The 100th Article Annual Special Celebrity Guest Extravaganza

We here at Castle Astrotrain are celebrating the publication of our 100th article. This thing has been around for over a year now, I couldn't say how much longer that a year but oh the memories flood these halls like blood floods the halls of the hotel in the Shining. Our esteemed writers weigh in on this milestone. People who got left out will be added if they so desire.

Sherwood Harrington (Editor In Chief)

It is a tough thing to be the Editor in Chief of Astro Train. A real tough thing. There are a lot of tougher things though. Like trying to survive on Venus. Good gravy, try that one on for size. That being said, if I am re-elected Editor In Chief during the mid term elections I vow to fire Mike Huguenor, Bob Vielma, Tommy Burma, Nathan Kavanaugh, Ruben Balderas, Matt Delong, Tom Kruller/Theiss, David Davis, Nemo, Jonathan Royalty, Alex Cesario Siquig Esquire, Brandon Mitchell, Mary Tumor, Brad The Bartender, Jake Feshbach, Joey the Barbarian, Bethany Watzman, Lindsey Morrone, Mishga Sohrabi, Michael Miszczak, David LeVak, Lia Goloff, and replace them with a bunch of robots who vaguely look like them and put them under the direct orders of Daniela Bustamante. I make good plans.

Charles Rochester Bucket

I'm so deep. That's really all I have to say. I like Bob's article about not being afraid of mad cow disease. God I hate people who are dumb about shit like that.

Cornelius Rooster

Honestly, since I am probably the best writer you've got I can't really spare myself for that long. I'm working on a seedy detective story. In the meantime, I like the picture of the black guy in a Klan outfit. Someone explain that to me. "LA finally Becomes Part Of Hell"! Yeah, I h8 LA like 4 realz. I've had more motorcycles stolen there than Nirvana has songs about heroin. If you are into porn I'd suggest keeping an eye on Jayna Oso, she's hotzors and gaining steam in the adult market. Get into her now (her work) and look cool when she hits big. But as for Astrotrain, the best article was obviously the Barn Vampires one. Sultry Diana was pretty sultry in real life too, she even touched my arm once in class. And I never washed that arm again.

Mike Huguenor

It's been a tumultuous and heart-wrenching 99 articles of Astro Train. Frankly, we weren't really sure we would make it to see 100. Thankfully, due to periodical periods of resurfaced interest, Astro Train is still kicking, and it's readers (Alex, weird girls Alex somehow knows, and myself) are glad to see it. Now, here we are at the star-studded 100th article retrospective, so let's look back on the things that make up the painfully self-aware zine that is: Astro Train!

Response Pieces: I would say a good 70% of Astro Train is made up of various responses to previous pieces. You would think that since we, mostly, all know each other we would simply respond in person, but, apparently, we all hate to speak tete-a-tete and so choose, instead, to write underhanded responses to each other. Some great examples of this are Tom Kruller's entire body of work and the heated "debate" between partisaned bodies over Libertarianism and Marxism, which featured the great title: "A Response to an Imbecile: Thoughts on Brad the Bartender." Nice.

Parallel Atricles: Very similiar to response pieces and helping to showcase our lack of exploration comes my favorite part of Astro Train: the parallel article. Look at the titles, why don't you! How to Know You Are a Punk Rocker, How to Know You Are Indie; "What I Think About, What IThink About"; "A Political Cartoon", "An Existential Cartoon", etc. Why is this hilarious? Because it's satire on something completely unnecessary! Like satirizing your neighbor when you don't even know him. Which brings me to....

Real People Fan Fiction: The best idea anyone has ever had. We know lots of people! Most of them don't know us! We're creepy! N!

There are some other important pieces of Astro Train refuse that are equally important such as: the occational serious article from someone we don't know, our early, wide-eyed articles and the inexplicable articles seeming to come out of nowhere ("Notes on Pulling Down the Sky", "Movie Review: Kramer vs. Freddie vs. Jason vs. Kramer", "A Beautiful Friendship Begins)".

Now, our celebrity guests talk about their favorite moments!

Jean-Claude Van Damme: Personally, I loved Bob's Cats article. It really struck a chord with my boyish heart. You know, I may have a tough-guy exterior but, apparently, I have a boyish heart. You really learn a lot about yourself when you type without thinking. How do you like this picture of me trying out for Dirty Dancing?

J Mascis: That one...about all the...breathing with the doing and the Jerry Lewis...hm...

Gene Shalit: Boy, Astro Train, you're one heckuva ride! I'd buy a ticket to ride you any day, you wacky train! For my money it doesn't get any better than the Real People Fan Fiction "Hosain, Pejman, and....HOSAIN?" - the fic that started the snick...ering...from me. So, remember, when you're thinking about what ASTROnomical place you want to go to, take the train with the brain: Astro Train! I'm Gene Shalit!

Cannibal Ox: We really like the one about fish. No real reason. I guess we just like fish. They're neat.

Two celebrities liked ones from the first issue with a monosyllabic animal name as it's title. That's weird. See you at 200!

Nate Kavanaugh

Astro Train is pretty tight. You should all watch Magnolia.

Bob Vielma (Federal Booty Inspector)

Whatever happened to Cromag?

Lindsey Morrone

My Top Ten Astrotrain Memories (in no particular order)

1. Astrotrain peeing in David Levanthol's front yard, even though David was clearly home and would have let Astrotrain pee in the bathroom.

2. The Scandinavian Mini-Gourmet waiter who kept hitting on Astrotrain and ignoring my pleas for some damn apple pie.

3. Nate and Astrotrain driving down to Tijuana together for the weekend and refusing to reveal the events that unfolded over the course of those wild nights (this happened on two separate occasions).

4. Me walking in on my mom, Astrotrain, my dad, and dead hamster Mario having sex. God help me for that which I can not forget.

5. That one time Astrotrain and I stayed up all night eating junk food, watching chick flicks, and talking about our past relationships. Then we TPed the guy's house astrotrain has a crush on.

6. That party where Astrotrain was jumping on the trampoline drunk and decided that a pee was at hand. When Astrotrain was peeing off the trampoline some dude bounced Astrotrain off and into the bushes with a steady stream of urine splashing all the way down. It was like a sprinkler.

7. Astrotrain signing everyone's year book: "Looking forward to you depending on me, bitch, for your livelihood! Also, hope you were nice to me in high school 'cause you'll pay for it later when I own the planet and rent it out to 50 foot aliens with an appetite for little shits like you. All My Love, Astrotrain.

8. Astrotrain with the 30 foot beer bong and five pitchers of grape Kool-aid. Astrotrain peed green for 15 days after. I would know.

9. That midget that rode Astrotrain like a pot-belly pig was pretty N!

10. Astrotrain meeting Georgie W. and telling him he's traditional slice.

That Astrotrain has moxie.

Bethany Watzman

My favorite Astro Train Memory is that one time when we had a Christmas party at the offices and I was pissed off because you didn't recognize that some people didn't celebrate Hanukkah instead of Christmas, but I kept my mouth shut and ended up making out with TOM KRULLER and NATE KAVANAUGH in the supply room. Oh, and you tried to get us all to make copies of our ass with the copy machine, ass.

Matt Delong

I'm a self-loathing bitch...and I tried to inhibit the beast known as Astro Train for some time, but all efforts came to no avail...as Astro Train is now a living, breathing astro train...that is beasty. I congratulate everyone on their brilliant awe-inspiring articles, critical essays, and real people fan fiction stories. Like the self-loating person I am, I think I am going to go to Fortress Of Solitude (AKA the Santa Clara University gym) to make myself feel better.

Tommy Burma

Wow, it's been 100 articles. I can't hardly believe it myself, but then again, I'm just a pseudonym, so what I think doesn't really matter does it? Looking back at the archive there are a lot of things I'm proud of, a lot of things I'm ashamed of, a lot of things I would have done differently, and a lot of things I still would have done differently. Most of all, I like the picture of me in my bio. I also like my bio itself, probably the best thing I have written during my entire tenure here. I probably should have done more, but it's been really hectic around here. There is this weird power struggle going on between Sherwood and Alex. If anyone is familiar with Animal Farm I'd say that Sherwood is definitely the pig that wins in the end. Other than that, there aren't really any grounds for that comparisson. Other than the fact that both of them are pigs. Now, the Best Of Awards.

Issue 1

Issue 1 is comprised of two interviews, two "How To Know You Are..." treatises, two articles about animals ("Cats" and "Fish"), two long retrospective on bands Bob really likes (oddly enough both were written by Bob), and some stuff written by Tom (including one where he pretends to be a NAZI). This is a toss up. I gotta say, I think I gave the best interview in the world when I "sat down" to "talk" with Ian, so November Trials, you have my vote!

Issue 2

This is where things get weird! Honestly. Both Mike and Nemo make their respective debuts, and hilarity ensues. We also have two precocioulsy drawn picture galleries that are full of inside jokes that no one other than like three people (at most) would ever get. Signs of our impending ultimate snobbiness are very much in evidence. Alex wows us with his knowledge on Iran (God, you are so smart, you Persian loving bitch), and Lia Goloff writes nine hundred pages about AIDS. I still haven't actually read all the way through it, I'm almost sure about halfway through she just starts writing random words, assuming we'd never get that far. Even though I have this suspicion I still can't bring myself to read the middle to verify or debunk this theory. We also got a poem from one Michael Miszcack, someone none of us have ever met. I like the poem actually, I think the award goes there. Hooray for Michael!

Issue 3

Honestly I'm not to enamored with this issue. It kind of seems like filler to me, but then again, I'm not qualified to talk about filler, seeing as how I'm a pen name. Point is, there is a lot of overlooked stuff on this issue, even by me, who just called it filler. The "Suitcase" article makes me laugh, do to the fact that it is presented as a Point-Counterpoint article and in reality, is only a counterpoint article. You can't make this stuff up. "The War of the Roses Part 2" is probably the worst piece of garbage that has ever been allowed to grace these hallowed halls. Joey comes out of his shell to review a video game and Tom, up to his old tricks, ALSO REVIEWS A VIDEO GAME. Nate's article on movies is good, because it is so earnest and full of truth. I am saying this earnestly. Jake's article is full of a lot of big words and Ruben's article is about a band I like but not as much as he likes them. I really can't say I have a favorite in this issue. Moving on.

Issue 4

Personally, I think Issue 4 is tight. The Astro Train debates are entirely classic, from Brad the Bartender and Jake Mahaffey at one anothers throats to the Gardener to more references to Nate and Tom's homosexual connections. This is the only issue in which all 6 MC's of the dearly departed (or maybe not so dearly departed) rap militia the Rap$callionz contributed. Which is to say, 4 more than contributed to any single issue of Cro-Mag, despite Cro-Mag's obvious superior web design. The epic "What I think About" string of articles culminating in "What I think about" just about takes the cake here, they are all good. Other things I enjoyed included Jon's review of Hinduism, reviews of 5 Bands (be they Mexican or Japanese) and just about everything else. I feel like this is the issue where we started to hit our stride.

Issue 5

I like Bob's thing about stalking girls. I relate. Honestly. "A Beautiful Friendship Begins" is probably my single favorite article to read over and over again due to it's total lack of worth or value but still managing to press the Tom and Nate are gay agenda. Lindsey also joined the crew with a series of oddly sarcastic articles that were pleasing. Tom talks to his girlfriend Ghandi, Matt Delong soul searches, Caligula reviews the new Interpol CD, Patrick Renna (fat kid from the Big Green) becomes our official spokesperson, Nate has a tight comic, and Alex feels the need to actually write more War of the Roses bullshit. Kill him.

Real People Fan Fiction:

IT IS ALL GREAT. Some are better than others, but they are all fucking good. Where else can you find so many stories about ship captains hunting elsuive prey, nice Filipino boys flying dragons, weird quadruple suicides, barn vampires, telephone calls with james joyce, or anything as oddly touching as the Bonsai Gardens? Nowheresville, Nove Scotia, that's where.

So that's that. One hundred articles. And such quality control too! I look forward to the next hundred thousand million articles, Allah and bandwith permitting. Peace y'alls, and keep it real, love to the Godz and represent WU to the fullest.

Daniela Bustamante

Once, in seventh grade, I was a young staff writer for Astro Train. There, I happened to somehow get a crush on a boy named Michael. I thought Michael liked me too, but alas, it was not meant to me. One day, after being forced by my friends Jamie and Alex (yes, that debonair, cunning, and all-around good friend of former rulers of the free world we know as "editor") to sit nex to Michael on all of the roller coaster rides (that is what I call board meetings) at an amusement park then known as Paramount's Great America (this is what I call the Astro Train Offices), he found it necessary to confess to me that he had a girlfriend. I was crushed, devastated, and completely destroyed, so I bought myself some of those delectable garlic fries and felt better. This summer, I discovered that Michael now considers me to be "practically [his] ex-girlfriend." and he was upset at dear dear Alex for not informing him sooner of our continued correspondence so many years after that fateful summer.

The moral is: Alex is a douchebag who doesn't tell his friends anything. Wolf Blitzer for secretary of state!

Brad the Bartender

These long-winded retrospectives are all well and good, but in my mind, there's really only one Astro Train memory worth taking to the bank: the fateful summer day six years ago when Alex first shared with me the early seeds of an idea that would soon grow into a national phenomenon.

Ruben Balderas (as told by Franklin Shields, his biographer)

We can only assume Ruben is still recovering from Whiskey Thursday. He will return with the weirdest fan fiction you've ever imagined. Provided you haven't read anything Thomas Bernad wrote recently. Man that stuff is weird!

Alex

This all started because someone sent me a link to a Russian Mail Order Bride website. From that innocuous start, sprung forth something I never expected. Attemtping to be snarky, I scrapped my stupid website and turned it into a Mail Order Groom website, cleverly titled, Mail Order Groom Heaven. Truly, if the Gods gave out wit I would have the lion's share. It was kind of funny, this Groom website, but not overwhelmingly so, and only so much could be done with it before all ideas had been exhausted. So, tacked on to the bottom of Mail Order Groom Heaven was a little link called "Features" and "Features" featured some odds and ends, things that really didn't have any place to go. The first issue of Astro Train mostly, some reviews of music, film, and literature. I scrapped the reviews and named the "Features" section "AstroTrain", a clear and not so clever play on "Cometbus", perhaps the most famous zine EVER. Astrotrain didn't have much of an identity or a set of rules. Even now I don't even know if it is Astrotrain or Astro Train or AstroTrain. I don't care and it doesn't matter and we're all none the wiser. I still don't have a uniform narrative for this. I don't think we need one. Like I've said, I like the idea of a place where nothing really fits. It kind of means it is a place where everything fits. There is a wide range of stuff going on here, and I like that. I don't want to earn the praise of the masses, cause clearly they aren't interested. I don't want us to reinvent the wheel. I don't know if I want anything in particular either. I'm just happy that we did something, that it may look shitty, some of the articles may be on the "ugh" side, interest may dwindle and rekindle, but fuck that, we did it, and that means a lot to this old soldier. And maybe it gets annoying that I'm always bugging you to contribute this, contribute that, but I only do it because I like you guys, and you aren't motherfucking staff writers to me and you never will be. You are my friends, and I'm glad that we accomplished this milestone together, whether you've written one article or twenty. So, this is where I tip my hat to each and every one of you and thank you, it's a grimy world, and I'm glad you guys have got my back. In whatever way I can, I've got your collective backs too. Next office party I'll buy you all cocaine. Just kidding. About the office party.