Practical Jokes and Banquets
I have 2 stories to go along with the Howard and Jeremy posts for the day:
Story number one:
When I was in my dating days, I went out with a woman for the first time and shortly into the date, realized what an error I had made. The woman really liked calling men “chauvinists” which I suppose dates the time of this story. I had gotten theater tickets for a touring Broadway show and while we were sitting in the theater waiting for the show to start, the woman said to me, “Tell me how much the tickets are and I will pay for mine.” I told her that since I had asked her on the date, that wasn’t necessary. She insisted and so I relented by handing her the ticket stub that had the price on it and she went silent, because the tickets to the show were very expensive. Needless to say, she didn’t pay for hers, but the fact she couldn’t put her in a foul mood for the rest of the evening. In particular, I remember asking her if she wanted to go for drinks after the show and she replied that she couldn’t because she had to be at the restaurant where she worked at 6 in the morning. I was familiar with the place and knew that it did not open until late in the afternoon, and asked her why she had to be there so early. This caused the woman to launch into a series of foul words, as she explained to me in the most derogatory terms that women could be chefs too and chefs had to be at the restaurant earlier than anyone else and if I wasn’t such a chauvinist pig, I wouldn’t presume that she couldn’t be a chef. I was unfamiliar with how the restaurant business works with chefs when I asked the question, but certainly not afterwards. It was with this in mind, that I wrote the Jeremy version of the Tangi / Jeremy Zorro date. I cannot tell you how many times I went on dates, in which I spent the date in fear of saying something offensive.
Story number two:
The second story has to do the story that Tracey Mayes tells about Wilfred Sobinski stopping Gordon’s dad from beating on him any more. I remember in the For Better or For Worse strip, it just seemed to magically happen once Gordon was engaged. There may be a strip with a better explanation that I missed, but I cannot check against the 3-year on-line archive to verify my feeble memory.
When I was in high school, a teacher I had, brought in a speaker from the Ku Klux Klan to talk to the class (something that would never happen today). The teacher was a leftover hippie from the 1960s, and so was hoping to show to the class what ignorant folks the KKK were. This young man was not well-educated and did not speak well, but he explained why it was that he joined the Klan. This is a story I find difficult for me to tell to anyone, because once they hear the words Ku Klax Klan, they usually interrupt my story with some sort of anti-Klan statement, and I can never finish telling it. Anyway, this man had an alcoholic father who beat him and his mother. One evening, the Klan stopped by his house and took his father outside and basically told him that if they saw another mark on the mother or the son again, they would beat him up. The father never touched him or his mother again, and the boy grew up wanting to join the Klan. I deliberately lifted this story for Wilfred Sobinski to answer the question of why Gordon’s father changed his ways. The banquet stuff was not too funny. I tried to throw in a little motivational speaker language for amusement, but sometimes I just get in the mood to do a little characterization. When I do this, I try to leave it for the last posts of the day, as to not interrupt the flow of the snark when most of the posters are active.
Other notes:
No snark on the strip today. Someone posted as Sharon Taylor-Edwards and did everything that I was planning to do and better. The colour strip looks a little difficult, and the main point is a joke on the word change. I will have to think on it.
The main focus of the day was the set up from yesterday of the practical jokes on Jeremy Jones. I got many great sighting feeds, but I was particularly challenged by the one with the clowns from aprilp_katje posting as Marjee Mahaha. The most difficult one to deal with overall was the Tangi Origami post that started off the day, in which she basically says that Jeremy harps on a girl being fat. This was sort of the opposite direction I was going with Jeremy, where his interest in Becky’s weight is purely for business purposes. The way I treat the ARB posts is that everything posted is true, but discrepancies have to be resolved. Tangi had already posted that she had an eating disorder. So I was going through every slang word I could find for vomit to see if I could find one to match Tangi’s quote of “spare tire.” Finally I came up with “spew attire”, and Jeremy’s reputation was saved. “Mmm. Becky” was a little easier to turn into “imbecile” misspoken as “imbecky.”
Qnjones as Becky is showing no signs of remorse for Jeremy, so I guess we will continue the battle tomorrow. Most likely Jeremy will spend most of the day in bed, and maybe try to skip school on Monday.
Story number one:
When I was in my dating days, I went out with a woman for the first time and shortly into the date, realized what an error I had made. The woman really liked calling men “chauvinists” which I suppose dates the time of this story. I had gotten theater tickets for a touring Broadway show and while we were sitting in the theater waiting for the show to start, the woman said to me, “Tell me how much the tickets are and I will pay for mine.” I told her that since I had asked her on the date, that wasn’t necessary. She insisted and so I relented by handing her the ticket stub that had the price on it and she went silent, because the tickets to the show were very expensive. Needless to say, she didn’t pay for hers, but the fact she couldn’t put her in a foul mood for the rest of the evening. In particular, I remember asking her if she wanted to go for drinks after the show and she replied that she couldn’t because she had to be at the restaurant where she worked at 6 in the morning. I was familiar with the place and knew that it did not open until late in the afternoon, and asked her why she had to be there so early. This caused the woman to launch into a series of foul words, as she explained to me in the most derogatory terms that women could be chefs too and chefs had to be at the restaurant earlier than anyone else and if I wasn’t such a chauvinist pig, I wouldn’t presume that she couldn’t be a chef. I was unfamiliar with how the restaurant business works with chefs when I asked the question, but certainly not afterwards. It was with this in mind, that I wrote the Jeremy version of the Tangi / Jeremy Zorro date. I cannot tell you how many times I went on dates, in which I spent the date in fear of saying something offensive.
Story number two:
The second story has to do the story that Tracey Mayes tells about Wilfred Sobinski stopping Gordon’s dad from beating on him any more. I remember in the For Better or For Worse strip, it just seemed to magically happen once Gordon was engaged. There may be a strip with a better explanation that I missed, but I cannot check against the 3-year on-line archive to verify my feeble memory.
When I was in high school, a teacher I had, brought in a speaker from the Ku Klux Klan to talk to the class (something that would never happen today). The teacher was a leftover hippie from the 1960s, and so was hoping to show to the class what ignorant folks the KKK were. This young man was not well-educated and did not speak well, but he explained why it was that he joined the Klan. This is a story I find difficult for me to tell to anyone, because once they hear the words Ku Klax Klan, they usually interrupt my story with some sort of anti-Klan statement, and I can never finish telling it. Anyway, this man had an alcoholic father who beat him and his mother. One evening, the Klan stopped by his house and took his father outside and basically told him that if they saw another mark on the mother or the son again, they would beat him up. The father never touched him or his mother again, and the boy grew up wanting to join the Klan. I deliberately lifted this story for Wilfred Sobinski to answer the question of why Gordon’s father changed his ways. The banquet stuff was not too funny. I tried to throw in a little motivational speaker language for amusement, but sometimes I just get in the mood to do a little characterization. When I do this, I try to leave it for the last posts of the day, as to not interrupt the flow of the snark when most of the posters are active.
Other notes:
No snark on the strip today. Someone posted as Sharon Taylor-Edwards and did everything that I was planning to do and better. The colour strip looks a little difficult, and the main point is a joke on the word change. I will have to think on it.
The main focus of the day was the set up from yesterday of the practical jokes on Jeremy Jones. I got many great sighting feeds, but I was particularly challenged by the one with the clowns from aprilp_katje posting as Marjee Mahaha. The most difficult one to deal with overall was the Tangi Origami post that started off the day, in which she basically says that Jeremy harps on a girl being fat. This was sort of the opposite direction I was going with Jeremy, where his interest in Becky’s weight is purely for business purposes. The way I treat the ARB posts is that everything posted is true, but discrepancies have to be resolved. Tangi had already posted that she had an eating disorder. So I was going through every slang word I could find for vomit to see if I could find one to match Tangi’s quote of “spare tire.” Finally I came up with “spew attire”, and Jeremy’s reputation was saved. “Mmm. Becky” was a little easier to turn into “imbecile” misspoken as “imbecky.”
Qnjones as Becky is showing no signs of remorse for Jeremy, so I guess we will continue the battle tomorrow. Most likely Jeremy will spend most of the day in bed, and maybe try to skip school on Monday.
posted by howard at 9:28 PM
4 Comments:
Tangi and Jeremy's differing accounts worked out well in light of Tangi's apparent hypersensitivity on weight issues. I imagine she has nothing approaching a spare tire, but of course she perceives that she does. I confess that in my mind, Jeremy did say what Tangi reported he'd said, but one of the fun things about ARB is that other posters can change course.
I suspect that should Becky decide to soften towards Jeremy (and she probably will need to in order to match what's to happen in the strip), he'll need to lighten up on his business/career advice. ;)
Lightening up on business/career advice may be difficult for Jeremy. He usually has to be hit by a car to see the error of his ways.
Good point. :)
Q.N. Excellent. I love where you have been taking Becky with this. I have often thought that some of our ARB fights resolved themselves a little too quickly. Jeremy can be quite a nasty boy, and it is a fun contrast from the overly-nice Howard.
Hey, you called me Howard, instead of Howie. Should I read something into that?
By the way, don't worry about missing story arcs. I have missed plenty of them myself. I view it like fishing -- you throw out a lot of bait and hope you land at least one good fish. I have my characters toss off possibilities all over the place, because it is much more fun for me to create a story with someone than to do it on my own. I love playing back and forth with you, so there will be plenty more coming your way.
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