We all have heroes, and I am no different from anyone else, in that respect, save for the fact that all my heroes are weird and don’t make any sense to normal people.  It will therefore come to most of you as no surprise whatsoever, that high on the list of people who changed my life is, (drum roll………) Skeletor.  Yes, Most kids probably wanted to be firemen of ninjas or dinosaurs when they were little (or fiery dinoninjas) (which would make a totally sweet name for a band), but me, I wanted to be like Skeletor.  What made him so cool, you ask?  Well, for one thing, he had a skull for a head (most of us do really, come to think of it, he was just more obvious about it, I suppose) he beat a lot of stuff up, and he taught me all sorts of invaluable life lessons.  Insert segue here, here are a few of them:

 

            First, he was determined and dedicated to his life’s work, getting into Castle Greyskull, so that he could gain access to its many secrets.  We never found out what these secrets were, but since everything else that Skeletor ever did made perfect sense, I’m sure these secrets were totally sweet, and would, had he ever have gotten ahold of them, easily allowed him to dominate Eternia (which, by the way, was really just a metaphor for Richmond, like Narnia was for England, or like Hell for New Jersey).  As it was though, he never really succeeded, even though he summoned innumerable monsters, and once dressed up as a fat Italian chef (this one almost worked, actually).  So yeah, next time you feel like giving up, ask yourself, WWSD?

 

            Next, he didn’t let the fact that he was (like so many of us) surrounded by retards get him down.  In fact, most of his band of henchmen also had homoerotic names, like Beast Man, and, um well, actually it was mostly the good guys who had insanely fruity names, but still Beast Man was always hitting on Skeletor, making it that much tougher to capture the secrets of Castle Greyskull.  But did he ever let it get him down when Webstor got his butt handed to him by Ram Man for the umpteenth time in a row?  Nope, he’d just shoot some evil at Trap Jaw and then go make out with Evil-Lyn for a while.  There’s a moral in there somewhere, but it’s probably a silly one anyways, so don’t look too hard.

 

            He had a totally sweet voice, and laughed all the freakin’ time.  Now, a lot of you out there probably also have pretty awesome voices as well, but stop for just a moment and shout the following phrase, “Soon, Randor, the Trousers of Power will me mine! Hahahahaha!!!” Did that sound awesome?  If not, it’s probably because you don’t have the Skeletor voice.  It’s worth perfecting though; I use it all the time at work and it never fails to get me what I want.  As for the laughing, just think about it for a moment; he had a skull for a face, always had to wear purple, and he lived in a mountain full of retards.  But he was still able to laugh at life’s little ironies.  Try to remember that, won’t you, next time some triflin’ little thing gets you down.

 

            He was mysterious.  Yes, even though pretty much everyone in Eternia was completely freaky looking (again, just like Richmond) as a child I was always convinced that Skeletor had some uniquely awesome origin.  Was he burned by acid, like Two-Face?  Was he part armadillo, like Hillary Clinton?  Was he He-Man’s real father, like Herbert Hoover?  I never could figure it out, but that made him all the more of an enigma.  As such, I knew from my earliest days that in order to be, like Skeletor, I too must strive to acquire such an aura of mystery, a quest which I think I’ve done admirably well at over the years.

 

            Finally, he had a heart of gold.  Yes, even though he spent countless hours trying to figure out a way to rip through He-Man as easily as a hungry gorilla rips through a bag of kittens, he still, deep down inside, knew the true meaning of Christmas and once saved an alien space-puppy from a hideous and nameless evil.

 

            So remember, even if you’re ugly, shrill, surrounded by retards, and constantly defeated by a half-naked guy with a really good tan, keep on truckin’, it’ll pay off eventually.  I know that really applies to most of us, and especially to Al Gore, so take heart, and know that the some day, the secrets of Castle Greyskull may be yours as well (secrets void where prohibited, Castle Greyskull not available in all areas).

  To the casual observer, it might appear that my blog is in fact, nothing more than a bunch of random crap and formulaic mockeries directed at 80’s pop culture, Dick Cheney, monkeys, and band names.  In fact, all the myriad secrets of the universe are contained within these daily (for the most part) writings, like the Da Vinci Code, or the after 11:00 menus at Waffle House. Nay, my blog a like a Rosetta Stone of human existence, a veritable Mad fold-in of the soul.  But it owes it’s existence not merely to me, but to innumerable others, and so I would like to take this opportunity to thank one of them for their awesomeness.  That one, is my van.

 

            How, you ask, does my van contribute to this blog?  Well, for one thing, without my van I would doubtless live a homebound and dull existence, developing a dual personality, staring at shiny objects, and fearing the light of the day, my only computer activity consisting of that old Qbasic game where you blow up gorillas.  Yes, my van gets me all over the friggin’ place.  It is nothing short of my very own Millennium Falcon, or to use and even geekier metaphor, my USS Defiant, that allows me to leave Deep Space My House, and boldly go where no man has gone before, as well as garner better ratings.  Let’s take a look then, at what makes my van totally sweet.

 

            First, while most vans that year were made with a Big ol’ V6^®, mine was the economy model, and came with the Not Quite Big Enough 4 Cylinder^®.  As a result, there’s enough extra room in the engine compartment to fit Grover Cleveland (affectionately known during his Presidency as “Uncle Jumbo”) in there.  This has the happy side effect of making it totally easy for me to reach in there and fix stuff without having to go and pay a man of questionable hygienic practices named Earl (the man, not his hygienic practices) large quantities of money to do stuff a monkey with a ratchet set could do (we are, of course, talking about a glow-monkey here).  Also, owing to the uniquely weird engine design, combined with the fact that the catalytic converter plate fell off sometime last year and the steering gear never has sounded quite right, my van sounds like Sebulba’s pod racer.  This makes driving fun, as I can always pretend I’m about to run over Anakin Skywalker.  Finally, owing to the teacup engine in my van, it always feel like I’m going way faster than I actually am.  Many a time, I’ve hit the road and floored it, listening in a pleased manner to the roar of the engine as I let those horses run, and then looked at the dash and seen that I’m still pushing 35.

 

            It’s a Plymouth.  Why is that cool you ask?  Simple, they don’t make Plymouths anymore.  A few years ago they were bought out by some German company and the American branch was renamed “Hitlermobile USA” thus relegation the Plymouth to that venerable list of old-ass cars they don’t make any more, like the Stanley Steamer, the Edsel, and the non-gay-looking Beetle.

 

            It was made in Canada.  Now, this by itself isn’t all that cool, but in a way it’s kind of inspiring.  You see, my van came to this country from a far Frenchier one, and though an immigrant in this great nation of ours, has learned to fit in perfectly, running red lights, disregarding speed bumps, and running off of regular unleaded, rather than croissants and moose snot, as cars do up in the frozen North.

 

            It didn’t come with many gauges in it.  Yup, as part of the whole economy plan, it pretty much just came with a speedometer a couple of idiot lights, and a gas gauge that’s just accurate enough to tempt you into believing it, just so that it can crush your hopes like a baby chipmunk beneath a cinderblock.  As such, I’ve taken the liberty of adding a few pieces of instrumentation to the dash, but since I don’t really know what I’m doing, they’re all just sort of bolted on wherever, so my van has more of that H.G. Wells, retro steampunk look to it, which is totally sweet.

 

            It has a blue book value of $138.  Really.  You know what that means?  It means that I pay no taxes on it at all.  It means that my insurance is totally low.  It means that unless I park it next to the junk yard, there’s always another car nearby that looks more stealable.  Also, this is a point of honor amongst my people.  Long have the elders of my tribe decreed that it is a shameful thing to get rid of a car while it’s still worth more than $400, and I have surpassed all my brethren in this degree.

 

            So yeah, kudos unto thee, my van.  You’ve carried me nearly 200,000 miles, we just need another 800,000 before your odometer rolls over.  Next time I take you to East Coast (Where your Mom would stop!)  I’ll give you a tank full of the good stuff.

 

            And, for all you people out there in cyberspace, here’s a bit of a poser.  You see, the one thing my van lacks is a totally sweet name.  So think up a good one, and send it to me, if it totally rules, I’ll use it, and your name will be remembered for as long as I have the van (estimated time, 10,000 years).