One topic you won't see revisited on this page is circumcision. I blogged about an article on that topic on May 1st, and received a number of emails about it, prompting another post about it on the 2nd, which prompted a bunch more emails about it, which caused me to write about it again on the 3rd. It's a valid topic, but since I quoted a bunch of emails about it on both the 2nd and 3rd, I don't really want to post them again in this mailbag.  That and I'm sick of the topic, despite not giving it any thought in the last four months.  The May 1-3 blogs are linked to in this paragraph, if you are curious or want flashbacks, feel free to click back and read them now.  Because you're not going to see any snippy remarks about foreskins on this page.

Due to endless delays in actually creating this page, this mailbag was compiled and captioned in early September, 2003.

Mails are presented chronologically.

Date: May 2, 2003
From: Alfred
Subject: hot or not page

Forgive me, but I just HAD to send you a link to this shot. Now, I have nothing against the mentally challenged (or drunken, whatever it may be) but for one to warrant a rating as high as this one? Christ, it seems like if a woman has blonde hair she automatically get a 5 point increase....maybe 6... 9.3??? No bio to be seen, but from the expression on her face, it wouldn't be much to begin with.  Something tells me, that if ever brought to real light, that picture will inspire many a dumb blonde joke. 

This mail is in regards to my Hot or Not page, which was about the first feature I ever wrote for this site, nearly two years ago. As the Hot or Not page intro describes, I had gotten into the habit of surfing that site, and while appreciating the occasional beauty or funny shot, I began to notice more and more how grossly inflated most of the scores were, for any woman who was even remotely attractive.  Not to mention blonde, as this emailer comments.

Not that I have anything against blondes, having been one myself until about age 12 (when it began to steadily turn brownish red) but it is rather a well-established cliche that blonde girls are um... shall we say... seldom class valedictorians. It's been remarked that mediocre brunettes dye their hair blonde when they are tired of trying to compete on their own merits.  Breast implants never hurt either.

Anyway, my hot or not page is one of the perennially most popular pages on this site, and seems to touch a cord in quite a few visitors, judging by how many people I hear from who are in total agreement with my comments about the absurd score inflation that's regularly evidenced in Hot or Not scores.

I'll just grab the shot and preserve it here (after a bit of cropping and a slight size reduction), since who knows how long it'll remain visible on HotorNot's server. Plus it saves the reader from having to click over to some other site to see the photo in question.

I gave her a 6, which I thought fair.  The current standings, as of Sept 12, 2003: 9, based on 4373 votes.

As you can see by the average score, she's come a little closer to reality in the 4+ months since Alfred sent this email, dropping from a 9.3 down to a 9, but I think we can all agree that that's still a lot higher score than she deserves.

I don't think she's hideous or anything, but she does look a bit drunk and/or stoned.  It's not a very flattering picture, and she might warrant an 8 or 9 in a really good shot.  But then again, that's true for most people, with the proper lighting and camera angle.  If I were her this would not have been my first choice for a photo on hotornot, that's for sure.

_________________

Date: May 2, 2003
From: Stephan
Subject: Whatever

I've been a regular visitor to your site since I stumbled over a link at diabloii.net and since it's a Friday evening and not much on my mind I thought I just give you some credit for all that work you put into your site. The amount you writing is pretty amazing and I am surprised that you get anything done at all since it must be so time consuming, though your sleeping pattern wouldn't suit me.

I was actually thinking about your writing career which seems at a stall since that mysterious editor has not been notified about your talent. I am not taking any offence here, talent your have - that's for sure. I used to write quite a lot myself and still do and writing is what keeps me sane.

I am pretty sure that your confident that your writing is probably much better what get published these days, be it a Diablo or Warcraft novel or whatever (it is, believe me ;) ). However you seem very reluctant (yet) to actually go for it. I sometimes get the notion that your waiting for that editor turning up at your door step. On the other hand that editor just might tell you your writings just sucks which definitely would send a tremor though ones beliefs. Ever thought of getting one of your novels self published? I know you can do that in Germany and I am pretty sure in the States as well. Of course you have to pay for it and it isn't really cheap but at least you might have novel in your book shelf with your name being printed on. You also get an ISBN number, so everyone can order it - if word has come around.

Not sure how many visor hit your site daily but they all pretty fond about your stuff. If worse come to worst ask for donations to get it published - I am more than eager to contribute my share. 

Readers regularly give me encouragement along these lines, and it's nice to hear and it does give me some motivation.  Not enough to actually change anything, since I know more about the process of getting published successfully than most of the readers, but perhaps I'm just looking for yet more excuses.

_________________

Date: May 4, 2003
From: Tom
Subject: the power of perfectionists

Flux -

Quoting you from today:

I need to learn to substitute "good enough" for "perfect", and be pragmatic and a realist, and stop using lack of perfection as an excuse... 

No, no, no. What is it that makes you better than everyone else at writing? Is it your natural ability? Yes. Is it your writing experience? Yes. Is it your drive to achieve perfection? YES! Your great writing is an aggregate of the above three items.  Without any one of them your writing will decline in quality. I do not think that anyone should ever accept "good enough," if we do not strive to be perfect then we will never achieve all that we can. I understand that striving for perfection should be tempered with realism, but only slightly.

I am a very cynical person by nature and I think that "you can do anything you put your mind to" is a bunch of bullshit, so do not consider what I said above to be in the same vein as that. Some people are equipped to do some things and some are not. I am simply saying that you sell yourself short if you do not have a little bit of arrogance about what you do, and if you do not always strive to be perfect in what you do.

Let's not kid ourselves here. You know what it is you need to do to be happy in life; you tell us every day. You are not using perfection as an excuse, you are afraid of failing. You are afraid of being told that you are not good enough. I know this because I am the exact same way and it took me a long time to be convinced of this fact, not in writing but the same principle applies. You need to put your ass on the line and get it done.

I would wager that you are right now denying the validity of what I just said, but if you are honest with yourself I think you'll find that I am right.

Back in the pre-Malaya days when I was all miserable and self-analytical and such, I'd often write about why I was annoyed with myself over this or that.  Most often over my lack of drive or motivation or whatever I need to get more work done, especially in terms of my writing.  May 4th was one such day.

And in reaction to my self-described plight, this email came in.  What's interesting about it to me is how often I get mails very much like this one. Readers who think they know me, at least a little bit, writing in with long analyses of my behavior, usually with suggestions on how I could/should change it to improve myself and attain some of the things I constantly say I want.

I don't object to their comments; it's not as if I'm not inviting them with my blog topic selections.  But this is similar to my other frequent question, "Why do people write in with such long emails about personal issues when I am, basically, a complete stranger?"  I suppose the frequently-personal nature of my blog creates a sort of rapport, where people feel like since I'm opening up to them, they can open up to me via email, either in terms of advice or questions, and sometimes both in the same mail.

Post your problems on the Internet, and get free advice via email.  It could be worse, eh? At least the advice is usually sound and good-hearted; hell, people could be writing in and telling me to kill myself.  (No, that's not an invitation.)

_________________

Date: May 5, 2003
From: S
Subject: A question...

...which you can answer any way you feel like - it might even be possible to extrapolate an entire entry from it.

Are you conscious of your language when you write? As in vocabulary, register, etc. I know that when I write online I try and make it in some way distinctive in order that people don't just pass it by as some other internet self publicist who doesn't have the intellect to publish properly. Maybe it's just arrogance, but I do feel that it makes a page more enjoyable when people bother putting some effort into their style to give it personal character, and I was wondering if your page's distinctly enjoyable style is something you are aware of as you write it?

I quoted this one when it came in and discussed it a bit in the blog, and I'm reading it again now, 4 months later, but I still don't know what it means.

As best I can say, my answer is no.  I'm not really conscious of my writing style or vocabulary in blog entries, since I just write how I think or talk, both activities I do very rapidly, and post the blogs (as well as the mailbag comments) with very little or no editing.  I sometimes write something up a day or two in advance and actually have a chance to edit it, and sometimes when I write something (usually when it's not really flowing smoothly) I spend some time picking at it and changing things around, but generally I write the blogs as fast as I can type them.  And I type pretty quickly.

So anything good about my style or voice or vocabulary is basically an accident, if you want to look at it that way.

Fiction is different, since with my writing I do edit, often quite a bit, and work to attain a consistent tone or voice, and try to vary it from story to story, depending on what I think the appropriate voice should be. I seldom write in the omniscient, preferring to filter a story through one or more of the characters, thus layering their observations and PoV onto the straight narrative description. Several times I've written fiction and posted it here or on the D2 site (in the form of Halloween stories) with virtually no editing at all, usually because of time constraints, but when I go back and archive a story to add to the writing section on this site, I always put in some editing time on it.  Some stories are changed around a lot, and others are just nibbled at with typo fixes and slight wording changes.

In an ideal world, I would write the blogs in advance and then always take at least 30 or 60 minutes to go over them and make changes and improvements to the writing.  Usually when I reread one of my blogs the next day or week or month, I see minor mistakes, and lots of things I could change/improve upon.  But I'm lazy about proofing at the time, and the deadline is always looming for the daily updates.

After I blogged about this, S wrote back with a further clarification.

Anyway, there was no real profound question involved. I was just wondering how you managed to fill such a space each day - whether it was off the cuff or somehow planned over the course of the day and then carefully typed up when you got home. I always find "creative processes" interesting, being a language and literature student. Of course, I realise that some subjects (and days) are easier to expand on than others, so the odd off-entry is only to be expected. It's just that anyone who can consistently fill such a lot of space daily with what is almost without exception at least partially of interest and amusement seems to me to be worth congratulating and learning from.

I loved his last few "veddy British" words here so much that I made "almost without exception at least partially of interest and amusement" the site main page tag line for a few weeks.

_________________

Date: May 5, 2003
From: Geoff
Subject: Hiya

I have a similar relationship to you and Malaya have now whereby I can only contact my g/f Emma by phone/ internet. I had the same worries as you (will it work? , will there be love?) etc but when i met her for the first time it all went very smoothly. Apart from maybe 10 minutes of awkwardness.

We got along very well and were making with the kisses and hugs within hours. I stayed there for a week and we do love each other very much.

Well, This was just some encouragement, It'll all turn out fine 

I believe this is the first "your long distance relationship will work out in the end" email I received.  It (and subsequent ones) were prompted by my incessant blogging about Malaya and me and our growing relationship, which was long distance for the first few months of it.

Nice to see how many emailers were correct on things, as I type this in mid-Sept, having lived in Malaya's condo for the past two months.

_________________

Date: May 13, 2003
From: Michael
Subject: Another goddamn cat declawing email

People who have thier cats declawed are missing great fun. Ever see a helpless rodent run (or helplessly limp away, rather) from a cat, only to be mauled and eaten? I see this every day! What entertainment! My oldest cat is a 21 pound big ass black cat. Claws are about 2 inches long. Declaw cats? What the flying fuck? You have to chop off its genitals, give it a whole shit load of goddamned shots, then you go ahead and chop off its claws? Haven't they done enough? First we breed cats down to the genetic equivalants of deflated basketballs, slice off thier cocks, pump them full of drugs, and force them to play with fucking yarn the rest of thier meaningless lives. 

Show your future cat(s) a shred of decency and let them keep their claws. Whats the point in having a clawless and dickless cat? You could just buy a fucking plush toy! Fuck these yuppy cocksuckers and their furniture. If they wanted "nice" furniture, they wouldn't buy a damn cat.

Clawed cats: For when you absolutely need a yard full of dead woodland furry creatures.

Much as I mentioned the big circumcision debate from early May, but didn't post any emails about it, here I'm mentioning the big cat declawing debate from mid May, while posting one email about it.  I mentioned it in a news item on May 9th, I got angry feedback from people in more civilized countries where cat declawing is considered barbaric, and after I posted that and did some more research, I got mails from people angry that anyone is really that concerned with whether a fricking cat has claws or not.  Read the blogs on May 9th and 10th if you want the full recap.

Bonus points if you've already giggled at the curious parallel between the de-foreskin and de-clawing subjects stirring up so much discussion.

As another reader said in an email from the 15th:

Just a quick analogy between cat declawing and circumcision. They both mean amputation of Nature's gifts, they both happen to helpless creatures who are given no choice, and it's best in both circumstances that the victim not realize that there might be something missing in their life . . .

_________________

Date: May 29, 2003
From: Samantha
Subject: blogging a living

Occasional reader of 'Black Champagne' here, and I was intrigued to see this when I dropped by after an interval:

<<Fiction may someday earn me a living. This blog never will.>>

Because I had been meaning to email you about a thought I had RE the blog: I've been particularly enjoying the more 'personal' bits of your ongoing saga, IE how it goes with Malaya, the Crap Job, and even the shoe-shopping nightmares (...especially the shoe-shopping nightmares :) ), and it occurred to me, with all this output, you *could* probably edit it down into a memoir-style book -- people get that sort of thing published all the time, just look at Frank McCourt. Anyway, it might be something to think about; why not write it up as a book-proposal and see if any editors/agents bite? I'm always in favor of seeing people make money from their creative efforts, and since you've already *done* a lot of the work, well... :) And diaries have always been a popular form of writing, people love to snoop into other people's lives...

I'd do my usual "why this wouldn't work" type of commentary, but as others have frequently pointed out, I seem to spend infinitely more time talking about why my work isn't saleable than I do trying to sell it.

_________________

The following is one of the more remarkable emails I've ever received.  I wanted to present it unedited and unbroken, so numbers you see throughout it are sort of reverse footnotes; scroll down past it to see my comments on the numbers, or click the numbers to jump to my comments.  The numerical commenting begins after an introductory discussion of who this person is (author of a couple of infamous D2 site guest articles) and why he's writing me this email. 

Date: May 31, 2003
From: CanisMortifer
Subject: Story of the Day: Why your fantasy was not so fantastic

Hello:
In case you remember me, i am the now most hated person in diablo for writing that Hacker's Plight article, i always wanted a way to outspam junk mailers but not with hate mail...Anyway I'll start by being honest and saying that i don't really like you the way i don't like most of those holier-than-thou purist diablo players(1). When i read your Top 10 or whatever most annoying people in d2, and mind you believe it or not i didn't fit into any category but i think i should fit into one(2), i ran into some part talking about people without lives. I found that funny because it occured to me that you seem to spend a lot of time on the net doing your stuff so just to make sure i followed the link to your website and was convinced that you coudnl't give lip service to people for not having a life, just looking at one of your pictures that happened to be posted on that day made me realize that where you live the sun doesn't shine often.(3)

Anyway, by now you must be like, YOUR POINT BEING? As i said, i don't like you but similarly i don't hate you or wish your harm or anything like that. Maybe it was fate that i should check your website again today, maybe i am in denial that i have become a daily reader of your cotidian nonsense(4), but i still feel that it is my civil duty as a fellow man to warn you about your emotional "outpourings" which is sure to instill the "can't eat w/o puking" sensation into a lot of people. I don't know you but i think from this one single post i have learned more than i wanted. First of all, as you describe all the conglomeration of emotions swelling inside of you to describe your "inadequacies" (AKA impotence)(5), am i correct to assume that "I have never been in love" is a euphemism for "never had sex"? As you said you only dated women for a day or so, so unless they were prostitutes i dont' think you got any.(6) IF this is the case, maybe you felt the way you did because you were nervous, after all not only was it your "first" but also because it was an unusual relationship, as opposed to regular get-to-know-in-real-life relationships. But whatever, the main thing i wanted to say was i think this is one of those things you describe only to your shrink or to a woman once she has married you and has to put up with all your quirks. I am glad you were not far gone enough to not realize the cornish(7) nature of this story but maybe because of your solitary (aka hermit) existence you are not fully aware the way people respond to these things. Sure when one gets the urge to write something like this one can't help but picture how moved humanity will be by such pure thoughts and experiences, unbiased due to fear of criticism or lack of self-confidence.(8) Unfortunately, people dont' give a shit (not that i know from personal experience, just common sense). I think after that some would even question whether you felt uncomfortable because you are GAY! (9) If i were you i would delete that post and return to my cyniscism-based commentaries of why the world sucks, you can always blame this lapse as the deed of some evil thought-to-be-dead siamese twin. If you fail to see wisdom in my words, just think that you are not the first person to feel this way and may not be the last person to fall "out-of-love", yes it seems like that could never happen at this point, i have one word for you: DIVORCE. If the powers that be decide that shooting rat pornography (btw do you know there is a word for when a female goes into the "FUCK ME" position? Lordosis) condemms you to a life of misery and your relationship turns to shit, you are going to feel so stupid about this that is probably going to make you kill yourself. (10) I don't think it is wrong to actually feel like that, but don't let it get out of proportion in case things dont' go the way you plan, i believe this is what causes people to commit crimes of passion (a fanciful expression for rape, murder and the such). I will end by quoting ancient roman philosophers, "in all things, moderation is best." (you can actually look up Cicero's "On Duties" (11) to find a section describing the proper emotional behavior of men, don't laugh, the man was wise, some times).

Though it pains me to do so, I'm presenting it here just as it was sent, in two gargantuan paragraphs, though it would be far easier to read if I broke the 2nd one up into 6 or 8 chunks.  You know, like where he changes topics and such?

Some background, which he alludes to in the brief introduction.  This guy wrote an article for the D2 site that I posted, entitled A Hacker's Plight.  I was not entirely sure it wasn't elaborate sarcasm, and first read it expecting that he'd have a punch line somewhere.  He did not. His premise was that cheating in online gaming (Diablo II, specifically) is great and fun for him since it makes him better than other people who are so stupid that they play by the rules.  He somehow spun that absurd premise into a painfully long and as you can see, terribly-written article that managed to contradict itself at least half a dozen times, while insulting everyone in sight, especially its author. I posted it despite the atrocious writing quality and grammar, since it was not something anyone else had previously said in the Dii.net Guest Articles, and since it would be interesting for people to see the sort of delusions and weird ideas some kids have that allow them to be such assholes towards everyone else. 

In response to his article there were hundreds of forum posts, 98% of them taking his "logic" apart, and about two dozen dozen emailed Guest Articles eager to rebut him. A month after posting his article, I posted three of the replies he motivated as a single article and called it Cheater Rebuttals. Each of the three grouped articles took on the topic of cheating from a different perspective, and used logic and reason and common sense to show why it's a really bad thing, overall.

Predictably enough, CanisMortifer was unmoved, and wrote a follow up article entitled A Hacker's Rebuttal. In it he basically repeated all of his (flawed) arguments in greater length, while appearing to address the comments made by the other articles with some cherry-picked quotes.  His ultimate conclusion was that he didn't want to go play Open Bnet (where there are few cheating obstacles) since it wasn't any fun if everyone cheated.  It was only fun on Closed Bnet (which Blizzard sort of attempts to keep cheat-free) since most people weren't cheating, and there he was able to feel special.

While it's somewhat admirable for a person to so freely admit to being a selfish and immoral child, it's not exactly the sort of personality traits the rest of civilized society admires.  There were, of course, dozens more forum posts and guest article submissions eager to further take CanisMortifer apart, but I was pretty well sick of the topic by then, especially since Canis had nothing new to say in his second article, so I didn't post another group "why cheaters suck" article, nor did I post his next article submission that continued beating the horse to death.

As for his articles, I should warn you that despite him obviously trying to clean up his grammar, and despite the fact that I did a LOT of spellchecking and punctuation fixes on both articles, they are pretty much as bad as his email.  So if you encountered impossibilities difficulties wading through the above swamp of typos, endless run-on sentences, and purple text, you'll probably be happier if you don't click either of those article links.

He sent this email on May 31st, which was about a month after his first article was posted, a week after my column that he mentions as the supposed prompt for his email, and four weeks before the three-part reply article was posted on the D2 site.  I guess he was just reading the site all the time, and trying to think of something to complain about, and found it in my Malaya visit discussion posted May 31st and June 1st... Since he mailed on the 31st, his comments here are all about that day's blog, rather than waiting to read part two the next day and get the full picture of things.

On to his points, or at least the various things I thought worth a comment.  Click the numbers to pop to the point in the email, and click the number there to jump back down to this section.  Ahh, the magic of hyperlinks.

#1: "those holier-than-thou purist d2 players"  That would be, "people who don't cheat," I guess.  Pretty low standard for holiness, eh?  More like "holier-than-my-cheating-ass."

#2: Decahedron #16: The Most Annoying Types of People on Bnet article appears to be what got his attention, since he doesn't seem anywhere near curious or inquisitive enough to have searched out the link to BC.com from my Dii.net columnist author info page. It shows a remarkable lack of objectivity or self-awareness for him to say he doesn't fit any of those molds, when both of his articles are basically extended auditions for #4 "Cheaters who deny that cheating is cheating", and he certainly qualifies for #1, #10, and #12 as well.

My point isn't that he personifies so many annoying traits; it's that he's so oblivious to how others perceive him.  It's not so bad to be an asshole if you at least take some pride in it and are proud of it.  As I said in the #4 entry in my Decahedron article; it's not that they cheat, it's that they cheat and then deny they are cheating.

#3: Except that he's read the blog for a while and must know I live(d) in San Diego. I'm certainly not going to deny that I didn't have a life back then (I hardly have one now.) but what does my lack of a tan have to do with that one way or the other?  I tend to think that people with dark tans have no life; after all, they have all that time to just lie around in the sun, doing nothing.  Or standing around playing golf or fishing or whatever else you do to get a tan these days.  Not to mention the whole skin cancer thing that's kept most reasonable people from working on a tan for the last 10 years.

#4: Um, "cotidian?" That threw me, until I realized he meant "quotidian", which means "occurring each day".  More on his startlingly out of character flashes of intelligence in #11.

#5: His whole email is trying to be nasty without actually being obviously nasty. As Malaya said upon reading it, "He's trying really hard, but it's just a bit out of his range." So he throws in the "impotent" line, and "GAY" later, and tries to just be conversational about them, even though it seems clear that he's hoping to offend me with the mentions.  In this case he just looks dumb, since the very next line after I mention "inadequacies" reads:

I suppose this is really opaque, so just to try and clarify; I was not impotent, but we were not able to properly complete our fooling around, and it left us both very restless and unsatisfied.

#6: No, I have never been with a whore, and would never have sex with one, though I'd like to talk to one about her opinions on her job. I don't think I have ever said anything anyone could reasonable take to mean that.  I have said that I'd never been in any long term relationships before Malaya, largely because I had never been in love (or anything approaching it) before Malaya.

#7: His mention of "cornish" took me a bit to figure out, but I guess he means it as "corny-ish."  Fair enough.

#8: Here's where he tries to be nasty, with his, "Yes you poured out your heart and soul and thought you would be amazingly moving to everyone, but you must know that no one gives a shit." Which is exactly wrong, since I frequently say that nothing really moves me when I hear it from other people, and that I don't expect anyone will be moved or inspired by anything I say.  I had no expectation that my Malaya blog would mean anything to anyone, other than Malaya and myself.  I just had to write it, after experiencing the most profound emotional event of my life, and I'm not afraid to let other people read about that.  Even petty little fools who will try to use it to hurt me. 

#9: Another attempted insult that says a lot more about him than about me.  I never once considered that anyone would take anything I said to mean I was "GAY."  And why does he capitalize the whole word like that?  Compensating for something?

The best thing about anyone who tries to insult with "fag" or "queer" or "homo" or whatever is that they are so obviously advertising their own worries and sub-conscious short comings.  And it's so very easy to turn it around on them and either totally perplex them by playing along, or make them furious by repeating their comments back to them.

#10: Here's where he's trying to get really nasty, I guess, but he does it with such an incoherent sentence that it's not entirely clear.  It's also an excellent example of the weirdness of his writing style, which I'll discuss more in #11.  I mean read that sentence, minus the parenthetical digression about lordosis.

If the powers that be decide that shooting rat pornography condemms you to a life of misery and your relationship turns to shit, you are going to feel so stupid about this that is probably going to make you kill yourself.

Um... what?  I'll feel so stupid about rat porn that I'll be suicidal if my relationship breaks up?  Or I'll be suicidal just over the relationship?  And if that's what he means, why the hell does he mention rat porn at all, since it's a totally unrelated topic?  I think he means the later, but he had the thought about rat porn at the same time, and wanted to show off his "lordosis" knowledge, so he tried to shoehorn it all into the same sentence, with predictably dismal results.

#11: And he closes with a mention of Roman Philosopher Cicero, and his famous "moderation is best" quote.  A philosophy that almost no one on earth has ever followed, and certainly not one that "cheat at D2 all day, cheat at D2 all night" CanisMortifer adheres to. I'm not taking issue with the quote, though I don't really agree with it (Why moderate things that are good for you, and why be moderate with things that are bad for you when you should eliminate them entirely?)  I am more interested in how it's another example of Canis' general level of babbling suddenly kicks out a nugget of informed gold.  Or at least Iron Pyrite.

From any random 2 or 3 sentences of his writing, either in the email or his D2 guest articles, I would say he's just a sad little AOLese using troll.  He has something to say, on occasion, but has no idea how to go about saying it.  Most sentences are jumbled, most paragraphs are repetitive, and that's assuming he even manages a paragraph, rather than just going on and on in a solid block of text a mile long, as he does in this email and both of his guest articles. I will never understand how so many awful writers don't realize how much harder they are making their "work" to read by not putting in appropriate space breaks.

My tip: If you can't organize your thoughts into coherent blocks and express them in several consecutive sentences, or you don't have a good enough ear for the language to know exactly when you should put in a paragraph, just hit return after every 4-6 sentences.  You won't be any more incorrect with inappropriate paragraphs than you were with none at all, and you'll be far easier to read.

As Canis brags says in his 2nd article:

By age 20 I had a BS in Biology with minors in Classics, French, Anthropology and Psychology; with one course away from a minor in English literature and had taken courses in a wide variety of fields such as Computer Science, Political Science, Sociology, Black Studies, and even (sorry ladies) Women Studies. I graduated Summa Cum Laude and with the ward medal of both the biology and classics department (over 300 credits total).

It's hard for me to rectify this with his writing; I can't see how any paper he ever turned in didn't get a failing grade, just due to the general incoherence of his prose. So perhaps he's lying madly to try and build himself up in classic inferiority complex behavior (which would also be evidenced by his "cheating because I can't handle a fair fight/losing" D2 behavior)?  Or perhaps he was able to get some tutorial help with his writing?  I can see him putting together good enough information and material to get credit; it's just his inability to communicate that handicaps him.

More to the point, he does seem to have a lot of knowledge; what with the quoting Cicero and knowing relatively advanced vocabulary words like lordosis and quotidian. (Even though he couldn't only spell the latter phonetically.) This is what fascinates me about him; he goes from AOLese to scholarly and back again within a matter of sentences.  I do always get the feeling that he's writing from a place of deep insecurity, and trying to prove that he's better than he really is by stretching, always stretching for slightly more meaning and eloquence than he can manage.

Hey, he's a troll and a script kiddy haxor with no sense of morality, and he's gone out of his way to try and fuck with me, but you've got to give him credit for trying.  He doesn't just cheat, he writes long articles defending cheating.  He doesn't just say I'm a dick, he writes a very long and rambling email that tries to hurt me in a variety of ways.  He doesn't just write on a low level that he could do safely; he stretches and tries to be an advanced writer, even though he inevitably crashes and burns in the process.

I can't be mad at him or really dislike him; he's too interesting an enigma for that.  I certainly don't like him, but he's sort of got that "human train wreck" thing going, where you are horrified and appalled by the spectacle, but you also can't bring yourself to look away.

And sadly, this email is all I've ever heard from him, aside from his submitted D2 site guest articles.  I never replied to this mail; it came while I was still flush with my post-Malaya emotional glow, and I was very busy working every day and catching up on the blog and talking to my new love for several hours a night on the phone.  And this mail was just too long and too incoherent for me to really delve into back then.  I knew I didn't want to give him a quick "fuck off and die you troll" reply, but I didn't have the time or interest or inclination to deliver the much longer analytical email that he deserved.  So I just left it, and gradually forgot it.  I'm glad that I'm now at last catching up on the old mailbags, since I really enjoyed reading this one now, with enough emotional distance to really analyze it clearly.

_________________

Date: May 31, 2003
From: C3B3N3
Subject: I have a question

well do u think yours is big enough. You have a nice body but u don't show a pic of your penis if u have one send it here thanks 

And from the heights of analytical joy, we descend into the depths of pointless porn.  In case you are wondering, 1) I do have such pictures, 2) they are all Malaya's fault, and 3) I didn't send this guy (girl?) any of them.

This concludes the May 2003 mailbag.  Page created and comments added September 13, 2003. If you would like to be included in a future mail bag, give it a try.

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