Yeah, yeah, I know: all these blog entries in a single day make it look like I’ve nothing better to do. Can’t be helped. Some days are just bloggier than others, and anyway, this is too funny not to share.
I’ve just had a co-worker who knows virtually nothing about me come up and ask me a question about the dank underworld of comic books. She said I seemed like the sort of person who “knows [my] way around a comic-book shop.” She approached the whole thing, I might add, with the air of someone about to make her first drug deal, or at least with the concern that she was about to deliver me a grave insult.
(She needn’t have worried. As it so happens, I have spent quite a bit of time in comic-book shops, although not so much in recent years.)
Later, I emailed her and asked what it was about me that made her think I might be her go-to guy on this matter. Here’s her reply:
You seem to have a unsettling command of the detritus of pop culture, an preoccupation I share. Dont tell me you cant pick freaks like us out of a crowd.
She makes it sound like we fannish types are the Immortals from Highlander, sensing one another’s Quickening from across the room. That’s just silly. I like to think I’m perfectly ordinary-looking, when I’m not wearing a t-shirt with an incriminating logo.
I do, however, like the phrase “unsettling command of the detritus of pop culture.” I’ve been thinking lately of reworking the description at the top of this page; I might have to try and work that in…
Oh come now, Mr Bennion. We’ve known of you for a long time. Come over, fully and completely, to the dark side.
De-nile ain’t just a river in Egypt…come on dude, my MOM pegged you as an “unsettling influence” type the first time she met you when you were in middle school. Need I say more?
Speaking of “lower” literature, ever heard of Jael Rusch (www.jael.net). Check out the site, she does a lot of cover art. Originally a Utah girl, she is living in NJ about to move to Florida. Getting close to last chance for me to chat and get her to sign something if your interested.
Keith, I’m not familiar with Jael, but looking over her website, I like her stuff. A signed doodad of some sort would be most appreciated! How’d you meet her, by the way?
As for you, Mr. Broschinsky, we will have our revenge soon enough…
How could she tell? Film / Rock Band t-shirts worn to work at all? Ponytail? A Highlander bumper sticker on the Mustang? – the fact that it’s an Ad Agency maybe it’s easier to peg the type.. it must be Midiclorians?
That’s the funny thing about it… I haven’t worn any of my incriminating t-shirts to work, haven’t taken in any toys, and there are no bumperstickers on the ‘stang.
Of course, I do bear an unfortunate resemblance to The Simpsons’ Comic Book Guy…
Or it could be those midichlorians. Damn little things…
Or maybe word has gotten around from the girl we saw at “The Man with the Screaming Brain”. (I still can’t remember her name.)
Her name is Marni, and you’re probably right…
Marni…hum, I once went on a double date with with Eric. His date was a Marni. Did the one you know go to Bingham? About a year or two younger than us?
Different Marni — this one is quite a bit younger than us, early twenties from the look of her, and I think she actually spells her name with two i’s, i.e., Marnii.