Read Part I
Read Part II
Read Part III
The city of Mustang, Oklahoma is in the heart of Central Oklahoma. I should have suspected as much. It was my next stop across the nation, visiting the leadership, and one I almost decided to skip. After all, today was the day I was to visit the top of the (DoD) food chain--Council Member slayr357.
I was a little surprised how easy he was to find. A kid on the bus (there were no cars to rent here. Nothing decent anyways. Hey, it's Oklahoma! Not the most touristy place!) heard me muttering to myself (it is undecided whether this journey drove me insane, or if I've always been there) and overheard "slayr." Now, apparently, there is little much to do in Oklahoma besides cow-tipping and playing video games, so this kid had heard of slayr. I guess he was something of a LAN party legend in these parts. That's how I found myself knocking on his door.
I wasn't expecting to see a man in what appeared to be his late 30s answering my knocks.
"Who are you? What do you want?" he asked, suspiciously.
"You know me as YoSpankDawg. I think you know why I am here." I told him.
"Listen, kid...give up. You can search all you want, but you won't ever find anything. You have to stop eventually. Heck, not even I work 365 days a year."
With that, he closed and locked the door. I tried knocking again, but no response. That was it. I am sure you are as disappointed as I am. I am not sure WHAT I expected from a man as high in authority as he is in DoD, but I figured whatever would happen wouldn't be so short and...uneventful. Alas, I knew it was just time to continue on.
I made my way to Pensacola, Florida, to search for KILLERxDEBO, but I had no luck whatsoever. I searched for several days but it seemed that that moniker meant nothing to anybody I ran into. Instead of wasting more than the few days I already had wasted there, I decided to move on to my next stop, Saint Petersburg, Florida.
I had been in Saint Petersburg for, I would estimate, ten minutes when it happened. I was walking down the road when suddenly a blue car pulled over right next to me and the window went down.
"Get in." The young driver said.
As I saw that it was a Dodge Stealth, I laughed and said, "You've got to be kidding me..." but got in.
As Blue pulled out, I was the first to speak, "Ok. How did you do that? How did you even know who I was or that I am here?"
"Do you know what an aptonym is?" he asked me.
"Uhhh...I think so?" I replied. I was a little too shaken up to think at the moment.
This must have been clear to Blue, because he continued, "It is a name that fits the person using it. I didn't get this moniker just cause of the car--I am pretty sneaky and at the same time very mellow."
"Cool blue..." I said, making the connection out loud.
"So listen...I knew you were coming, so obviously I know why you're here too. I figure I'd find ya, let ya know that you're just wasting your time, and then let ya go so you don't waste as much time as you did in Pensacola." He laid it out for me rather directly.
"Hmmm...so that's that then..." I said. I could tell by his tone that he meant it. If there WAS anything to learn from him, I wasn't going to pull it off.
No more than a minute later, he pulled over--back where we started. I got out of the car and, just before closing the door, I leaned back in, "Hey, uh...Blue?"
"Yeah Dawg?"
"That aptonym thing...that only applies to some people, right?" I asked.
"What are you getting at?" He asked.
"Well...Ya got me thinking about my run-ins with some of the other guys..." I started, but stopped when I saw his eyes narrow.
He considered the consequences of telling me what was on his mind, but in the end must have decided that no harm could come of it, "All of us who have been chosen specifically for a task, yes."
"So General Nuisance...when I ran into him it was a very strange encounter. It's his job to be a total jerk?" I asked.
"Well...nuisance...yes. You do have that right." He affirmed.
"But Spray...that name has nothing to do with the lies he told me. I mean, maybe the unending spray of words out of his mouth in our one-sided conversation."
"Well, that..." Blue said, with a laugh, "is true."
When he said nothing else and looked straight ahead, I could tell the conversation was over, so I closed the door and started walking away. Behind me, I heard a whirring sound and then, "Do you have cats?"
It was a rather strange question. "Yes." I said and then turned around.
"My cats went through a horrible phase where they'd pee on everything. Drove me insane. Territorial little pests." he said, and then drove away.
'What in the world is that all about?' I thought. I stood there for a while like a puzzled white guy standing around on a Saint Petersburg sidewalk. 'I mean, my cats went through the same peeing phase, but they were just spraying to cover the scent of each other.'
The light bulb came on.
'Ahhhh...stealthy, stealthy, Mr. Blue.'
...to be continued...
Read Part II
Read Part III
The city of Mustang, Oklahoma is in the heart of Central Oklahoma. I should have suspected as much. It was my next stop across the nation, visiting the leadership, and one I almost decided to skip. After all, today was the day I was to visit the top of the (DoD) food chain--Council Member slayr357.
I was a little surprised how easy he was to find. A kid on the bus (there were no cars to rent here. Nothing decent anyways. Hey, it's Oklahoma! Not the most touristy place!) heard me muttering to myself (it is undecided whether this journey drove me insane, or if I've always been there) and overheard "slayr." Now, apparently, there is little much to do in Oklahoma besides cow-tipping and playing video games, so this kid had heard of slayr. I guess he was something of a LAN party legend in these parts. That's how I found myself knocking on his door.
I wasn't expecting to see a man in what appeared to be his late 30s answering my knocks.
"Who are you? What do you want?" he asked, suspiciously.
"You know me as YoSpankDawg. I think you know why I am here." I told him.
"Listen, kid...give up. You can search all you want, but you won't ever find anything. You have to stop eventually. Heck, not even I work 365 days a year."
With that, he closed and locked the door. I tried knocking again, but no response. That was it. I am sure you are as disappointed as I am. I am not sure WHAT I expected from a man as high in authority as he is in DoD, but I figured whatever would happen wouldn't be so short and...uneventful. Alas, I knew it was just time to continue on.
I made my way to Pensacola, Florida, to search for KILLERxDEBO, but I had no luck whatsoever. I searched for several days but it seemed that that moniker meant nothing to anybody I ran into. Instead of wasting more than the few days I already had wasted there, I decided to move on to my next stop, Saint Petersburg, Florida.
I had been in Saint Petersburg for, I would estimate, ten minutes when it happened. I was walking down the road when suddenly a blue car pulled over right next to me and the window went down.
"Get in." The young driver said.
As I saw that it was a Dodge Stealth, I laughed and said, "You've got to be kidding me..." but got in.
As Blue pulled out, I was the first to speak, "Ok. How did you do that? How did you even know who I was or that I am here?"
"Do you know what an aptonym is?" he asked me.
"Uhhh...I think so?" I replied. I was a little too shaken up to think at the moment.
This must have been clear to Blue, because he continued, "It is a name that fits the person using it. I didn't get this moniker just cause of the car--I am pretty sneaky and at the same time very mellow."
"Cool blue..." I said, making the connection out loud.
"So listen...I knew you were coming, so obviously I know why you're here too. I figure I'd find ya, let ya know that you're just wasting your time, and then let ya go so you don't waste as much time as you did in Pensacola." He laid it out for me rather directly.
"Hmmm...so that's that then..." I said. I could tell by his tone that he meant it. If there WAS anything to learn from him, I wasn't going to pull it off.
No more than a minute later, he pulled over--back where we started. I got out of the car and, just before closing the door, I leaned back in, "Hey, uh...Blue?"
"Yeah Dawg?"
"That aptonym thing...that only applies to some people, right?" I asked.
"What are you getting at?" He asked.
"Well...Ya got me thinking about my run-ins with some of the other guys..." I started, but stopped when I saw his eyes narrow.
He considered the consequences of telling me what was on his mind, but in the end must have decided that no harm could come of it, "All of us who have been chosen specifically for a task, yes."
"So General Nuisance...when I ran into him it was a very strange encounter. It's his job to be a total jerk?" I asked.
"Well...nuisance...yes. You do have that right." He affirmed.
"But Spray...that name has nothing to do with the lies he told me. I mean, maybe the unending spray of words out of his mouth in our one-sided conversation."
"Well, that..." Blue said, with a laugh, "is true."
When he said nothing else and looked straight ahead, I could tell the conversation was over, so I closed the door and started walking away. Behind me, I heard a whirring sound and then, "Do you have cats?"
It was a rather strange question. "Yes." I said and then turned around.
"My cats went through a horrible phase where they'd pee on everything. Drove me insane. Territorial little pests." he said, and then drove away.
'What in the world is that all about?' I thought. I stood there for a while like a puzzled white guy standing around on a Saint Petersburg sidewalk. 'I mean, my cats went through the same peeing phase, but they were just spraying to cover the scent of each other.'
The light bulb came on.
'Ahhhh...stealthy, stealthy, Mr. Blue.'
...to be continued...
