Do you hear that folks? Listen closely. That’s right, it’s the soft, delicate, succulent, humming of the Internet and it’s emanating from my laptop. After a two and a half month hiatus from the Internet, I finally broke down and purchased a small ethernet-usb adaptor that allows the internet to flow through my laptop. I finally received it in the mail this past Tuesday and after spending a day catching up on things, I went straight to work on two projects I’ve been working on. One old (Shlyrics) and one new (to-be-named), but both of which should be completed and open to the viewing public by the end of this month.
This update, however, is not going to be some longwinded story about Bus Losers or Psychology AP. Oh no. I want to share something even more wonderful with the world, something that not only made me burst out laughing in the middle of the computer lab, but which caused me to loop it three more times, all the while still laughing like an idiot. I’m talking about The Goob Movie that was recently crafted by the one and only BostonBrat!!
I honestly don’t know what to say. That video, along with the two songs that Stan wrote about me, are probably the coolest / most creative things that anybody has every done for me through this wonderful contraption known as the Internet. I’d be lying if I said I don’t listen to Stan’s song’s often and I can assure you that The Goob Video has already gone into my rotation of funny clips I watch whenever I’m having a bad day.
When I first met Angela and Stan on KMB back in September ‘03, I remember thinking they were cool, they both already had established (okay, semi-established in Stan’s case) sites, and that was honestly it. As time went on, I began to associate Angela as person on the message board that could actually talk sports with me (guys and girls alike were idiots on that board) and Stan…well, Stan was the resident “I’ll say anything to piss you people off because you take everything so damn seriously” person. So you can see why I was drawn towards both.
For some asinine reason, I was made a moderator, which meant that of the 500 or so people who frequented the boards, I was one of the 6 or 7 that could tell them to shut the hell up and back it up by editing any post they made to say something along the lines of “boy, I love to kiss my own penis.” Times were good. So, naturally, I started to abuse my moderator powers to further the cause of my fellow mates. Any time Stan would become banned or flamed, I was there to back him up with my “authoritative” powers. The number of “private” moderator debates that were held on banning Stan was staggering. It seemed as if every day I was championing for Stanley behind the scenes, for he truly had a knack for pissing off Amy and Abesmom, two of the most anal-retentive moderators in the history of the Net. Of course, Stan was apt at pissing off all the other mods as well, especially Die Hard whenever he wasn’t sucking up to Mia in the hopes of one day Mia allowing him to…well…I’m sure you can fill in the blanks. Other “prominent” members such as gwenabee, ebony, hsoolien, green, and gir all began to call for Stan’s banishment forever. It seemed as if the only people person who agreed with my assessment of Stan’s hilarity was Angela, and for that reason alone I lobbied strong and hard for her to be granted moderator privileges. For I had visions in my head of her ascension to power, followed by our graceful and glorious destruction of the board from the inside. I envisioned us both, parading around the board late at night, toying with other people’s posts, and having our way with their words via our poetic licenses. Slowly, but surly, I felt we could bring down the house from the basement, all behind the guise of Stan doing the destruction from the front door.
Unfortunately, Krakkles beat us to it. In a fit of rage unmatched in my history of Internet usage, Krakkles decided that not only was the boards increasingly boring, but that it was up to him to use his mod privileges to stir things up a little. So he posted a very polite “SO LONG FUCKERS!” and went out in a blaze of glory by deleting everything in my way, leaving in his wake hundreds of pre-pubescent girls and an alarmingly high number of guys in their mid-thirties wondering what in the hell had just happened.
Within a year, KMB had completely lost every ounce of appeal it had ever once held. Every post seemed to be a variation of “OMG!!!!1 That’s sooooooo kewl! ROFLOL! Mktxbye!” So you can imagine the intellectual vacuum that was soon created when Stan, Angela, and myself decided to leave. Just subtracting our three selves from a message board of over 700 by this time resulted in the collective IQ dropping at least 40 points. And to think that I actually held one of the best debates of my life on that message board regarding the at the time soon-to-be war in Iraq. I even think I have that thing lying around here somewhere, but I digress.
So what happened next? Well, in all honesty, I expected that to be the end of our little threesome. With no message boards to frequent and us having not really known each other but for a year, I assumed our group was just another Internet faze that was destined to fadeout before the next season of Simpsons started airing. And that is when Dooglas opened DMB. Our prayers had been answered as a new message board was opened and *gasp,* I was once again handed moderator privileges. I still to this day have no idea why either of those two sites gave me mod powers, but I must thank them. Why? Because it was the only reason keeping me around the boards at all hours of the day and night. And had I not been constantly trolling KMB and DMB at night, Stoobela would never have been formed. Officially gaining our title in November ‘03, we went on an amazing blaze of post whoring. We conquered message board after message board, filling up not just one or two threads at a time, but 8 or 9. For hours at a time, we would dominate the landscape, laughing at any and everybody who tried to join us and pretend they were as funny as we were. Plans to travel to Boston for a real life meeting were made (I’m still waiting for the official word, you two!) and our conversations soon spread to IM and each other’s websites.
Merlin soon began taking dumps on each other’s monitors, Angela soon began consoling me through the rough Packers / Mariners seasons, and Stan decided that he would take up playing the guitar. Epic songs were written about each other, our post whoring continued to climb to the point where us three alone owned 75% of the messages on DMB, and Angela’s comments section was the first to break the story of JohnAle being arrested for having sex with a 15 year old!
I can’t tell you how surprised I was to realize that times were still, even over a year later, good. Sure, Angela would start to pull a Me and forget to update her site for a week and Stan would drop off the face of the earth for a week or two at a time, but in the end we always got back together. Back when I started frequenting message boards years ago (KMB being one of them), I never would have guessed that I would one day call one of its fellow members a true Friend. Well, thankfully, I didn’t have to make that guess, because I’ve found not just one, but two.
Stoobela, to this day, is still going strong. I still look forward to one day meeting these two fools in real life. I can’t wait to kick back and enjoy a cold one while watching a random episode of Simpsons with them. I can’t wait to see if they are as funny in real life as they are on the Internet. And when we do get together, you just know we’ll have to sit down in front of a computer together and surf some random message board, trolling around and making fun of people as we go. Because what is Stoobela without the laughter?
But until then, watch out folks. Because if you happen to know of a message board that needs to added spice, we’re your team. Just make sure you’re ready for us.
