I've been meaning to post something to this extent for a while, but, you know; you put things off. I'd like to thank Ant and/or whoever keeps this site going at this point.
In 2001 I moved to a new city for university. I didn't know anyone and had in my possession a new computer to replace the Pentium 166 I had previously been hammering out half-plagiarized essays on. I also had a broadband connection, which was great for downloading mislabelled songs off of Napster and Kazaa. It was a new frontier.
I met new people and had good times, but found myself spending more downtime on the computer than I had previously thought I'd ever be inclined to do. Coincidentally, the first memory I have of any of you is getting in an argument with Idol on IGN. There was some thread polling how much time people spend on the internet and Idol answered with some number I thought was insane at the time. Not knowing how the internet worked, I voiced my concern and he defended himself - he didn't watch television or movies really. His go-to for entertainment was the PC. I conceded that he had a good point and Pug chimed in that it was probably the first time that an internet argument ended amicably. I thought you were all fags and moved on.
6 months later, I received a PM from some kid named The Grey King. Apparently IGN was going pay and he was trying to round up some peeps for some other site. I think I had skipped class (probably to make hooch in a 40 gallon Rubbermade container - as we were known to do at the time) and had some time to kill while some idiot sieved all the apple bits out of our mix. I registered. There were, like, 12 people on this site - every one of them talking about some inane shit. The number grew (by like 4 people), and I remember getting in a mock insult war with some guy with a bunny picture for his profile. To be fair, I don't walk into parties trying to start fights, but asians are like God's jesters and he needed to be called out on that.
Some other shit happened, we weren't gay enough for our host, and 6 years later one of us turned out to totally not be a girl. Some of us got married, some divorced, and that asian kid finally came to terms with the fact that he has a vagina. Another grew into a woman and moved to Russia for a bit - which is something I still find suspicious, but she was just following the travelling pants, I guess. Another became a leather supplier and almost killed some kids right before getting mobbed by terrorists (THEY'RE ALL TERRORISTS TO ME) in Pakistan. Yet another cut a swath through the ranks of upper management at the ice factory before telling me I need to bail on on chicks with kids (note that not everyone needs to....just me). Some black kid got high a lot and some British guy framed his room mate for distributing child porn. Oh, and this dude in Oakland probably killed a whole bunch of mother fuckers. At some point there was some retard all up in this bitch with his sister and apparently we were all assholes for calling them on being dumb as fucking rocks. Whatever. Chick had a baby, some kid posted one day that he was going to be a marine and then the next said he wanted to be a nurse - total closet case. Couple of guys have an obsession with obscure Japanese games and at first I was all like "These mothers be whacked", but then they whittled me down and I played Xenogears...which was dope. But then they lied to be about Xenosaga and were dead to me. Oh, and this one mother fucker reminded me of Omar from the Wire, but some alternate version of Omar who's, like, twice as gangster and loves pussy. Well, at least that's why I think he spells his name with an X instead of an E. That shit is hard. And goddamn roller-figureskating? Didn't even know it existed before all this shit went down.
And thinking about it, this all started just under ten years ago for me. That's like a million beers, one car wrapped around a pole, a few concussions, dozens of girls I didn't like, a handful I did, a couple that broke me, six different career paths, 2 degrees, at least 3 focuses of study, no less than 5 or 6 houses, a few nitrogen incidents, and a ton of real life friends I've lost touch with. As gay as it is, I just wanted to show my appreciation for the constant.
