My Diseased Mind

I Think I Probably Know These Guys

It’s been entirely too long since I’ve blogged. In fact, it’s getting to the point where I’m not 100% sure I can still read and write. Bhan loont rarjar. See? To that end, I’m going to write a quick blog entry in advance of my review of Transformers. To that end, I present you with a hastily-written, half-assed blog entry. Selah.

Having played Everquest for a few years, I’m familiar with online feuds. Done properly, they’re awesome, often outliving the website or game from which they spawned. The truly epic ones add new terms to the lexicon that persist so far into the future that many of the people who ultimately use them are completely ignorant of their origins. Myths and legends aren’t dead; we’re churning them out at a record pace.

To that end, I give you this. It’s a legend in the making. While that may not be obvious to those of us who see the light of day at least twice a week, I promise you that “PyroDice” is both a name reserved for hushed tones, and a newly anointed verb.

ELM MOTT, Texas - A Navy man who got mad when someone mocked him as a “nerd” over the Internet climbed into his car and drove 1,300 miles from Virginia to Texas to teach the other guy a lesson.

As he made his way toward Texas, Fire Controlman 2nd Class Petty Officer Russell Tavares posted photos online showing the welcome signs at several states’ borders, as if to prove to his Internet friends that he meant business.

There are two things in the above quote that totally rule:

1. 1,300 miles! He drove 1,300 miles to torch a guy’s trailer! Let’s put that in perspective. Now I love a good blow job. I’m what they call a ‘living male,’ and that’s what we do; we like blow jobs. But even so, I’m not driving 1,300 miles to receive even the most amazing blow job. Granted, you throw in a few more sexual favors and I’m there, but for a blow job alone, not gonna happen. PryoDice wanted to torch a stranger’s trailer more than I want to get blown. That’s huge. By the way, this entry marks the absolute end of any thoughts I might have entertained of showing Mom my blog. Bye Mom!

2. He showed everyone he was on the way. That’s some straight-up Stephen King shit right there. You’ve got to wonder how that guy felt seeing those pictures pop up as Pyro made his way to Texas.

“I didn’t think anybody was stupid enough to try to kill anybody over an Internet fight,” said John G. Anderson, 59, who suffered smoke inhalation while trying to put out the 2005 blaze that caused $50,000 in damage to his trailer and computer equipment.

Clearly John G. Anderson is pretty unfamiliar with teh intarweb. And who here wants to bet that his trailer has broadband and at least 4 computers in it? I’m willing to go a step further and say that, in lieu of the customary half-dead fridge with the word “beer” spray-painted on it, he’s got a pile of fried motherboards and hulking metal PC cases in his yard. He’s got more money invested RAM than he does in living space. I’d go on, but I just crunched some numbers, and I’m feeling a little sad right now.

Anderson, who went by the screen name “Johnny Darkness,” traded barbs with Tavares, aka “PyroDice.”

Investigators say Tavares boiled over when Anderson called him a nerd and posted a digitally altered photo making Tavares look like a skinny boy in high-water pants, holding a gun and a laptop under a “Revenge of the Nerds” sign.

Time constraints prevent me from searching for these pictures now, but know that I will be looking.

Tavares’ attorney, Susan Kelly Johnston, said his trip to the Waco area was a last-minute decision during a cross-country trip to visit his parents in Arizona. She said he never intended to hurt Anderson and did not think he was in the trailer when he set the fire.

I don’t know how many times I’ve been on a cross-country road trips and, in the heat of the moment during my 24 hours of driving, swung through Texas to torch the trailer of an internet rival. I mean, we’re well into the triple digits on that scenario.

Tavares would not let the feud go even at his sentencing. According to Pack, Tavares took cell-phone photos of Anderson in the courtroom while the judge was hearing another case. Authorities ordered the photos erased.

He’s gathering material to further humiliate the guy whose home he torched. Classic. I can’t improve upon this. It could be the single funniest thing in this article. Oh wait, no…

He said he is convinced the harassment is related to the Internet feud and plans to spend $30,000 on more fencing topped with barbed wire.

“Before this happened, the rule was: Nobody messes with the haunted house guy,” Anderson said.

Ok, it’s time for another episode of What Would You Pay? What would I pay to be a high school senior, with the line ‘Nobody mess with the haunted house guy’ available for yearbook signings? Seven grand, and I wouldn’t blink twice.