SHANIA’S TWANG
From Screech: I have one brief thought for Rollerdiva to ponder. Even Shania Twain is smart enough Net: Which is a wonderful way of saying that country music folk are clingin’ to the low branch on the idiot tree to branch out into the pop genre, because she knows that she isn’t going to get anywhere by staying entirely with schlock called country music. Net: We think you’re giving Ms. Twain a little too much credit. If it weren’t for the bare midriff and the Barbie-doll looks, she would still be crooning for tips at a lounge in Canada. Don’t underestimate the power of T&A; she could do Tiny Tim covers and go platinum.
STRETCHY DUDES AND SUCH
From Kung Fu Joe: Dude, it’s good to be reading the Network again after a summer without you. Net: A summer spent, like, you know, on the beach. Dude. It is good to see you are still pounding away at the old Commodore 64, exposing the absurdity of the University. Net: We are mere cogs in the absurdity-exposing machine. Absurdity, you see, can not be conquered by one Net alone. To truly overcome the balderdash that flows so freely across the land, we must band together — a merry band of Networkians traipsing to and fro, dismissing all that sucks and reveling in all that rocks. Wherever there is injustice, you will find us! Wherever this is suffering, we will be there! Because we are … oh, never mind.
The action figure you were referring to Thursday was Stretch Armstrong. Net: You should receive your Net action figure in four to six weeks, along with the Extraordinarily Clever NetWit Decoder Ring, a personalizable (glow-in-the-dark letter stickers included) Net All-Stars lunch box and an eight-track of Net’s Greatest Hits, featuring Siegfried and Roy’s “Macarena.” I believe he also had a sidekick, Stretch Armdog, but I can’t confirm that. I remember the commercials for the action figure to be rather disturbing because he had live action parts in them. Net: Sheesh, why do you think ol’ Stretch weaseled his way through our iron-clad mental defenses after all these years? There was some blonde dude who would play Stretch and use his stretchy super powers to do things. Net: Yeah, having a body composed completely of rubber would allow us to perform so many strange and wonderful feats. Like reaching for a beer can we left on top of the TV, or preventing venereal disease. I also remember later on a ninja version Net: Teenage Mutant Stretchy Dude? the commercial showed Stretch using his stretchy powers in live-action fight sequences. Net: What would he do, wrap his stretchy arm around the bad guys’ necks and choke ’em to death? In retrospect there is only one thing to say about these commercials: to quote the great Neo, “Whoa.”
ALTITUDE SICKNESS
From Yngwie: Ah, dear Network, so thy wishes include learning how our friend Matt Bullard relieved himself whilst hanging from a most precarious position? Net: Wait … didn’t we wish our roommate would die so we’d get straight A’s this semester?
Well, as a dedicated cog in the University bureaucracy, I have connections to those people in blue, and thus I have the information for thee. My friends, he pissed into plastic bottles, and for the old number two he used newspapers, which he then rolled up and placed in plastic bags. (I don’t know if he was using the Daily, but how fitting if he were!) Net: Rejected Daily slogan, intended to replace the entirely too trite “It’s Free — Just Read The Damn Thing”: “The Daily: A Good Paper … For Full-Time Activists To Poop On!” And in answer to thy follow-up question, he kept them all up there with him. Perhaps to keep him warm on those long cold autumn nights. Fare-thee-well!
DOOMSDAY? HOLD, PLEASE
From Phlegm of Discontent: Dear Penthouse, I never thought it would happen to me, but this weekend … .
Oh, wait, wrong letter. Net: Who says? With the loss of my beloved science lab to the forces of mediocrity, I’m forced to spend my time watching daytime TV with Bobo, my lab monkey, while drinking schnapps. My doomsday device is now sitting in my Blair-Witch-esque basement collecting dust and my gas-guzzler from Hades is barely held together with duct tape and Bondo.
And yet, I am jubilant, for I have reprised my role as Bastard TA, giving me the chance to warp young freshman minds. Net: Ahh … you must be teaching one of those freshman seminars. Having evolved beyond freshmanity long ago, we couldn’t help but wonder what they’re really being taught in those things. “Always take the chicken over the meatloaf” better be atop the list. Once again, fortune holds me to her sweet bosom. Net: Are we back to Penthouse again? And to Billy Baroo, there is nothing wrong with listening to MPR. A little of the old Ludwig von is just what you need to get you into a shopcrasting mood.
DANCING IN THE RAIN
From See-Kay: I am writing to you about an experience I had at the Williamson bookstore today that has made me quite irate. Net: If you’re shoppin’ for jubilance, baby, you ain’t gonna get it there. After standing in line for half an hour for overpriced books, I went to the bag counter to get my backpack.
I attempted to hand my bag-check ticket to a brutish-looking man Net: Ricky Martin? who was yelling “Check Out Only!” Net: With a hot Latin backbeat? After yelling again and giving me a menacing look, Net: In that oh-so-cute way of his? he finally took my ticket and threw my bag on the corner. Net: And punctuating the action with a sassy pelvic thrust? This entire time I had said only three words to him, Net: “La Vida Loca?” none of them sarcastic or biting. Did he not like the fact that I was not masculine or that I looked like a “freak” or what??? Where do they get these people to work the counter there? Net: When they graduate from Menudo. I would hope at a “world class university” that even the minimum-wage job holders at the bag-check counter would be able to extend even the smallest amount of common courtesy or decency toward other human beings. After hearing all the horror stories from friends living in Sanford Hall last year, I can only guess he must have been a sports player on a scholarship who believes himself to be a king. What happened to “Minnesota Nice”?