Post by Akbar Le Grey on Sept 25, 2005 1:17:40 GMT -5
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WTF?
A column with Dupin.
BEAUTIES AND THE BEASTS
This week, arguments kicked off when a competition to find the prettiest member of 667 Dark Avenue turned ugly. The contest-which can be found in Menacing Miscellaneous-is run by member Char, who made the joke-y comment ‘I meant ‘pretty’ as in pretty without make up’ before banning Amber from being nominated.
‘Char, are you insulting Amber with your snide makeup aside?’ asked one curious member. Char replied by saying she wouldn’t be jealous of someone with no eyebrows. After someone asked why she was being mean, member and columnist for ‘The 667er’ Ennui decided to pipe up the answer.
‘Because Char is a superficial little egotist who has nothing better to do than pour vitriol at girls thousands of miles away as the Sun outshines Pluto?’ he insulted. As the arguments went on, moderator Pandora decided to defend Char and post her opinions on the whole fiasco.
‘There's no need to attack Charlottes appearance or start being petty, if you want Amber back on the list then you're not going about it the proper way,’ she carefully explained in her rant, which was more towards Ennui then toward Amber.
Whilst the arguments continued, I managed to talk to Amber, who explained that she was upset about Char’s comments, and then she was taking a several day break from 667, explaining she had coursework to get on with as well. And as the whole thing came to a halt, when J decided to end it and call everyone petty, before declaring that her daemon was the prettiest.
The argument died down after that…for now, anyway.
LINKS TO TODAY’S STORY:
The prettiest 667er thread (first post deleted)
Prettiest 667er poll
'BON VOYAGE’ OF THE WEEK
This week’s ‘bon voyage’ goes out to Nina (current name Ditzy Chick!), who has revealed that after the completion of her story she is posting in Chaotic Creativity, she will be leaving 667 for good. After clarifying who she was to confused members, she explained that she didn’t really fit in with the forum, and that was how she came to make her decision.
Goodbye or good riddance? I for one always thought Nina was an okay member, and whilst I won’t be down on knees begging for her return, I won’t be pushing her out of the front door.
INTERVIEW OF THE WEEK
I managed to catch up with PJ, to see what he thinks about 667, the alphabet awards, and his writing.
D-Hullo there
PJ-Hey, Dupin
D-I hear you’re writing a new ‘Kill Bill’ fanfiction.
PJ-I am
D-Is it a 667/Kill Bill fanfiction, or one with characters unrelated to the forum.
PJ-I know it’s been done like three times, but uh, 667/Kill Bill fanfiction. It’ll be close to the actual film, basically like the movie in written form, with 667 characters.
D-Cool-you have a thread in CC with all your written stories. How recent are they?
PJ-Well that varies. My latest story, I just recently wrote, whilst the others are 1-2 years old.
D-Really? So, you’re also a columnist for ‘The 667er’. Do you plan to continue with the rant theme for your columns?
PJ-Actually, not really. This week, for instance, it’s non-rantish, but I WILL probably still rant occasionally.
D-Do you have a strong Australian accent? I want to get one.
PJ-It’s hard to say, because, you know, it’s my own voice, but I wouldn’t say so, not really. I have a strange European/Australian accent, because of my Swiss backgrounds.
D-My accent sucks-it’s all posh and nasally.
PJ-English accents rule HARD. So…[sips water]
D-How well do you think you’ll do in the ‘Alphabet Awards’? You won your heat in Round One.
PJ-Well, I think I’ll survive this round as well, even though the competition is even tougher this time.
D-Anything else you’d like to add?
PJ-Well, I’d like to add this: VOTE FOR ME, READ MY STORIES, SEND ME MONEY, MOOOOONEEEEYYYY. Ahem. That’s all, thanks. [shakes Dupin’s hand]
D-[shakes PJ’s hand]
‘INVESTIGATION OF THE WEEK’: WE WANT AIMEE BACK
The ‘We Want Aimee Back’ campaign, started by Kimia, -Aimee’s best friend in life away from 667-has raised a massive fifty-three signatures to it’s petition in the past weeks. But how has it had an affect on Aimee-who is better known on 667 as ‘Pucca’. I managed to catch a quick word with her sister, Charlotte.
DUPIN: Has Aimee shown any slight behaviour of wanting to return back to 667 Dark Avenue?
CHARLOTTE: No.
DUPIN: Are you sure?
CHARLOTTE: Yes.
Unsatisfied with my results, I decided to ask old member JayK, who regularly talks to Aimee on LiveJournal.
DUPIN: Do you think that Aimee may return back to 667?
JAYK: Nah.
And there we have it. The investigation seems to suggest that Aimee won’t be returning. In my column each week, I’ll keep you up to date with my work, which I like to call ‘Aimee Observance’
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Confused?[/u]
by Sixteen.
Burdensome Books has been a place of utter confusion in the past week.
With the loss of so many pages in the NamelessNovel.com thread on Saturday night, it took members a while to get their bearings. A confusing clue referring to burning pigeons in the Great Fire of London made many of us scratch our heads trying to decipher the meaning.
Monday brought a piece of the cover. A shady-looking, uniformed woman (who was said to look feline) was staring at the Baudelaires. We also got part of the border. It seems that flames will be used. Unusual, that it wasn't kept for Book the Thirteenth. However, it seems we won't get the title on this cover, judging by the size of the border.
Tuesday was strange, as it gave us a new clue (a quote about marmosets) and also a note about last weeks clue on Merlin's Precepts. This has never happened before on the site, so it was a surprise for all.
Wednesday and Thursday were both Task Days. On Wednesday was a rather disappointing corner piece, but Thursday gave us the face of the woman standing close to Klaus. The most common theories on who she is are Fiona, Kit Snicket and the woman from the triptych. We also saw a shadowy man who seemed to be wearing a fedora in the background, but nobody is quite sure about him.
Friday gave an extremely confusing quote and link. The quote was from The Grim Grotto, about the taxi. This linked to kidzworld.com. Probably the most confusing so far. There was nothing to do with taxis on the site, so what was the link for? The only plausible theory, really, was that kidzworld.com has done several aSoUE related gimmicks before.
In other threads, such as, Something's Fishy Here... and Is anybody else worried?, to name a few, people contemplate disastrous outcomes of our missions for the past few months.
Hopefully next week will give us what we want, in classic Olivia style. But, for now it seems that, as we go on, more questions are arising than being answered...
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INTO THE LITERARY FRAY
Ennui colonizes another section of 667 in a desperate attempt to find new material, comparable in essence to the Viking invasions of Anglo-Saxon England.
The esteemed editor’s reaction to my last critique had, I felt, some kind of caution about it. An unspoken but.
“Great.” Crib to thoughts: but so accursedly long! What on earth are you going to write about next?
I replied confidently and flippantly. But dear old Ooga-Booga was quite right. There is no way that you, my readers, can write stories at the same rate as I can be nasty to them in print. This means that-unless action is taken-my source material is bound to dry up.
My solutions:
1. Shorten the column, at least temporarily. This has the happy side-effect of meaning I have less work to do, the unhappy one of meaning I have to, at some stage, come to the point, a destination I have always distrusted.
2. Do some archaeology, and review stories from longer ago in the interim.
3. Muster an army of figurative Norsemen and invade anything tenuously connected to art or letters on the site, requisitioning it as my domain.
And so it was that I fastened my seatbelt, braced for action, and plunged into the unforgiving jungle that is Leering Literature...
Leering Literature is the least appropriately named section on the Dark. “Leering” is a transparent attempt at finding a negative L-word more comprehensible to the average user than “lugubrious”, while “literature” is wide of the mark-the description has it better, if rather clumsily, “general book-talk”. The closest thing this collection of eulogies to favorite novels gets to “literature” is in the “Classic Literature” thread; a complicated phenomenon, asking not for people’s favorite books, but what they think, in effect, their favorite books should be.
The result is a bizarre and multi-colored canon, flawed in many ways; containing the big successes of the era whose popularity has magnified them unfairly, like Tolkien or Harry Potter; books that do not in fact exist, but are imagined to do so, like King Arthur; and books caught by the trendy zeitgeist of the insufferable literati, like The Life of Pi. But to castigate this thread entirely is unfair; much of its respondents’ personal tastes and preoccupations shine through, and it is fascinating to read as a result.
Rather more barren to the mind is the large number of polls with names like “The Literature Awards”; little-read, just as they deserve to be, with necessarily constricted options and nominations. It is an impossible task answering an impossible, and inane, question. Anyone who truly appreciates books realizes that in the end, taste decides everything. Literature is-thank goodness-a subjective pastime; it is this that the “Classic Literature thread” proves, if nothing else.
Back into already well-trodden ground, Chaotic Creativity has seen the return of a long-lost favorite-incidentally contravening my prophecy of last week, for it is a 667 fic, indeed entitled, 667. It is one of Akbar’s opuses, and in its revived form as slick and urbane as ever, none of the touch lost in the long interim. It is one of the few 667-fics that can be read enjoyably even if the reader is not in it...though I am, admittedly, in the cast, so my declaration is speculative.
The PJ Anthology has seen the addition of its most amusing installment yet, Death, a rousing yarn of apocalypse, resistance, and compromise, to the discredit of everyone involved. A cynical and paralyzingly hysterical tale with an intentionally flabby ending, this is sure to entertain its readership. On the negative side, Nina is using polls to decide the denouement of her 667-fic-a word of advice, m’girl-democracy and writing don’t mix.
In Fearsome Fiction, I am glad to say that a movement is in progress to ridicule jcgsebald (supported by the Editor-in-Chief’s signature, no less...). Apart from this, little of moment is occurring; the extensive number of fics focusing largely on Esmé by Hanna Squalor are not particularly to my taste, but neither especially worthy of verbal flaying. Again, I hope this quietness will be stirred fairly soon, whether by one of Dupin’s initiatives or by Book the Twelfth.
Aggravating Art is much illuminated by the return of Luna, who has some fascinatingly abstract Flacutono drawings. J’s oeuvre continues to amuse, with The Cakesniffing Orphans in the Orphan’s Shack recently joined by The Reptile Room (featuring Klaus in a green jumpsuit.)
And what do I do next time? That depends on what you do. Tap the keys and sweep the brush; you’ll gain inner satisfaction and the knowledge that you’re giving a starving critic employment.
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PJ’s Rant[/b]
For Sam
Originally, this article was going to be a heart-throbbing piece about how great BSam is, and filled with words like “a legend has died” and stuff like that. But then I realized that I’d never be able to pull it off, so I’m writing this piece instead.
So, randomly structured (and written) articles. Some BSam quotes. Classical ones. Funnily classical ones.
"i'/m a preist
i have magyk god beer"
and
"just so you moderators know i'm not actually doing anything
i just seem to be lying there and somehow i get sexed
not that i'm complainning"
Both of those came from the daycare center thread. Were we all got e-married, and received strikes for it? Good old times.
Ok. Back to BSam. He’s cool. He’s funny. He’s very, very entertaining. 667 has grown quite a bit less fun since he’s left.
But the golden 667 rule states, that everyone comes back. Without exception. Who am I kidding? Sam is probably Dante in disguise for years, in case he ever decided to “leave”. So, Sam, wherever you are, we’d like you properly back, so you can make jokes again, without fear of breaking your cover.
Oh, all right.
“A legend has died…and the whole world mourns.”
Amen.
Ok, Akbar, here’s the article. It may be shoddily done, it may be short, and it may be about BSam (god help us), but it’s done. So there. (Editor’s remarks: …)
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Word Up In Da Hood.[/b]
By Choucroute.
667 has become a haven of egotism, what with Char's newest contest idea: Prettiest 667er. She's always had a knack for wreaking havoc, and this is a wonderful outlet for her to constructively do so. She started with some controversy, confiscated the nominees, then she slipped in some nasty comments, fought some pseudo-intellectuals, and made a poll. Some might describe Char as "odious," her response to this petty accusation? "I'm definitely not odious, I just have a puerile charm"
Lottie's "Word for the day": Puerile (pyoo'r-ul) adj. 1. Having a juvenile disposition, immature 2. Suggesting childishness.
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The Dairy of…
Oh, look. Mother left some juice on the table. I love juice. I wonder what today’s juice is like. Much the same as yesterday’s, I suppose. Ho-hum
A bird just came and sat on my windowsill. I think it might be a blackbird. I shall take some pictures of it with Mother’s camera before leaving for school. School will be quite boring today, my associate J.’s been sick; he probably won’t come. Oh well. I suppose I’ll have to sit alone in Chemistry. I think I have time to run a little virus scan before I go. I forgot my watch. I must wear my watch; I’m obsessed with time. There’s a sheet of paper on my desk. And a pen. I think I shall write something. I might scan it later, if I’m bored. Oh, look, another bird. I shall have to take pictures of both of them. Well, I must go now. Goodbye.
-Le Grey.
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The column of randomness by Deanna.
THIS WEEK’S THEME:[/u]
Urban Housework
Urban Housework began in December of 2000 as something called the Urban Housework Project. Elbonio, the creator of the Urban Housework Project, soon found out about Extreme Ironing, a sport which mixes doing extreme sports and ironing clothing. Elbonio wished for the Extreme Ironing Bureau and the Urban Housework Project to join forces, but the EI Bureau refused. The two factions have been enemies since then.
In 2001, the central focus of the Urban Housework group became downhill vacuuming, which involves riding a vacuum down a hill and attempting to be the first to the finish line. After the Extreme Ironing documentary aired on television, the Urban Housework Project expanded to include other sports, such as apocalypse dishwashing, inner city clothes drying and suburban mop jousting.
The Extreme Ironing Bureau and the Urban Housework Project like to think of themselves as doing separate sports from each other, but they are both still fighting for the elusive outdoor housework crown. We’ll just have to wait and see who wears it after the dust settles.
-Deanna.
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Scotty.[/u]
Hello. This is an article laughing at a theory , and then trying to make you lot laugh at it as well. Hopefully I’ll be writing a weekly column from now on, on different topics each time.
I'm sure everybody has seen the new theory in Conflicting Conjectures, saying that Mr. Poe is a woman. This theory had apparently been submitted by 'Dreamer'. To Dreamer if he's reading this, sorry, but this is the lamest theory anyone could think of (if anyone has seen a worse theory, please PM me at sc0tty, and quickly.) Now on to the actual theory.
For one thing, there would be no conceivable reason for Mr. Poe to be a woman.
The Baudelaires would definately notice if Mr Poe was a woman. I mean, they've been hanging around with the guy for Books 1-7, and then in TGG. For those observant people who pay close attention to the drawings, Mr. Poe has been drawn from the front, only once. That was in Chapter The Thirteenth of The Grim Grotto. From what we can see, he does not look like a woman.
Mrs Poe would definitely have noticed.
The Poe children (who would have to be adopted. Maybe their real parents died in a fire…) would have noticed.
It would be too 'lame movie' if he was revealed to be a woman (ludicrous as it sounds) in the next two books.
In summary, this theory is one of the most pathetic theories anyone could think of.(I know I've already said this, but I'm trying to make a point. Bear with me.) Dreamer, for the sake of our brains and eyes, please, do NOT submit any more theories.
-Scotty.
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