My best friend
I miss my old roommate - lets call him "Dan" - good soul, great guy - and eccentric? Absolutely.

While driving his Gold 70's Camero (which he had removed the back seat from and replaced with a set of giant bass speakers (girls, um, just loved sitting on them for some reason...) home from Washington DC one day we looked in the rearview mirror and saw not just one cop car following us - but a flotilla of cops taking up the entire highway behind us. Red and blue whirring lights literally filled our view as far as we could see. A U.N peace conference was going on that week in DC and they were getting a police escort back to their hotels (or the airport?) and the cops were driving in front and along side it to clear traffic to the sides as it passed and make sure everything proceeded in a secure and orderly manner.

Dan - in his camero with it's "Ozzie for president" bumper sticker and fake Zebra skin seat covers decided this was the moment to "get back at the cops" for all the times his car had been towed for parking violations.

And so he did *not* move out of the way.

Cops on motorcycles came up and flashed their lights.

He slowed down.

The entire motorcade behind him slowed down - they weren't going to split around him.

The cop on the motor cycle *knocked on Dan's driver side window* and gestured for him to move aside.

Dan went slower.

Through out much waving and gesturing between the cop and Dan starring straight ahead with a determined look on his face, the entire motorcade traversed two or three miles of the highway at a maximum rate of about 15 miles an hour... until Dan got to his exit and pulled off to continue home. I was sure at least one cop would follow to deliver a warning, beating or at least a court summons ... but instead the whole thing just sped back up and went on.

Bastard was lucky too =)

I'd never seen him so proud =)

While going to college - he built a running moat in his dorm room. With an operable 4 foot drawbridge.

Damn near killed himself when he was spray-painting it too. After 2 hours of spraying his drawbridge he just had a little bit of unpainted area left - and had breathed in enough paint fumes in the small enclosed room that when he ran out of paint the idea of just "popping open" the pressurized spray can to get that last bit of paint he knew was still inside... seemed like a perfectly reasonable idea... one hammer, one nail and *Boom* later - he was shocked sober enough to open a window to get some fresh air. He, the last patch that needed painting, and most of the room actually - were also covered in a fine mist of silver.

I met him a short while after that, we became immediate best friends when we met - because I gave him my extra oatmeal cookie. That was all he needed, friends for life from that moment on.

College spirit week with Dan was an epic adventure - Hat day alone was worth a 4 years tuition. His hat was over 5 feet tall, 4 wide, and had supports which went down to the ground from the edges with wheels on them so he could walk around and still wear the monstrosity. It had it's own sound system, was at least partially edible, and if I remember correctly had a live in resident (chipmunk? squirrel? something small and furry) which would clamber about on it. Fantastic, sitting in class when that walked in was something no one ever forgot. Of course it needed it's own seat when he sat down, but I think that's understandable.

He spent a summer packing parachutes for people who wanted to go skydiving. His one complaint? He wished the job came with some training...

His final project - a Movie titled "How to disarm a thermonuclear device in south america if your entire unit should have been eaten by giant radioactive fireants" actually didn't suck. The conversion of a riding mower into a "Battle Wagon" for the insertion team became legendary. "Samurai Night Fever" needed a little work though.

Living together after college (how could I not invite him to live with me out in DC? what bad could possibly come of it?) was pure pleasure.

We built a Tesla coil. If you've never built one - do so - it's a wonderful experience. Nothing like having pure electricity arc between your hands, stings like a bitch though. We used it mainly to tattoo tomatoes.

At one point he was looking for work ... so we ran for local office. I went for school board, he did more research and found out the local head of the "Office of Water and Soil" had run unopposed for the last 3 years - we felt a little bad when requesting the forms and such because the nice lady on the phone mentioned a local "Crackpot" who ran for elections with out any qualifications...

Even if it wasn't directly aimed at us we'd never graduated to actual, officially titled "crackpots" before.

He got a job doing in house instructional videos for a dotcom investment place - his "If you don't lock your computer, a Ninja will steal your pants" video was beyond Brilliant - best thing I ever saw - the demonstration (in both real time and slow-motion capture) of the ninja stealing the worker's pants convinced many an IT drone to properly hit ctrl-alt-del before leaving their work station.

Sometimes we'd just get in the car and trust to the universe to provide an adventure. From driving the stranded mother daughter hooker team home (a three hour drive where the daughter made serious moves on Dan, and the mother did rain man impressions at me - no, that's not innuendo - she just kept quoting Rain man at me - I don't know why.) to the "Little Ricky" Pirate soda Homies, to ... well, it worked, you should try it sometime. Adventures are there to be had.

When he moved out he moved into Hostel community in Georgia - that lives entirely in tree houses. You move in, and you can either pay to stay - or work on building more tree houses in trade. He stayed for over 6 months. Met his now wife there. Lovely place. Google it.

After that he became an air traffic controller. He's red green color blind, but he didn't let that stop him.

And recently he left that and joined the intelligence community. No joke.

In the evenings he does a local cable news show that's just about everything you would hope it would be =)

Great Guy =)

Apologies for length - but the young naked lady he tied up in a pirate flag swore it was all worth it.
( Allisade would love to hear from you, Mon 3 Nov 2008, 21:52, 7 replies)

i need to see the films!
youtube? vimeo? anything?!

he might be the God i am looking for :D
(DreddPirateBob has watched every scifi film ever on, Mon 3 Nov 2008, 22:11, closed)

Sorry! I want them too!
It was all before the days of Youtube - I think the only copies in existence at this point are on VHS tapes.

I keep pressing him to transfer them to DVDs or the computer but all he's done so far is collect the cable news show, which - while fun, is still limited by being a somewhat serious (ish) news show.

Maybe I can talk him into doing it this year as a xmas present or somesuch - if it happens, I'll make sure it gets seen somehow =)
( Allisade would love to hear from you, Tue 4 Nov 2008, 15:48, closed)

Wonderful
Sounds like good times.
( FeralCatMan Unusual disease collector., Mon 3 Nov 2008, 23:15, closed)

sounds like a great bloke to know

( Smash Monkey lowering the tone of the whole internet, Tue 4 Nov 2008, 1:10, closed)

That's entertainment
*clicks*
( wynoh kills threads by his mere presence, Tue 4 Nov 2008, 4:56, closed)

Haven't laughed like that in ages!
The hat, superb! *clickity*
( Uncle Phallus Strong like fly, fast like elephant, Tue 4 Nov 2008, 7:57, closed)

Fantastic hat
"It had it's own sound system, was at least partially edible"

2nd Coffee+nasal mucosa=pain moment of the QOTW
(sittingduck Attention seeking, bullshitting fuck-knuckle, Wed 5 Nov 2008, 15:23, closed)