October 13, 2004

• My Son, the Slacker
  [said with pride]

  I wonder how many women can utter the words, “my son, the slacker,”
  proudly.  Most would be proud of achievements that were
  tangible:  titles, degrees, awards, etc.  I happen to love my
  kid unconditionally, but beyond that I feel very good about what he’s
  doing.  In typical maternal fashion I wonder how he’s going to
  make it on his own in this world, but I staunchly refuse to
  worry.  He’s a genius.  He’ll figure something out.

  In point of fact, he’s only a slacker in a limited sense.  He
  seems to lack worldly ambition, it’s true.  If there’s blame to be
  assigned for that, I’ll accept it.  As he was growing up, I had
  only two objectives:  keeping him safe and thinking for himself.  
  The  only rules in our household were safety rules.  I never
  censored his intake or his output.  Consequently, he never was the
  sort of potty-mouthed little rebel that most of his schoolmates with
  conventionally strict parents became. 

  Unthinkingly, I tried to apply my own standards of personal hygeine to
  him.  Consequently, that being the only thing he had to rebel
  against, he now chooses not to bathe, groom his hair, brush his teeth
  or change his clothes until he’s going stir crazy and I refuse to take
  him to town unless he cleans up.  This, I’m fairly sure, could
  lessen any chance I might have for grandchildren from his line, but
  I’ve already got great granchildren from my oldest daughter, so I’ll
  let Doug off the hook there.

  So, he’s not climbing the corporate ladder or knocking himself out in
  service of god or Country… thank God!  At least I have that much
  to be thankful for.  But he really does knock himself out at what
  he does.  All I ever need to do to get his attention from wherever
  it’s focused (and he is extremely adept at focusing attention — had a
  great teacher there **glances down, smiles modestly**), is say, “I need
  your help here, now.”  The magic words.  They never have
  failed yet.  So there’s that, and I cannot adequately express how
  important that is to me.

  And there’s more:  he washes dishes, shovels snow off the roof,
  chops wood and carries water, all tasks I might (or might not) be able
  to perform myself.  If I were to have to do them myself, it would
  take me a lot longer than it does him, and there would be precious
  little time or energy left for doing anything else, I know.  For
  any of my readers who does not already know, I have chronic fatigue
  syndrome, and don’t have a lot of energy to spare for physical
  activities.

  When Doug is not working to maintain this household and keep the fire
  going, or “playing” to challenge his mental and digital skills at some
  game, he’s usually either reading, writing, or working on some
  artistic/creative project.  He is so seldom really “slack” that
  when I see him sitting staring into space I usually wait until he comes
  back to earth and then ask him to tell me what he’s been thinking
  about.  It’s always interesting, often original, and usually
  amusing.  He’s a master of the ironic twist, and his comedic
  timing is exquisite.  In that, he has had two master teachers –
  Go Greyfox!

  A week or two ago, fatgirlpink
  asked me if he has any of his writings displayed on the web.  None
  of his stories is out there… none is finished, really, and when he
  does get one into a shape he’s satisfied with, he intends to submit it
  to publishers (so he’s not enitirely oblivious to monetary
  realities).  But the bulk of his creative writing work goes into
  an ongoing series of survivor-style role-playing tournaments at  randominsanity.org, where he is known as Dareon.  Among his creations there is the hilarious Bustinator sequence I posted here, from a beta-test in which he participated earlier this year.

  Now, I’m proud to announce (and this is the whole reason for this
  post), next week he will be beginning a new
  tournament.  He has chosen to play the role of the same character
  he assumed for that riotous beta test, Bam Margera (shopping cart
  commando from Jackass), and for good measure, George Carlin as
  well.  When I saw the graphics he’d come up with, I decided I had
  to post them — too good to keep to myself.

  Here’s his avatar:

  And here is his sig:

  

  I had forgotten that there was a new tournament coming up soon, until I
  sat down at the computer a couple of days ago.  I moved the mouse
  and the screen saver gave way to that.  I couldn’t wait to tell
  Greyfox that Doug had decided to reprise the Bam character and to add
  Carlin as well.  Then I decided to tell you, though I’m pretty
  sure nobody outside our twisted family will appreciate it as keenly as
  we do.

  I responded yesterday to a question about my moniker from sobasysta
  and that set me thinking about hobos and monikers and the arcane
  symbols that hobos have used to warn each other of hazards such as bad
  dogs or keen cops and inform of benefits such as a free sit-down
  meal.  That took me on another googletrip, which I wanted to post
  but decided to get this one, and maybe another one or two that have
  been in the works, out of the way first.

  

  • 2:13 pm
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