When I was in the fifth grade, I had a crush on Mr. B. He was, by all accounts, the most gorgeous individual ever to wear a yellow polo shirt and grace the sixth grade. I adored him. My eyes followed him everywhere. I got away with creepy behavior that is only acceptable in fifth grade girls who have crushes on sixth grade boys. It was beautiful.
Alas, Mr. B. never noticed me. Sure, he would speak to me, and he was always very nice and sweet, but I was a little fifth grader, and a nerdy one at that. I wanted to make a will in which my body was to be transported to the Undying Lands where I could spend eternity with Bilbo and Gandalf. I had several articles of clothing in my wardrobe that I had purchased specifically so I could match my friends on certain, predestined days. I was a tom-boy whose crowning achievement was being able to run faster than all the fifth grade boys and an adeptness at doing tricks on the jungle gym. It is, therefore, understandable that Mr. B., so very suave and charming and a whole entire year older, would patronize me but be completely oblivious of my unfailing, unrequited love for him.
Even so, I held a special place in my heart for Mr. B. all through junior high. He remained my ideal, my one and only, my soul mate. Sure, he may not have known it at the time, but we were destined for each other! I just knew it! Maybe I was a little awkward in seventh and eighth grade, maybe my affinity for poser-punk T-shirts and baggy cargo capris made me a little stand-off-ish, and maybe my glasses-adorned, acne-covered, squinty-eyed face was not exactly the epitome of beauty, but he could look past all that, I was sure.
Ah, Mr. B.
How misguided I was.
Nonetheless, he was a very sweet guy, and there emerged out of my undying love yet another inside joke among my companions regarding the identity of my soul mate. Mr. B. was perfect for me, they all proclaimed. As I began to outgrow my "look at my snarky T-shirt" phase and gradually gained a knowledge of acceptable social behavior and dress code, Team Mr. B. began to grow. They were all so supportive. "Just be patient, he'll figure it out one day."
Indeed, he did begin to notice me more as a girl and less as an awkward little kid by the time we were both upperclassmen in high school. We were casual friends. Team Mr. B. was rallying!
Then, the unthinkable happened.
Absolutely nothing.
Nada. Zilch. Zip. All of the hopes and dreams of Team Mr. B. were slowly dashed as he continued to date other people and I was left in single solitude. Moreover, I was shockingly, contentedly single, casually interested in other guys, mature enough to realize that Team Mr. B., while well-meaning, did not, in fact, have any power to dictate my romantic fate.
Until Coffee Shop Guy.
Sure, I didn’t know his real name. Yeah, he's actually less acquainted with me than Mr. B. But that didn't stop Team Coffee Shop Guy from forming and urging me to introduce myself, to start conversation, to form an attachment with a guy of whom I knew nothing aside from the fact that he almost always wore some nice button-down shirt and he had a very attractive laugh. How could it possibly go wrong?
It was at this point that I had a dream. After months of joking about Coffee Shop Guy’s role as my soul mate, I dreamt his name, and that name was Ryan. I could practically hear the collective sighs of the team in my own dream world:
Ryyyyaaaaan.
Indeed, they were exuberant, as was to be expected. After all, I have bizarre dreams that typically mean nothing. This one was so normal and realistic. It was A Sign. If we ever discovered that he was actually named Ryan, one of two things would happen: either the universe would implode because of some strange time-space continuum thing I would explain if I could, but I can’t, so I won’t, OR Coffee Shop Guy and I would get married. They all just knew it would be the latter. It was meant to be, right?
Right?
Uh, well, you see…
Coffee Shop Guy’s name is David. Yes, David. And while this name is extremely fitting, and I did once speculate before The Prophetic Dream of Destiny Or Potential Universal Destruction that he was, in fact, named David because it suited him so well (yes, I did spend some time wondering what this guy’s name was; I couldn’t very well call him Coffee Shop Guy forever, although, since the moniker has now been used so often, I’m willing to bet we all will call him Coffee Shop Guy forever), it is not Ryan. It’s nowhere near Ryan. It’s not even a variation, like Brian or Bryant. It’s David.
Team Coffee Shop Guy just took a nosedive. Mere moments after realizing their error, a few were switching sides back to Team Mr. B. My mother and grandmother could almost instantaneously feel the odds turning back in the favor. At the very least, I knew Mr. B’s actual name. Heck, I’d grown up with the guy, and I had a passing knowledge of his personality and interests. Coffee Shop Guy? Hmm, let’s think about that one OH YEAH I KNOW NOTHING.
However, my roommate hasn’t given up yet! She almost immediately recognizes the truth, the heart of the matter, the quintessential mix-up so indicative of the true romantic-comedies found in life. David —le gasp— isn’t my soul mate! His twin brother is!
Of course! I dreamt about David’s mysterious twin brother, who also works at the coffee shop and looks identical to David, but is actually the real Coffee Shop Guy named Ryan with fabulous riches and an irresistible personality. It makes perfect sense! There can be no other explanation! Team Coffee Shop Guy is saved by the theory that this David character is hardly of consequence, while his nonexistent twin is the man for whom I should be pining.
Gee, what a relief.
DAAAARRRNNNIIIIIT, I just realized that since my prophetic dream theory has been disproven, I won’t ever have Neville as a neighbor, Tom Felton doting on me, a conveniently-located Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters nearby, or dinosaur llamas I could potentially smuggle into the US from Jurassic Park in order to be my pets. …This…this is a sad day for all of us.
Monday, June 7, 2010
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
FanFiction Can Burn Part 1: The Lord of the Mood Rings
Is anyone cool is junior high? We weren’t. We really weren’t. We’d just discovered the genius of such parody specialists as Monty Python, Mel Brooks, and Cleolinda Jones. We were also entirely obsessed with the Lord of the Rings. Consequently, and almost inevitably, one laaaate night, Beatrice and V concocted the idea to create a Lord of the Rings spoof, and in one evening, the characters were born and given what were assumed to be very clever spoof-like names. The title? The Lord of the Mood Rings. Clever.
It wasn’t long before Portia was informed, and, after another evening of highly caffeinated antics, we decided to write the story. At first, it was written in script form, which may or may not be in existence by this point. After the fact, we converted it into a fan fiction story and, though it causes us to cringe now, we did post it online for the geeky masses. Believe it or not, the reviews were pretty favorable, if few.
Now, we present the story to you in two forms: a collection of unfortunate quotes harvested from the still-viewable, still cringe-worthy, and still highly embarrassing fan fiction known as The Lord of the Mood Rings: The Mood Ring Club. The second form of the story was a film version, because we were that hardcore and that obsessed with bad, home film-making, of which there is still carnage to be found somewhere in Beatrice’s house. Given that we can’t actually post the video, as it is frighteningly lost to the world somewhere, we’ll present some highlights.
And thus, The Mood Ring Club.
Just so you know…
Frodo Baggins = Dodo Flaggins
Samwise Gamgee = Spamdumb Smarty
Gandalf the Grey = Bingaling the Silvery White
Pippin Took = Mitten Look
Strider = Strydex
Bree = Debris
Prancing Pony = Stampeding Elephant
…believe me, we know.
The Scene: Gandalf/Bingaling tells Sam/Spam where to meet him in Bree/Debris.
“Okay, so what am I supposed to do again, Bingaling?" Spam was practically dying from all the walking they did…all the way down to the road from Dodo's house. Yeesh!
Bingaling sighed. "You're to look after Dodo, you hear me? You're to accompany Dodo to the village of Debris and keep your eye on him."
"So, I'm supposed to go to Debris and leave Dodo here?"
"NO! You and Dodo go to Debris. Meet me at the Inn of the Stampeding Elephant."
Spam sorted through this for a second then said, "Right. So go to Debris without Dodo and be sure to stay away from the Inn of the Stampeding Elephant."
"Argh! NO! Both of you go to Debris…"
"Both of us go to Debris…"
Bingaling continued. "And meet me at the Inn of the Stampeding Elephant, not to be confused with the Prancing Pony."
"Meet you at the Inn of the Prancing Pony."
Bingaling was nearly at the point of strangling the little bobbit when Dodo said, "Spam, just follow me, okay?"
Spam smiled brightly, "Oh, okay, Mr. Dodo!"
The two set out for Debris. They passed through beautiful country and farmland, all the while with a lovely soundtrack playing in the background. Soon, while passing through a cornfield, they chanced upon a very unfortunate pile of obviously placed thorny sticks. I suppose they weren't that obviously placed though, since both Dodo and Spam tripped over them.
The Scene: Pippin/Mitten inadvertently reveals Frodo/Dodo’s identity in Bree/Debris. Barney-related havoc ensues.
Suddenly he heard Mitten's voice saying, "Yes, his name is Dodo Flaggins. He's my second cousin's aunt's nephew's third roommate's girlfriend's brother's grandson's best friend's third grade teacher's sister's son's neighbor."
Dodo abruptly got up in alarm, rushing over to Mitten. Unfortunately he tripped over another one of those unfortunate piles of thorny sticks (funny how those keep turning up, huh?). This sudden fall caused the mood ring to fly from his hand! Upon trying to catch it, the mood ring decided that now was a good time to find out what Dodo's mood was for the day, and I can tell you that it wasn't all sunshine and rainbows.
Dodo suddenly entered a world filled with Teletubbies and horrible Barney videos! He screamed in terror and then he saw a vision that horrified him even more, and Barney videos are pretty horrifying already!
It was the great Nose of the Dark, very dark, Lord Baron! It was sniffing around and it said, "I smell you!"
The Scene: Strider/Strydex grabs Frodo/Dodo after he accidentally puts on the Mood Ring in the Prancing Pony/Stampeding Elephant.
...a hand reached out and grabbed him from underneath the bench Dodo had crawled.
"You draw far too much attention to yourself, Mr. Baggins"
Dodo found that the hand was attached to a very strong arm which propelled him up some stairs to a room, where he was tossed in. He turned around and got up from the ground where he had been shoved and saw that the hand and the arm were not, in fact, just floating, severed appendages, but were connected to a rather broad chest and shoulders and neck and head and legs and, well, you get the picture.
"That is no trinket you carry!" the man exclaimed. It was the same deep and gloomy voice that had belonged to the man that had passed him the salt. He started putting out the candles, only to burn his fingers. He started to run around, screaming, and sucking on his scalded fingers.
Once he contained himself he said, "I can avoid being seen if I want to, but to disappear entirely…" He pulled off his hood gingerly, avoiding the tips of his burnt fingers, revealing a somewhat troubled face. "…That is a rare gift," he finished.
"What are you?" Dodo asked.
"Don't you mean 'who' am I?" the man, who Dodo now recognized as Strydex, asked, a little puzzled.
"No, I mean who are you, not who am I? I know who I am."
"But you said what am I? and I assumed that you meant who am I?" Strydex explained.
"I don't need to know who I am; I've already told you that! And I know what I am too, thank you very much!" Dodo was tiring of this man and his stupidity.
Strydex sighed and said, "Oh, never mind. Are you frightening?"
"I don't know, am I? I don't think I look frightening, although I might since stupid Sad threw away my spare contacts and these aren't nearly as blue as the other ones….not that I wear any…"
"No, I mean are you frightened?" asked Strydex.
"But you said…"
"Oh never mind. I know what it is that hunts you!" He listened at the door, thinking that he heard something...
Don’t even ask about the pile of thorny sticks --which do indeed appear sporadically throughout the story—because we actually have no recollection of how we came up with them. If we needed someone to fall on the floor, we just put a pile of thorny sticks there to trip them. I guess we were holding to the idea that obviousness is funny.
As might be expected, the filming of this went really awry, really quickly, leading to just a few mishaps and/or questionable judgement calls.
You know the Ringwraiths? They became Ringroses, also called the Nasals (instead of Nazgul). After all, they serve the dark, very dark Lord Baron, who took the shape of a giant Nose. Nasals, therefore, seemed an appropriate correlation. But the creativity didn’t stop there. They didn’t wear black, scary cloaks. Instead, there were Barbie sheets. Ballerina Barbie sheets. Because that’s increasingly more horrifying. For many different reasons. Especially as time has passed.
Other costumes choices in the movie version were either incredibly questionable or incredibly brilliant, depending on how someone looks at it. The best? We’d have to say Lady Gladbags. Thaaat’s right, we went to the effort of literally making a dress out of Glad garbage bags for our Lady Gladbags to wear as she gracefully descended the stairs in Gothlorien. To our credit, it actually came out surprisingly well. But no, we won’t post pictures.
Several actual filming mishaps occurred as well, and always, for some reason, in the most dramatic of sequences. Case in point: when Arwen attempts to ward off the Nazgul while she’s transporting Frodo to Rivendell. In our scenario, Darwin, played to perfection by the incomparable V, raised her plastic sword dramatically, brandishing it in the faces of the evil Nasals, hoping to scare them away. Unfortunately, as she pointed that sword to the sky, the tip of it, already bent after years of wear and tear by younger siblings, finally fell over, smacking with ominous finality on the face of our Dodo Flaggins. I’m pretty sure you could actually hear the laughter of the other “crew members” in the background, but our actress portraying Dodo kept her calm and pretended that her moans of pain were a result of being stabbed by a Nasal a few scenes earlier.
However, the absolute best moment took place during Boromir’s depressing death scene, shot down by an Uruk-hai. Our version? Doromir is shot by a Dork never pictured on camera. Except…the arrow shot by V from off-screen never hit Doromir. It, in fact, was a brilliantly aimed shot delivered with perfectly deadly accuracy at Sad, our version of Merry Brandybuck.
Nevertheless, our dedicated crew remained in character and, despite the realism of Sad’s injury by foam-tipped arrow, Doromir dropped to the ground as if dead. Miraculously, Sad made an instant full recovery. Doromir did not.
We could go on, but our pride can only take so much. Therefore, given that we’ve clearly put ourselves out there, ripe for insults due to this humiliating product of our junior high imaginations, we encourage you all to relate your most hilarious, albeit immature, and potentially embarrassing memory of a time you’ve had with friends. We know you have some. You can’t deceive us. We made Lord of the Mood Rings. We can’t be the only ones.
It wasn’t long before Portia was informed, and, after another evening of highly caffeinated antics, we decided to write the story. At first, it was written in script form, which may or may not be in existence by this point. After the fact, we converted it into a fan fiction story and, though it causes us to cringe now, we did post it online for the geeky masses. Believe it or not, the reviews were pretty favorable, if few.
Now, we present the story to you in two forms: a collection of unfortunate quotes harvested from the still-viewable, still cringe-worthy, and still highly embarrassing fan fiction known as The Lord of the Mood Rings: The Mood Ring Club. The second form of the story was a film version, because we were that hardcore and that obsessed with bad, home film-making, of which there is still carnage to be found somewhere in Beatrice’s house. Given that we can’t actually post the video, as it is frighteningly lost to the world somewhere, we’ll present some highlights.
And thus, The Mood Ring Club.
Just so you know…
Frodo Baggins = Dodo Flaggins
Samwise Gamgee = Spamdumb Smarty
Gandalf the Grey = Bingaling the Silvery White
Pippin Took = Mitten Look
Strider = Strydex
Bree = Debris
Prancing Pony = Stampeding Elephant
…believe me, we know.
The Scene: Gandalf/Bingaling tells Sam/Spam where to meet him in Bree/Debris.
“Okay, so what am I supposed to do again, Bingaling?" Spam was practically dying from all the walking they did…all the way down to the road from Dodo's house. Yeesh!
Bingaling sighed. "You're to look after Dodo, you hear me? You're to accompany Dodo to the village of Debris and keep your eye on him."
"So, I'm supposed to go to Debris and leave Dodo here?"
"NO! You and Dodo go to Debris. Meet me at the Inn of the Stampeding Elephant."
Spam sorted through this for a second then said, "Right. So go to Debris without Dodo and be sure to stay away from the Inn of the Stampeding Elephant."
"Argh! NO! Both of you go to Debris…"
"Both of us go to Debris…"
Bingaling continued. "And meet me at the Inn of the Stampeding Elephant, not to be confused with the Prancing Pony."
"Meet you at the Inn of the Prancing Pony."
Bingaling was nearly at the point of strangling the little bobbit when Dodo said, "Spam, just follow me, okay?"
Spam smiled brightly, "Oh, okay, Mr. Dodo!"
The two set out for Debris. They passed through beautiful country and farmland, all the while with a lovely soundtrack playing in the background. Soon, while passing through a cornfield, they chanced upon a very unfortunate pile of obviously placed thorny sticks. I suppose they weren't that obviously placed though, since both Dodo and Spam tripped over them.
The Scene: Pippin/Mitten inadvertently reveals Frodo/Dodo’s identity in Bree/Debris. Barney-related havoc ensues.
Suddenly he heard Mitten's voice saying, "Yes, his name is Dodo Flaggins. He's my second cousin's aunt's nephew's third roommate's girlfriend's brother's grandson's best friend's third grade teacher's sister's son's neighbor."
Dodo abruptly got up in alarm, rushing over to Mitten. Unfortunately he tripped over another one of those unfortunate piles of thorny sticks (funny how those keep turning up, huh?). This sudden fall caused the mood ring to fly from his hand! Upon trying to catch it, the mood ring decided that now was a good time to find out what Dodo's mood was for the day, and I can tell you that it wasn't all sunshine and rainbows.
Dodo suddenly entered a world filled with Teletubbies and horrible Barney videos! He screamed in terror and then he saw a vision that horrified him even more, and Barney videos are pretty horrifying already!
It was the great Nose of the Dark, very dark, Lord Baron! It was sniffing around and it said, "I smell you!"
The Scene: Strider/Strydex grabs Frodo/Dodo after he accidentally puts on the Mood Ring in the Prancing Pony/Stampeding Elephant.
...a hand reached out and grabbed him from underneath the bench Dodo had crawled.
"You draw far too much attention to yourself, Mr. Baggins"
Dodo found that the hand was attached to a very strong arm which propelled him up some stairs to a room, where he was tossed in. He turned around and got up from the ground where he had been shoved and saw that the hand and the arm were not, in fact, just floating, severed appendages, but were connected to a rather broad chest and shoulders and neck and head and legs and, well, you get the picture.
"That is no trinket you carry!" the man exclaimed. It was the same deep and gloomy voice that had belonged to the man that had passed him the salt. He started putting out the candles, only to burn his fingers. He started to run around, screaming, and sucking on his scalded fingers.
Once he contained himself he said, "I can avoid being seen if I want to, but to disappear entirely…" He pulled off his hood gingerly, avoiding the tips of his burnt fingers, revealing a somewhat troubled face. "…That is a rare gift," he finished.
"What are you?" Dodo asked.
"Don't you mean 'who' am I?" the man, who Dodo now recognized as Strydex, asked, a little puzzled.
"No, I mean who are you, not who am I? I know who I am."
"But you said what am I? and I assumed that you meant who am I?" Strydex explained.
"I don't need to know who I am; I've already told you that! And I know what I am too, thank you very much!" Dodo was tiring of this man and his stupidity.
Strydex sighed and said, "Oh, never mind. Are you frightening?"
"I don't know, am I? I don't think I look frightening, although I might since stupid Sad threw away my spare contacts and these aren't nearly as blue as the other ones….not that I wear any…"
"No, I mean are you frightened?" asked Strydex.
"But you said…"
"Oh never mind. I know what it is that hunts you!" He listened at the door, thinking that he heard something...
Don’t even ask about the pile of thorny sticks --which do indeed appear sporadically throughout the story—because we actually have no recollection of how we came up with them. If we needed someone to fall on the floor, we just put a pile of thorny sticks there to trip them. I guess we were holding to the idea that obviousness is funny.
As might be expected, the filming of this went really awry, really quickly, leading to just a few mishaps and/or questionable judgement calls.
You know the Ringwraiths? They became Ringroses, also called the Nasals (instead of Nazgul). After all, they serve the dark, very dark Lord Baron, who took the shape of a giant Nose. Nasals, therefore, seemed an appropriate correlation. But the creativity didn’t stop there. They didn’t wear black, scary cloaks. Instead, there were Barbie sheets. Ballerina Barbie sheets. Because that’s increasingly more horrifying. For many different reasons. Especially as time has passed.
Other costumes choices in the movie version were either incredibly questionable or incredibly brilliant, depending on how someone looks at it. The best? We’d have to say Lady Gladbags. Thaaat’s right, we went to the effort of literally making a dress out of Glad garbage bags for our Lady Gladbags to wear as she gracefully descended the stairs in Gothlorien. To our credit, it actually came out surprisingly well. But no, we won’t post pictures.
Several actual filming mishaps occurred as well, and always, for some reason, in the most dramatic of sequences. Case in point: when Arwen attempts to ward off the Nazgul while she’s transporting Frodo to Rivendell. In our scenario, Darwin, played to perfection by the incomparable V, raised her plastic sword dramatically, brandishing it in the faces of the evil Nasals, hoping to scare them away. Unfortunately, as she pointed that sword to the sky, the tip of it, already bent after years of wear and tear by younger siblings, finally fell over, smacking with ominous finality on the face of our Dodo Flaggins. I’m pretty sure you could actually hear the laughter of the other “crew members” in the background, but our actress portraying Dodo kept her calm and pretended that her moans of pain were a result of being stabbed by a Nasal a few scenes earlier.
However, the absolute best moment took place during Boromir’s depressing death scene, shot down by an Uruk-hai. Our version? Doromir is shot by a Dork never pictured on camera. Except…the arrow shot by V from off-screen never hit Doromir. It, in fact, was a brilliantly aimed shot delivered with perfectly deadly accuracy at Sad, our version of Merry Brandybuck.
Nevertheless, our dedicated crew remained in character and, despite the realism of Sad’s injury by foam-tipped arrow, Doromir dropped to the ground as if dead. Miraculously, Sad made an instant full recovery. Doromir did not.
We could go on, but our pride can only take so much. Therefore, given that we’ve clearly put ourselves out there, ripe for insults due to this humiliating product of our junior high imaginations, we encourage you all to relate your most hilarious, albeit immature, and potentially embarrassing memory of a time you’ve had with friends. We know you have some. You can’t deceive us. We made Lord of the Mood Rings. We can’t be the only ones.
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