March 15, 2008 - Beware the Ides of March

Posted by E

Friday, February 29, 2008

Hello, residents of Georgia. In the event that you have been living under a rock for the past month, we are anonymous. We are your mothers, fathers and children. Your students and teachers. Your police and firemen. Your lawyers and doctors. Your IT specialists and waitresses. Your farmers and mechanics.

We are men and women, young and old. We are rich and poor. We are everybody and nobody. We are everywhere and Georgia is no exception. From all of metro Atlanta to the campus of the University of Georgia. From the streets of Savannah to the west border of Columbus. From the outskirts of Albany to the edge of Augusta. We are among you.

On February 10, 2008 we united globally to speak out against an organization that has brought suffering, corruption, lies and death upon many for the sake of self interest in the guise of faith.

We, of course, refer to the "Church of Scientology". Just as Anonymous exists in Georgia, so does the threat. The protests were nothing short of successful and our protest in Georgia was no exception. But we have only begun.

Anonymous is asking all of Georgia to take time to examine our claims against Scientology before dismissing our words. We wish for all of you to realize that our motives are not against religious beliefs. This would be hypocritical to our cause. It is with this that we ask you to listen to both sides of the issue and compare.

And should realize what many of us have about Scientology, then and only then do we invite you to stand with us on March 15, 2008 when we once again speak out against the "Church".

For those whose minds have been made up, we will first gather at the Taco Bell, 2081 Savoy Dr in Chamblee, GA 30341 at 12:30. We do not advise parking here. From there we move up to the Church of Scientology at 4480 N Shallowford Rd.

Please check this link or email Anonymous at atlantaanonymous@gmail.com for further information.

We are Anonymous. We are legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget.

Beware the Ides of March.

For The Ladies

Posted by E

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

This one's for the ladies.

Saturday night I came across a nice little Belgian bar in Athens. They offered a wide array of beers to choose from, and being a bit of a connoisseur I decided to infiltrate their place of purveyance to negotiate the vending of some hoptacular comestibles. After making my selection I began my normal practice at bars, namely staring around wild eyed while violently shaking my right leg, generally frightening away those who might want to speak with me.

This habit affords a good deal of time for people watching, and it was as a result of this that I was able to intently follow the conversation of the douchebag next to me.

"And what made him a douchebag?", you would rightly ask. Let me tell you.

This "gentleman" was attempting to pick up the young lady sitting to my right. Apparently he picked up on the fact that there was nobody to her right and a shivering madman to her left, so she must be flying solo. (Amazing deductive abilities!) He was attempting to win her heart by demonstrating his high levels of intelligence.

And what did he use to demonstrate this? Did he speak voluminously about the subtleties of various Shakespearean soliloquies? Was it a dissertation on the symbolic meaning of Ahab casting his pipe overboard the Pequod? No. It was a high level discussion of all the various beers for sale at the bar as well as a breakdown of what all these different types of beer were.

I could see the complete lack of interest in the girl's face as he described the difference between an India Pale Ale and a Hefeweizen. Her eyes dulled and lost the flicker of life around the introduction of the lager, and I'm pretty certain I discerned some drool leaking from the corner of her mouth once relative alcohol levels were mentioned.

The whole time I watched this act all I could think of was what a pointless way of trying to impress somebody this was. If I'm just meeting somebody for the first time, I think I could find better ways to attract their attention than to go on and on at length about my knowledge when it comes to DULLING MY BRAIN AND HIDING FROM REALITY.

Ok ladies, you're at the bar enjoying a nice evening out on the town. All of a sudden I appear, collar flipped up, perhaps the first three buttons on my shirt opened so that you can see my gold cross on a chain mingling with my wife beater and overly thick chest hair. Having already made the mistake of establishing eye contact with me, I swoop in for the "ladykill".

"Hey, baby, did you know that the easiest way to tell if your crack has been cut with sodium bicarbonate is by the color? A good cut of crack, and by good I mean a 40/60 split should be somewhat yellowish in color and relatively odorless. Cut it with other chemicals and the rock may take on a little drier countenance, coupled with a lighter color. Smoke some shit like that and you're looking at a 90 second high, tops."

Would that impress you? How about:

"A lot of people eschew using black tar heroin, but this is primarily a kneejerk reaction, as purity levels (particularly in Mexican operations) have continued to increase in recent years. Stick to the China White when you're on the east coast, look for the black tar while on the west."

I have a feeling you would all be as turned off as that poor woman was.

It's a shame that some people can't find any better way of espousing their greatness than pure douchetry.

Vowel Movement

Posted by E

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

I had quite a productive day today.

In fact, you could say that I had a vowel movement. A warm softserve of my information starfished feverishly into the cup of life called the internet.

You slather my information all about you until possessed with a steaming desire to discuss it further. Soon we vigorously exchange the mucilaginous paste of assimilating knowledge betwixt us.

And lo, though my writings may satiate your deepest hungers, fulfillment arrives only from violently retching the hot splash of semi-processed information back into my eager mind.

Once again the free exchange of thought wriggles down the serpentine tunnels of the mind, imbued with your musky heft of discovery and speckled with the partially consumed nuggets of my original idea.


















Or you could just say I managed to get a lot written.










If you WOULD HAVE said the former, please send me an email with a picture, phrenology measurements for each of the 27 brain organs, and a 200 word essay on how "Teen Wolf, Too" changed your life.

Like a lolgin. Loled for the very first time.

Engage me in an online discussion for any length of time and you will find that I tend to adhere to the rules of punctuation and grammar. I'm not keen on using acronyms, internet slang or anything else of the sort unless it is being done in an ironic fashion. In fact, I pride myself in the fact that I have never used the term "lol". Until last night.

Last night I received a text message from Bonez that made me rather unexpectedly burst into spontaneous laughter. Being that our avenue of communication was SMS messages, I lacked a method for explaining that the message had birthed a much grander response than was likely assumed. As a result, the only reply I could give that would convey the unexpected outburst was "lol".

Now, I'm a lolgin. As I said before, I pride myself on not loling for anybody or anything. I am, however, a whore for emoticons. I keep an entire arsenal up my sleeve. In fact, my preferred program for chatting is Yahoo Messenger, ONLY because of the large number of available and well animated smileys. A good laugh via Yahoo will be displayed in any number of ways from me.

A giggle - ;))
That was silly - :P
I'm gasping for air - =))
Groan - 8-|

All of these emoticons as well as a host of others keep me contented and able to express my humor satisfaction levels with ease. As a result, I have been lolbstinent all these years. I knew I would eventually give my lol to the right person, but the timing had to be right.

To be honest, I've never even really loled on my own, just to practice. (I've heard it makes you go blind.) Loling should only be done at the right time with the right person.

And lucky for Bonez, last night was the night.

Lacking any method for expressing my unexpected laughter, I replied with the only thing that one could say in that situation - "lol".

Don't go thinking just because I've burst my lol cherry that I'm going to become some sort of slolut. I've no intention of that. She'll be tucked back into my unused vernacular and won't see the light of day for many years.

In fact, I ultimately intend to reclaim my lolginity. I've heard if you don't lol for a long time, you pretty much revert to what you were like before your first lol. I'll have to see if it's true. I'll tell you in ten or so years when I lol for the second time.

An additional word or two on encountering Anonymous

Posted by E

Monday, February 25, 2008

UPDATE: Since my initial post on this topic, communication has been re-established between myself and the person that was ultimately being discussed here. I wish to make clear any mistakes on my part and to apologize for any hurt I may have caused. Certainly no ill will was meant on my part and I do not seek to upset anyone.

The main mistake perpetrated by me is a doozy and one that we should all be careful of in our lives. Namely, basing our entire opinion of a person or situation on a brief meeting. As they say, first impressions are the most important, and to a large degree that is true. However, many factors can influence the words and actions of a person, especially on initial meetings.

For this reason we should not be too quick to judge others, as first impressions are just that; impressions. Having had further contact with the person in question, I apologetically rescind anything I may have said below that could have been taken personally. It has been thoroughly demonstrated that the impression I walked away with was not an accurate picture of whom I was dealing with. Again, my intent was not to offend, merely to impart a thought process based on information as I had processed it at the time.

All of the previous being said, I will leave the post below more or less intact, though with one or two minor changes. Although the impression I was basing my opinions on may have been incorrect, the thoughts themselves are still valid, though just not applicable to the person in question. Please recognize that these concerns are broad and not limited to the actions of Anonymous or any other specific group. Though this may have been written with specifics in mind, it rings as true for any other organization.

I have to admit I was a bit shocked at meeting Anonymous. Not so much shocked at the presence of Anonymous, as I had seen from the reports on the net that they truly were everywhere. What I found shocking was that I knew so much more about the topic than he did. Now, I agree with his cause. I'm down with exposing Scientology. Their litigious behavior has been well demonstrated to the American public and it goes without question that they hide behind their barrier of "religious tolerance" and attack any who point out their flaws.

I'm an agnostic. I would say I lean more towards full blown atheism. I find being an ardent atheist is every bit as arrogant as being a born again. We don't know the answers. We likely will NEVER know the answers. As such, it feels pretty ignorant to me to decry that there is absolutely no way that a god can exist, as we don't really know all the rules to the game. I have not seen a proof of god nor do I dare to reckon that I even know what "god" is, if it were to exist. All of us are limited by our senses and can experience reality only so much as we are able to perceive it. The reality of a creature that sees outside our wavelengths or hears frequencies that we cannot or that can smell all of the ingredients of a mixture instead of the cumulative odor is so different as to be alien to us. If our experience cannot even extend past that, then I would state that it is arrogant to believe that it is impossible for something greater than yourself to exist. Is it out there? Could be. I may never know, but if I were to see something to make me believe otherwise, well, let's just say my eyes are always open.

Back to the larger topic, though. My problem lies not with the feelings of security that religion can bring. We all need our own answers. The issue is how faith can be used against people. I'm no big fan of organized religion, I find it to be nothing but pageantry and ritual designed to keep you in line with the Brothers Grimm version of history that they choose to present. But do I think less of someone for wanting that, in order to make existence just make more sense? Nope. Can't say I begrudge them.

But with any of the major religions on Earth, you can walk into one of their designated houses of worship and someone will be there to help educate, instruct and indoctrinate into their mode of thinking. Once they've got you hooked, that's when they'll ask for the donations. But at least they're not compulsory.

The issue I have with the Scientologists is that their teachings are not provided free of charge. In order to begin following their religion, heaps of money have to be put forward for books, tapes, cd's, dvd's, etc. It is designed to keep you indebted to them, even sometimes to the point of working at their centers to pay for your "education". The net result of education is being sucked further and further into their organization until you are so helplessly entwined that your mind is more or less controlled. They will convince you to break off contact with your family, should your family be considered outsiders. They will lead you to believe that doctors are unnecessary for certain ailments (particularly mental).

They have had years of accusations thrown at them and they persist in trying to destroy any who dare criticize the words of LRH. To have faith in something greater than ourselves is fine. When enlightenment cannot be found without debt a serious problem is at hand. This disregards all the weird cultish behaviors exhibited by the "church".

So to stand here with a man that is protesting a system of belief yet who seems to be lacking the basic details of what he's protesting is shocking. If you don't understand what you're protesting, how can you really be protesting? His anger is directed at a series of buzzwords and printouts that conveniently tell him what has upset him.

This is the same behavior you can see in any forum. This is indicative of the modern culture. In the 21st century, everybody is an expert in every field and feels that everything is expressed as absolutes. You're with us or you're against us. Libtards. Republicunts. Everywhere you go on the net there's another series of smug, self satisfied arguments about how stupid the left is while the left calls the right "sheeple". It's the schoolyard banter of uneducated little boys playing (not nicely) with their toys.

Everybody picks a side and just spews the same banter back and forth. Every side has its own set of complaints and insults. By this token, this man could have been protesting anything and it wouldn't have mattered. Without any understanding of the argument aside from a handful of sound bites, anybody can be led to argue, complain or protest against anything.

Seeing this made me worry a bit for the Anonymous movement in general. In order to succeed in any endeavor of this size, they need to win the hearts and minds of those they are trying to convince. There is little doubt in my mind that a great deal of Anonymous has a at least a general if not a profound understanding of the people they're dealing with.

It concerns me, however, that the visible front line force could be someone who professed to me of only having heard of this whole ordeal three weeks ago on the Something Awful forums. Really? Some guy on a forum says, "Scientology is bad" so you rush out and get leaflets to hand to the populous telling THEM to stop following herd mentality and just doing what they're told?!?! Pot...Kettle...

Since Saturday I've just had these visions in my head of myself standing outside a church handing out leaflets saying that Christianity is evil and should be abolished. And out of nowhere a rather vocal member comes up to me, berating me and rightly upset that I am insulting his belief system. And my only reply is, "Wait. Hold up. Who the fuck is this Jesus guy you're talking about?"

I'm not saying the efforts of Anonymous are in vain. I support what they're doing. I even told the guy, "You're doing god's work". Should Scientology be stopped altogether? I don't think that's necessary. But take away their power. Make them understand that faith is not purchased. It has no price.

You can't buy your ticket to Hell. You have to earn it.

We Are Anonymous. We Are Legion.

Posted by E

Sunday, February 24, 2008

I managed to come face to face with current events last night. This was not something I had planned on. Hell, I never even had a contingency plan in case I was ever in this situation. Last night I ran into Anonymous.

If you are unaware, Anonymous is the group that has declared open war on the Church of Scientology. It is essentially a collective of people engaged in tactics such as DDoS attacks on Church web servers, dispersal of Church related materials and in-person protests of Scientology centers and individuals.

I was sitting on the porch of Hot Corner enjoying a nice cappuccino when I first spotted the man. He was standing about 10 feet away from the patio with a large box of papers that he was attempting to hand out. Some were interested in what he was peddling, some were not.

Because I am a people watcher, I kept an eye on this guy to see what was going on. After his third or fourth interaction I happened to catch the word Xenu and excitedly realized who he was.

A little background on me. I am a geek, through and through, and I love obsessive amounts of unimportant knowledge. I first became interested in Scientology around 1998 when I heard of Lisa McPherson. Her sad story and untimely death led me to investigate Scientology as best I could at the time. Around 1999 I discovered Operation: Clambake and read a good deal on the topic. All things considered, I've done a fair amount of research on the topic and read information from both sides of the argument in order to form the most well rounded opinion that I could.

A keen interest in current affairs has also left me acutely aware of Anonymous, their goals and their methods. I spoke with the gentleman about these things and even proselytized on Anonymous' behalf for a few minutes.

What I found most interesting from my discussions with Anonymous last night is that I apparently know a great deal more than the guy handing out fliers on the street. We discussed Anonymous, 4chan and, of course, Scientology. It became readily apparent that this Anonymous member was a Something Awful goon who had heard of current events via their forums.

That he was inspired to take to the streets and do his part for what he considers a just cause is to be commended. I just found it a tad odd that he had not armed himself with knowledge beforehand.

Back in the day I used to enjoy getting into long winded debates with Christians (primarily evangelicals). These were never negative affairs. It is not my place to insult the beliefs of others, whether I agree or not. It was more for obtaining a better understanding of both the nature of faith and the facts and details that inspire that faith. I went into those arguments armed with knowledge. If you can't discuss the minutiae of a topic, then you have no point in debating it.

And unfortunately, I felt that the person standing here with me lacked that ability. I did my best to educate and discuss in the short amount of time that we spoke. I managed to get copies of all 6 fliers he was handing out as well as a poster.

For any of you who may be in the Atlanta area, be aware that the "Second world wide protest against the Church of Scientology" will be held on March 15, 2008. This protest will be held outside the Atlanta branch of the CoS, at 4480 North Shallowford Rd, Dunwoody, GA. The protests commence at 12:30 pm. According to the flier, should you wish to contact the local Anonymous chapter, you can do so at AtlantaAnonymous@gmail.com.

Death of a Dream

Posted by E

Monday, February 18, 2008

In 1982 the video game industry started stagnating. Though production was still high and multitudinous games were still being released, a malaise spread among the consumer base, complacency borne by the excess of games and consoles available coupled with a general low quality of game play and lack of innovation.

What had until recently seemed exciting and novel had now become commonplace and droll. And the video game industry, riding high on its horse and unaware of the trends that would later come to define it nearly disappeared from the American conscience and relegated itself to obscurity.

Many factors bore responsibility for the ultimate crash of the industry and many companies paid the price for their arrogance. Riding atop the wave of popularity and goodwill that they had generated, major players such as Atari were soon to be crushed into near non-existence.

Atari was founded in 1972 as Syzygy, an engineering firm. After discovering that another company was using that name, they quickly switched to Atari, a term from the Japanese board game Go, which founder Nolan Bushnell was quite fond of. After hiring engineer Al Alcorn, Atari went on to create Pong and singlehandedly brought video gaming into the American vernacular. It should be noted that Pong was initially created by Ralph Baer, father of the Odyssey home console. Nolan Bushnell played a demonstration of it in 1972 and brought it to market before Baer was able to.

With the advent of Pong, people became interested in playing electronic games and almost overnight arcades began to pop up all over the American landscape. These arcades would house sometimes hundreds of machines and quickly became popular hangouts for American youths.

After Pong opened the floodgates, the industry exploded. Before long companies such as Taito, Namco, Nintendo, and Data East were bringing to life their ideas and soon new genres and means of entertainment presented themselves. Atari recognized the market for a home console and set to work creating the Video Computer System, later to be known as the Atari 2600.

The 2600 in the early 80's was synonymous with gaming. You didn't get together to "play video games", you went to your friend's house to "play Atari". And play we did. After licensing Space Invaders from Taito for their console, Atari grossed more than $2 billion in profits.

However, internal disputes ran rampant between upper management and the programmers, largely due to the lack of recognition for their work and the lack of royalties on the games they made. This dispute led to an exodus of Atari employees and the founding of Activision.

Atari was not pleased by Activision releasing cartridges for their system and ultimately went to court in an attempt to block third party games. This failed and soon the third party developers began to supersede Atari in popularity. These troubles, coupled with the emergence of several other companies looking to cash in on the video game craze began a slow saturation of the market.

By 1982 several consoles were available: the Atari 2600, the ColecoVision, Intellivision, Bally Astrocade, and Vectrex, just to name a few. With this large influx of systems it became more and more difficult for companies to find shelf space in stores to peddle their wares. Games which were previously selling for $35 began to sell for $5 as stores struggled to make way for the constant stream of inventory.

Atari's first major faltering came with the release of Pac-Man for the 2600. The highly anticipated port of this ubiquitous arcade game was considered subpar and poorly executed. Couple the low quality of this release with the inexplicable decision on Atari's part to manufacture more cartridges of Pac-Man than there were Atari systems on the market and the crashing of the video game wave became all the more inevitable.

The final nail in Atari's coffin and the symbol for many of the ultimate crash of the industry was the release of E.T. The film was expected to be a massive success and Atari, banking on this popularity rushed a game to market that is widely considered to be one of the worst games ever made.

Designed by Howard Scott Warshaw, who was given a mere five weeks to conceptualize, create, test and have the game ready to sell, E.T. was doomed to failure from the start. Atari was blind to this, arrogantly assuming that because it was E.T., it would sell by the truckloads.

And truckloads it ended up being for E.T. Only, these were not truckloads of cartridges being shipped to customers. No, these truckloads of cartridges ended up destined for a landfill in New Mexico in order to dump off excess inventory.

With poorly executed games flooding the market, too many consoles for consumers to keep up with, and a general lack of technological advancement since the 2600's inception in 1976, the video game industry came crashing to a halt in 1983. Almost overnight companies bankrupted and pulled out of the gaming business. Former giants like Atari found themselves being sold off, liquidated or closing shop.

Analysts predicted that gaming had been a fad and that the age of electronic entertainment was drawing to a close. The arcades began to close, the fervor began to die and the end drew ever nearer. And the end would have arrived shortly, had it not been for the machinations of a playing card company named Nintendo...

I Drink Your Blood

Posted by E

Thursday, February 14, 2008

Every once in awhile you see a film that ends up being way better than it deserves to be. You can't necessarily call it a good movie, per se, but it definitely has some kind of spark that you're not entirely expecting. I discovered one such movie earlier this week at the Plaza theater in Atlanta, and thought I would take a moment to recommend it to those who haven't seen it yet. The film in question is I Drink Your Blood.

Don't come into this thinking that this is an amazing movie. Or a great one. Or even a competent one. It is the lowest of the low in terms of budget and the acting is pretty hammy across the board. But horror fans have come to expect that few films in the genre are actually good movies. They're usually varying degrees of bad, but with some creative or innovative means of storytelling thrown in for good measure.

The plot of I Drink Your Blood is your standard "Boy injects meat pies with the blood of a rabies infected dead dog in order to sicken a roving band of satanic hippies who have taken up residence in an abandoned hotel and who have dosed the boy's sister and grandfather with LSD, but in fact ends up giving the hippies rabies which sends them on a rampage of bloodlust and violence" story. One that's been told countless times before, no doubt.

I Drink Your Blood was produced by Jerry Gross, the producer and/or distributor for a number of exploitation films that have since become classics: Mondo Cane, Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song, I Spit on Your Grave and Zombie, to name a few. Having seen the success of Night of the Living Dead, Gross wanted to capitalize on its popularity without being completely deriviative. To that end he hired David Durston to create a film that worked on a similar level, but without utilizing zombies. He wanted something more rooted in real life. Durston wrote a script called Phobia that dealt with a group of Satan worshipping hippies that became rabid and terrorized a small town.

Gross liked the idea and allowed Durston to begin filming it. Gross ultimately decided it would be best to release the film as a double feature with an older black and white zombie film he had. In a stroke of genius, Phobia was retitled as I Drink Your Blood and the other film became I Eat Your Skin. Of course, this led to an ad campaign that utilized those names to their fullest.

Once the movie was completed the next hurdle presented itself. The film received the very first X rating given out based solely on violent content. This presented an issue for the producer, as every day that the film was not released was another day that the film wasn't making him money. Very few theaters at the time were willing to present X rated material, so he sent the prints to the theaters and left it up to the individual projectionists to edit the film as they saw fit. As a result of this decision, no two copies of this film that one could see were the same.

The version we saw at the theater this week was a full 8 minutes shorter than the "full version" available on DVD. In the case of our print, a good deal of the gore had been removed, as well as some sexual material. This led to interesting plot issues, such as a complete lack of explanation on how the virus spread to the dam (it was a gang rape), how one of the cultists had died (she had been killed after being gang raped at the dam) and an absolutely amazing edit where a scene was cut in the MIDDLE of the exposition explaining the plot.

The hippies of the film were an obvious reference to Charles Manson and his "family". Given that the film was made in 1970, this reference would still have been quite relevant. Not only were they hippies, but they worshipped Satan, and apparently Benetton as well, given the racially diverse nature of their group. This included a black man, a mute, a middle aged asian woman, two white guys and an Indian.

So, after all this, am I recommending that you rush out and rent I Drink Your Blood? Not necessarily. If you are at peace with bad filming, bad dialog, inexplicable cuts, terrible acting, and the general feel of a 70's exploitation film, then you probably find this to be an enjoyable romp. It's not great. It's not amazing. But, if nothing else, it is very entertaining.

And isn't that all we want from a film?

It's So Easy

Posted by E

Sunday, February 3, 2008

There are moments in our lives that stand out as definitions of who we are and who we will become. Sometimes they can be major events such as the explosion of the Challenger or the falling of the towers in 2001. Other events can be much more banal but have equally as impressive effect on the person experiencing them. A point of example would be the first time I ever heard Appetite for Destruction by Guns N Roses. More specifically, the first time I heard "It's So Easy" off that same album.

Let me take you back to 1987 when a nearly teenaged E was struggling with his own identity. That year the family moved from the bright and comforting land of Huntsville, Alabama into the gray and depressing vistas of east bumblefuck Michigan. To say that it was a major life change would be an understatement. Huntsville was a cradle of technology, as I saw it with my young eyes. All of my friends had centered their lives around this emerging technological revolution and countless hours had been spent staring at the loving glow of various CRT's and televisions.

In the blink of an eye that had all changed for me. Instead of finding myself lost in a digital world, surrounded by those that spoke my language, I now existed in a town that I unaffectionaly referred to as "Six cows and a gas station". The entire student body of what would become my high school was smaller than just the freshman class of where I had been. Instead of being surrounded by those that valued an affection for technology, I could now count on one hand those that shared that bond.

I had gone from a land of cable television to a world where we had a roof mounted antenna which could pick up three channels on a good day. The landscape was no longer lush and green, it was dismal, a black and white world of misery and urban decay. There was nothing worthwhile, as far as my pubescent brain was concerned and an inexpressable rage began to well within my young mind, yearning to express itself but finding no means of doing so.

Then in December of 1987 my sister came to visit us. She always brought a little bubble of sanity with her, and seeing that she was old enough to drive would at the very least allow for a few days of escape, even if it was just to go wander the Meijer's the next town over. But she brought with her a gift so much more meaningful.

She called me into her room to show me this new band she was into. I made myself comfortable while she popped in the tape of Appetite for Destruction. Welcome to the Jungle blasted forth from the speakers and I immediately found myself entranced by the raw power of Axl Rose's voice and the dirty guitar work of Slash. But it was the second song that opened my eyes to the world around me.

It's So Easy came through the speakers, kicking off with a single note that soon devolves into a cacaphonous din of drums and guitars. Axl's voice was much lower on this song and the lyrics just felt sleazy. But is was about halfway through the song when I had my epiphany. Precisely the moment when Axl said the following:

I see you standing there
You think you're so cool
Why don't you just
FUCK OFF

My young mind was destroyed by those words. 1987 was a time of "With or Without You" and "Girls, Girls, Girls". Hearing something as raw as Axl opened a second set of eyes within me, fiery embers viewing reality for the first time. I had never heard such anger and aggression spat forth through the medium of music. I never knew that you could express yourself in that manner, that you could spit forth with derision and anger and call it as you see it. And with those words Axl freed my mind and showed me that it was okay to feel how I felt and was certainly okay to express it in any way that I deemed fit. In essence, Axl Rose awakened E.

A quick view of my school pictures can easily show the moment where Axl's influence came into my life. The previous year's picture showed a bright, smiling young e dressed in an adorable little maroon sweater. This year's had an E with darker eyes and a black t-shirt emblazoned with a skull firing guns out its eyes. Prior to this e had played cello in a symphony. Now E wanted to explore the darker side of his personality and wanted to face the world head on.

Axl managed to show me other things in life as well, such as being a completely untrustable prick. To date I have had tickets to see Guns N Roses TEN TIMES and Axl has managed to cancel NINE of those shows. I only ever saw them once. Thankfully it was a great show, but the fact remains that he gave me so much and so little at the same time. (I've only been waiting FOURTEEN YEARS for Chinese Democracy...)

If I ever manage to achieve some measure of fame, I am going to contact Axl and arrange to meet him, showering him with compliments and affection. Then I'm just not going to show up once he's there.