a computer when mine was broken. Which, I think you can agree was just too uncomfortably nice to accept.
I had to go take a shower after they did that, cut myself, and weep hysterically after shouting at myself in the mirror that I’m ugly and nobody loves me.**
*That’s actually true.
**This is not actually true, although I did shave my chest just before being offered the computer. I did it mostly on whim. And yes, it was a VERY bad idea.
EDITORS
Whenever someone takes the time to read my site, I am honored. When they take the time to write, I am humbled. And when they take the time to systematically go through something I’ve written and point out every inconsistency, grammatical error, or typo… I am without words.
Because I am so grateful that I cannot express myself.
Here I would like to thank all those people who have helped me become a better writer. The few. The proud. The Editors.
MARLA
Marla is a professional grammar Nazi and has been personally responsible for the industrial-scale execution of no less than 11 million unnecessary commas. Some say Marla’s grandmother was an emphatic comma and traumatized her as a youth, others say that a comma once turned Marla down for her dream job leaving her bitter. Still other say this joke is really reaching for any kind of comparison it can find to Hitler. Marla would probably be one of those people.
Suffice it to say, Marla has turned whole story manuscripts blood-red in her relentless pursuit of grammatical purity. Any mistake you will find in my work is a result of my own stubborn idiocy. Any great piece of text is great only because Marla wrung all the filth from it.
You can find Marla on the awesome game Kingdom of Loathing, which is literally so awesome I can no longer allow myself to play it because once I start I can’t stop. Seriously people. A game based on puns AND nerd culture? Be still my fluttering heart.
JOSH
Josh notices things. It’s more than what he does. It’s who he is. How many times has Josh walked onto a murder scene and reconstructed the event based upon the most obscure evidence? How many times has Josh had to dismiss everything that was told to him by previous investigators who were in a hurry to close the case? How many times has Josh balked when told that he’s “too close to this one” and had to turn in his “shield?” Well, to be perfectly honest, probably never. But that’s only because he’s such a LOOSE CANNON OF JUSTICE that no one would even let him onto a crime scene to begin with.
Josh lets me know things about myself that are so nuanced and true that if I were a teenage girl it would probably reduce me to tears. Or if I were a woman of questionable virtue it would probably make me susceptible to seduction. But since I am an overweight twenty-something who likes writing stories about dragons and such it just makes me a better writer.
You can find Josh on his twitter.
ILLUSTRATORS
As a Weird American, I often think of lots of weird things. Penises having sword fights. Sex vampires with two carotid arteries. Teenage girls looking at giant-headed fetuses in jars. You name it… and well it was probably too mundane for me to imagine if you named it with your normal naming powers. Think of something that makes your skin crawl and causes you to doubt your sanity. Yup. That’s the one. I thought of that one.
Pretty sick, isn’t it?
Anyhow, none of these things could ever be graphically represented if not for my harem of women illustrators. Why do they do this? What compels them to draw things which are better left undrawn? Who can say.
Nevertheless, a more sophisticated group of dames you shall never find.
ANNESOFIE
Annesofie, aka Sark, is from Denmark. To Weird Americans like myself, this is endlessly fascinating. Once, while away at art school, Annesofie received news that her father had passed away under mysterious circumstances. She returned to find her mother had married her uncle, which as you can imagine made her a little more than kin and a little less than kind.*
After using her art to overcome the fatalism which might have caused her to lose the name of action, Annesofie painted a picture of herself painting a picture of her uncle murdering her father. This so amazed her uncle that his head exploded, the shrapnel of which killed everyone that Annesofie loved, teaching her that sometimes meta isn’t quite as awesome as people seem to think.
Annesofie has drawn me many things from a sex vampire to a walrus mermaid. I intend to annoy her further in the future. For her gifts are many and mighty.
*I seriously never get over the level of fucking genius in Shakespeare’s plays.
ERIN
Erin is Canadian, which at current exchange rates makes her 0.9168 times as valuable as an American. Erin is so Canadian that she never even responded to the e-mail I sent her asking her what she’d like me to link to in her little blurb thing here.
Therefore, I will tell everyone just to click on the link in my sidebar labeled “Living Just to Watch it All Go By.” Also, Erin drew me a giant talking penis… and you can’t find friendship like that nowadays just anyplace. *Sniffle*
UPDATE: Erin finally sent me a picture of herself to use. I think you will agree she is emo and hot as are all of my other lady illustrators.
Oh lady illustrators, how I love you!
KRISTIN
Kristin has the ability to draw any seemingly innocent object and make it sinister. How does she do this? I’ll be honest. I don’t really have any fucking idea. But I saw a carousel she painted once, and immediately pulled a bedspread over myself, turned on a flashlight and began panting. When paramedics arrived three days later I had soiled myself and was told I would not stop reciting the Lord’s prayer.
How she acquired this ability, however, is a matter of well established historical record. Kristin grew up in pre WWII Japan, living in a Bamboo cage at a school for girl-artists. In order that she might never draw something which would express hope, Kristin was locked in the cage with a Panda Bear… which did not molest her, as I am not Scooter Libby and I am in charge of this fake scenario. Instead, the Panda read her depressing Russian Literature before noon.
As is known, reading Russian Literature before noon has roughly the same effects as feeding a Mogwai after midnight. As the Panda read aloud paragraph after paragraph of “The Brothers Karamzov” Kristin began to shudder. Slowly her body contorted. Her eyes became round. Her black hair turned white-blonde. Her skin became white.
And she stopped aging.
Upon receiving intelligence of the horrifying experiments taking place at this school, American GI’s gassed the compound. Kristin survived only by finding an abandoned gas mask and fleeing into the chaos. Confused for a white person, she was brought to America where her sinister artistic abilities were of pivotal use in drafting the schematics for the first Atom Bomb.
She may look like any other 18 year old Art Student… but beware! For she has painted me a fetus in a jar… and it is amazing. You can find more of Kristin on her flickr page.
SHAWSHAW
I never hate myself quite so much as when I am in the presence of a super nice, super respectable, super talented person.
Oh yes, I may have a sort of back burner self-loathing at all times just in case I am attacked by a demon that feeds on narcissism… but oh boy… just wait until someone like ShawShaw comes along. All at once, my wasted potential and squandered talents begin to throb like kicked testicles.
I used to think this was because ShawShaw was just an uncomfortably nice person like my Mormon neighbor, or the Mormon girl I work with who loves horses, or the other Mormon girl I work with who bakes pies. But oh no. I should have known better… because ShawShaw isn’t even Mormon!
ShawShaw is actually a Passive Aggressive Dementor.
Brought into this world by the ritual sacrifice of JK Rowling, ShawShaw assumed the shape of a… ShawShaw… yeah… she assumed the shape of a ShawShaw! You heard me! It’s a shape! Then, instead of out right hounding people, ShawShaw decided to make people hound themselves by being uncomfortably nice and responsible. And all… just adultish. Blegh. It’s really gross.
See my banner? See how good it is and how much time was taken in its construction? ShawShaw made it for me. Why? Because she’s never happy until she’s made me hate myself a little bit more than I already do.
SUPER READERS
DJ
DJ lives in Poland right now, even though he is from Texas. Everyone agrees this is pretty depressing. DJ also loves me so much that any woman he marries will always feel like she comes second in his life. When I announced that I was going to make a Contributors page DJ began to wail about how he didn’t have any money so he quickly drew me a Giant Sentient Human Penis. I have realized that it may be inappropriate for DJ to be next to the other Illustrators.
Which is why I recently named him “The Warden of Stories” which means whenever someone asks for a link to a story DJ gets to answer if I am feeling lazy and/or am too busy. As it is well established that DJ knows more about my life than I do he is more than equal to this task.
Also, DJ wants to be a writer. I do now know why he enjoys someone else who also wants to be a writer… but I appreciate his readership. You can find his stories here.
JESSICA
Jessica’s mother is the wise Sea Hag* of Aragnor and her father was an adventurous musketeer of ill repute. When her father shot her mother in the womb, the bullet quickened the Sea Hag’s egg and Jessica’a evil twin was born.
For years the Lead Sea Hag Acissej terrorized the folk of small New England villages until one day a gypsy held a magic mirror in front her, from which her good twin Jessica sprung. Jessica then slew Acissej and ate her throat.
Why? Because that’s just fucking gross.
I have decided that Jessica is to be my Wardeness of Stories. Fun times, no?
*Jessica’s mother was also elected Chair of the Sea Hag Union in 1836 and presided over a period of time which saw the biggest increase in the living wages of Sea Hags in living memory.
The Wall of the Acclaimed Donators!
(7/28/09) Kima is perhaps most famous for her starring role in the film “Henry the Hapless Hippo.” The film takes place in the forests of Oregon, and features a lonesome mountain man who befriends a depressed hippo and in the process of helping the hippo recover discovers how to care about the world once more. Kima played the mother of two children who befriend Henry the Hapless Hippo as well as the mountain man, after running across them on a school hiking trip. Then, after a greedy zookeeper tries to steal Henry the Hapless Hippo for himself, Kima and the mountain man must team with one another to save the Hapless Hippo, and eventually find love in each other’s arms.
At her Oscar ceremony Kima credited her inspiration to “Hungry Hungry Hippos” and told a delightful anecdote about playing the game for hours on end when she was young. She even used the chopped off fingers of small children in order to make the game more realistic, as statistically speaking, Hippos despite being bulbous are the most dangerous creatures in nature. Kima also is responsible for the famous PSA reminding children everywhere that “Cartoonishly round shapes do not a friend animal make.”
Kima is also credited with the invention of the “Hippo Saddle” as well as the sport of “Hippo Jousting” which is like regular jousting except that the lances can never get near the other person in armor, and the hippos generally end up trampling both contestants to death. Why did Kima invent this sport? Some would say it comes from a deep hatred of jousting, but still others would claim that its because the owner of this website has a strange fascination with animals.
(7/27/09) Marla was born in a small coastal village to an old timey sea captain and his goodly wife, the proprieter of the local tavern. She spent her childhood dawdling on the knees of her father’s haggard crewmen who regaled her with stories of the sea, their only mistress. “Aye Marla,” they would say “the land has many a fine lass and lady, but the sea… she be the only one who have me heart.” Which no doubt informed Marla’s doctoral thesis “Oceanophilia: And the Frustration of Intimacy with a Liquid.”
Marla’s only friend growing up was a manatee named Richard. Many were the days Marla and Richard would sit at the docks, staring into the depths of the bay, contemplating the mysteries of the deep. Then one day Marla made the mistake of making direct eye contact with Richard, and asked: “You reckon there are sea people down there, like old cap’n Byrd says?”
To which the manatee responded with a skin-ripplingly loud “UUUUUUFFFFPHHHHH!” Which is the sound a mantee makes when it wishes to express the fact that it is not sentient, but in fact a very large very dangerous sea mammal that could very easily crush a small child. That was the last Marla ever saw of Richard, for ever after she was too afraid of his weird manatee fangs and bulbous snout to ever near him again.
Marla currently ejoys two passions:
1. Editing, which is what it is called when someone has the kind of personality disorder requisite to look at something someone else has made and instead of experiencing it say “You used they’re when you should have said their.” She is very good at this.
2. The Kingdom Of Loathing, which is the best role playing type game I have ever played, combining sword and sorcery with sauce and sarcasm. Marla introduced me to this game which is why several months ago there were virtually no updates on this site.
(7/24/09) Josh began life as a mannequin in a department store, until awoken by the love of a hapless but somehow likable window designer. Was it strange the way this mousy haired woman stared at Josh? Did it make him feel weird to feel her hands running all over his hollow cardboardesque body? Yes, yes it did. So weird in fact that Josh had no recourse but to defy every law of biology and science, spontaneously come to life, and tell the lady to get fucked.
(7/24/09) Brad was born in the smallest possible increment of time it took for the master computer that controls the universe to fluctuate between 1 and 0. What lays in the sliver of infinity that lays between 1 and 0? The answer is Brad.
Brad appeared, fully formed out of the cosmic background data, on the doorstep of his parents house wearing only a brown fedora and a bullwhip.* Although he appeared out of the ether, Brad lived a normal life until his thirtieth birthday when he was bitten by a Native American with a great sense of direction, an eerie empathy for animals, and a feather in his hair. Once bitten, Brad adopted the Native American’s curse and became a stereotype.**
Yes, he could live a normal life in the 9-5 world of business…. but once every full moon, Brad is forced to exemplify all the quirks commonly associated with his race by people of low intelligence. As he was immaculately born of a fluctuation of computer data, this means that he must wear ironic t-shirts with in-jokes almost no one is capable of understanding. He drinks copious amounts of “Rock Star” and plays WoW for hours on end. For fear of passing on his curse to someone else, Brad chains himself to his gaming chair every full moon. In his stereotypical state, he possesses only a keen intellectual understanding of how the lock works, yet lacks the physical dexterity to pick it.
Some say on nights when the moon is clear you can hear Brad’s labored breathing, followed by the short burst of him taking a pull off of his inhaler.
*This is not to imply that he was holding a bullwhip. He was wearing it as clothing, similar to Sean Connery’s outfit in the film “Zardoz.”
**In his regular state this Native American is Mormon, hates the wilderness, and loves tofu.
(7/23/09) Eric the Amazin Hazen is an avid collector of exotic beetles. He loves the way their black carapace covered bodies scurry along his flesh with their six wriggly little legs. He says the bite of their pincers is more delicate than the kiss of a fair maiden. He wears clothes of sack-cloth covered with dirt and sugar water so his beetles can go with him wherever he wanders. This is not creepy at all.
Did you hear me? AT ALL!
*Stares at the army of telepathically controlled beetles crawling under the door suddenly stop, and reverse direction. Sits down wearily, and sighs*
(7/23/09) What can you say about Shawn Meyer that hasn’t already been said? You need simply dial any number in a rolodex of saints to get the following comments:
“Shawn Meyer makes me uncomfortable. No person is just naturally that nice. All she does is help people. Weird.” ~Fred Rogers
“I don’t know sometimes… I just think about Shawn Meyer and it makes me feel like I should be doing more for the environment.” ~Al Gore
“Every time I see Shawn Meyer, I die a little inside to know a spiritual beauty that I can never achieve. Out of all the masses of humanity, hers is the one life that has been lived without sin.” ~Jesus H. Christ
“I aspire to care as much about the truth as Shawn Meyer.” ~ Jon Stewart
“If I had half of Shawn Meyer’s ability to make intelligent, historically informed puns I would be a billionaire.” ~William Shakespeare
“Every day I wake up, I feel like I am laying on a bed of heaven. For I not only have a wife, but an artist, a genius, and a goddess.” ~Shawn Meyer’s Unworthy Husband
How was Shawn Meyer born? No one really knows. Some claim she sprung fully formed out of an Enya song. Other say she was sung in existence by Irish Nyads bathing in a crystal clear spring. Only one thing is for certain: there is no person on this Earth that is as uncomfortably nice as Shawn Meyer.
I want to lock her inside an invisible glass coffin and keep her safe forever.
(7/23/09) Rebecca is Australian… making her one of many refined citizens of the world, who read this blog to get a feeling what it’s like to be a resident of the Best of All Possible Countries. She spends many hours staring at my site, enviously dreaming of what it would be like to sleep beneath Spacious Skies. Also, like all people from abroad, she is surprisingly generous. Seriously.
(7/22/09) Ashlyn is like Ragnarok, if Ragnarok were instead of being the end of the world, a very pleasant place to go have a picnic. It should also be noted that Ashlyn smokes a corn cob pipe. She likes to smoke her pipe on her porch, rock back and forth in a swinging chair, and think about narwhals.
(7/22/09) Eileen is awesome. How awesome? Awesome as shit? Awesome as fuck? No, my friends. No!
To describe the awesomeness of Eileen we would have to invent a whole new swear word, with a meaning so vile and obscene it cannot even be reproduced for reasons both scientific and moral.
Eileen is awesome as @*%$
I can hear you pussies now, saying: “BUT BC! ALL I WOULD HAVE TO DO IS FIND THAT WORD IS WRITE A PROGRAM TO GIVE EVERY POSSIBLE FOUR LETTER WORD, SUBTRACT ALL EXISTING WORDS, AND THEN BASED UPON A BASIC UNDERSTANDING OF PHONEMES WEED OUT ALL THOSE WORDS WHICH ARE UNPROUNOUNCABLE! THE EXTREME UPPER BOUND IS ONLY 26^4 WHICH IN TERMS OF MODERN COMPUTERS IS TRIVIAL! THE FINAL SELECTION POOL WOULD BE ONLY HUNDREDS OF WORDS LONG!”
Oh really? You really think so?
Yeah, you would be right… if that word were written in letters that a human being can even understand.
The letters that comprise the written form of the horrible unpronounceable word, are made of un-seeable unknowable symbols. Your computer can’t be given those symbols as inputs. How does it feel crypto-boy? Hmmm? How does it feel to know you cannot compute the awesomeness of Eileen?
Eileen is an art teacher, hero, and mother of two smoking hot as @*%$ twins.
If I weren’t socially awkward, sexually incompetent, and weirdly reclusive I would try to have sex with all of them. At the same time.
(7/22/09) Kjell Tore Sørensen was born in western Swemark, known as “Sweway” to the locals. His father was Æürdengaard Sørensen and his mother was Hildefodder Ëørindotter. Before the rise of King Clectic, Kjell’s village was burned to the ground by the terrible Horror Gnomes, who are like lawn gnomes but with fangs, and taller hats. He was found in a burned out attic by a group of Swemarkian soldiers, and sent to live inside of Castle Swemark with the rest of the children orphaned by the terrible Horror Gnomes. In time, he joined the King’s army and was raised to the rank of captain.
When asked how he feels about losing his family, Kjell’s face turns to stone and he stares out into the Horizon, his eyes empty like those of a corpse. He whispers “Dee dardy dur dee dur,” which translated from Swemarkian roughly means:
“The sorrows wreaked upon me by the inestimable beast of providence has perhaps made me a mournful man, given too much to reflecting upon the horrors of this mechanical bondage we call life… but I will always remember the love my parents gave me, the bond of common humanity, and I weep to know that I am still capable of partaking in the simple beauty of mountainous Sweway… for Nature itself, stripped of its mysticism, is such a thing as to fill a man with such awe and wonder that he may well create, from the loving blood of his own heart, a God be there none in existence. To all of Swemark I say ‘I would give my life in your service.’”
Like all the men of Swemark, Kjell is embarassingly generous. So generous in fact, that if there were, hypothetically speaking, a website run by a total moronic asshole, he and a fellow citizen of Swemark would contribute to this site, more money than this hypothetical asshole makes in an entire day at his actual job. For the riches of Swemark are unlike those of other places, and gold and mead flow there as if brought from Valhalla across the rainbow bridge of Bifrost.
Kjell is a brooding warrior, and in the modern age serves as the defender of all Swemark under King Clectic.Women who have lain with him remark that is a lover more emotionally cold than even the most arctic Swemarkian Ice Dildo, although filled with an animal passion for physical love that is hotter than Thor’s lightning and deeper than the roots of Yggdarsil.
It is rumored he may be the son of One-Eyed Odin.
(7/22/09) Icyclectic was born on the frigid northern plains of Swemark* to his mother Ilga and his father Umlaut. Icyclectic was like most other children from Swemark, and in unremarkable fashion spent his days raising barns with the help of the fiercely intelligent and loyal Swemarkian polar bears, and spent his nights doing battle with the terrible Horror Gnomes known to ravage the countryside. It was during one such skirmish that Icyclectic earned his fame… and a crown.
When the Horror Gnome Gragnar decided to pillage the local Swemarkian Ice Dildo** Factory Icyclectic knew that for once the Horror Gnomes had gone too far. Without the money earned from selling the Ice Dildos, the whole Swemarkian economy was in jeopardy and the people would surely starve. After a brutal battle, Icyclectic challenged Gragnar to a duel to settle the long standing feud once and for all. Knowing that he could never hope to best Gragnar with steel, Icyclectic surprised the Horror Gnomes by choosing no conventional weapons at all. Instead he chose rape. Yes, that’s right. Rape.
At first when the Horror Gnome Gragnar raped Icyclectic, the people of Swemark thought all hope was lost, for never before had they seen a man so thoroughly raped let alone by a Horror Gnome. Then, anus still sore form his own raping, Icyclectic turned this fearsome concept against Gragnar. Men wept, and women screamed as the very fabric of the universe rippled. Icyclectic had managed to rape Gragnar so well, that he had in a sense, temporarily embodied the Platonic ideal of rape. His self-esteem so thoroughly shattered, Gragnar huddled in a ball on the field of battle and wept. He revealed that once he had been the King of the Horror Gnomes, but after the humiliation he had suffered knew that none of his subjects would obey him ever again. He gave his crown to Icyclectic, who ordered the Horror Gnomes back from whence they came, forging a peace that lasts to this day.
Today, the children of Swemark honor Icyclectic every day on his birthday by melting an Ice Dildo in his honor. His name has also been adopted into the Swemarkian lexicon “Clecticgaard” meaning “to have raped very very very thoroughly so as to leave no bit of flesh unraped.”
*The super-country country containing Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, and certain parts of Poland. Once, these countries were separate, containing only people with only certain aspects of the racial stereotypes Americans commonly associate with Vikings… until Icyclectic was born and his glorious Norseness exerted such enormous racial gravity they all collapsed into one.
**The ice dildo is the chief export of Swemark
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