Tall American White Guy

Greetings, fellow residents. I am John. Some of you may know me as such. Others might recognize me simply as Johnny. Still others might acknowledge my existence with titles such as Elmer, Chouinard, Choui, Choubacca, or even Cosgrove. Though I must say that the most bizarre nickname I have ever been graced with goes a little something ... a-like-a dis-a:

"Short Canadian Red-Boy"

Let's take a closer look.

There are a few things about this name that are a given. I am, in one way or another, a boy of some kind, and I do indeed have ancestral ties rooted in Canada, though I am not actually Canadian. Nor is my father. Nor his. But that�s beside the point. The point is ... well, there really isn�t a point to all this, is there? Hmm. Anyway. There are also a few things about this nickname that don�t quite add up: I am, in fact, taller than a good deal of people I know, and I have no Native American blood running through my capillaries. You know. �Cuz I�m not red. I�m very, very white. If you�ve ever seen me -- at all -- you know what a pasty-white hue my skin has. To delve deeper into what actual meaning this designation holds, I should probably identify who it was that bestowed me with this nickname in the first place: Theresa �T-Pou� Ghana. No, wait ... Theresa Banana. Poulos. There we go. My friends Marshall Banana and Colonel Schpotz took recent leave in Ghana. I must have been confused. Mental lapse.

If you don�t know this Theresa person ... then I can honestly say I have no idea why you�re reading this right now. I mean, seriously -- how bored out of your mind could you possibly be if you have nothing better to do than to read a documentation of nothing hosted on the web page of some guy with contact lenses that you don�t even know? Now that I think about it, how could you have possibly found this web page in the first place? What�s the average rainfall in the Amazon basin? How many fingers in a furlong? Send your comments and answers in .dna format to thetick42 (at) japan (dot) com by September 23, 2004 to receive a complimentary googly-eyed walnut!

Now that I think about it, I can only really describe Theresa as sufficiently, cheerfully random. Which kind of goes well together, since I never really expect cheerful people to make offbeat remarks, ergo enhancing that already existent element of randomness. I wouldn�t say that Greg or Nick are �cheerful,� though. The Brothers Pram have more of a �chummy� quality to them. Chummy people saying random things are nothing new to me. But cheerful and chummy are very different things in the world of Elmer �Cosgrove� Choubacca. And I should point out that, in the past, Greg has mentioned a few things -- and I have witnessed at least one instance -- that might make that �cheerful� description (talkin� �bout Theresa now) temporarily inaccurate in certain situations. If memory serves, one occasion involved Mr. Dr. Poulos and a chair.

You can edit this out if you want to, Greg, since I pretty much don�t have the right to talk about your family in any fashion. But it was still funny.

I dunno. For a more accurate idea of what Theresa might be like were she able to exist in html, hop on over to the quotes section and you ought to see what I mean.

At this point, I�ve completely lost track of where I was originally going with this, so I�ll pause to let us both remember what the hell I was talking about.

... Ah yes.

At one point, I was amidst the entire Poulose troupe -- the context isn�t that important, but if someone actually asks me about it, I�ll stick it in here sometime -- and remarked quite generally that I felt short. Although it might not be the case, I�ve always felt as if the majority of the Poo-Tang clan was taller than me. Catching wind of this remark, Theresa melded this comment with the fact that I was Canadian -- an apparently very amusing concept -- in order to create the label �Short Canadian Boy.� I think. That may not be how things actually progressed, but it�s all I remember, so I�ll stand by it.

The �Red� of �Short Canadian Red-Boy� came along shortly after. Kinda. Later during my amidstness, Theresa seemed to notice that I was wearing both a red jacket and had on my person red luggage.

EPIPHANY!!!!

SHORT ... CANADIAN ... RED-BOY!!! The dawn of a new era was at hand! All acknowledge the awesomemnity of Short Canadian Red-Boy! I�m king of the squirrels!! WHEEL ... OF ... MUCUS!! Don�t ask questions: I once won a Nubby!

I suppose that�s all I have to say about that. I suppose there are more appropriate nicknames out there, but I must admit that I�ve grown to like this one. So, in closing:

I�m short.

I�m Canadian.

And I don�t want any more bears.