Exmas party pickshurs.

I don't know why I have these pictures. I'm sure I didn't take them. They seem to be from StarToons' final Christmas party... the one we had at the office. The one where we played "drivers' license frisbee golf" - a game in which the victims /players throw their license from target to target around the office. The winner is any player who doesn't have to visit the DMV the next day. This time, everyone won but Andy (top picture on the right. Not Andy VanDalsem, with the Batman shirt on). His license wound up inside the wall of one of the "offices", I think it was Dave Pryor's. I say "office" because three walls and no ceiling do not an office make. Apparently, the gap between the sheets of wallboard was open at the top, so it really seems as if those walls were very optimistic about having a ceiling some day.

Andy never got his license out. He left the country not long after, returning to the Great White North. I hope someone invited him to "take off you hoser". I think it was about 8 months later when StarToons imploded. Conceivably, one of us could have stopped by when Bamboo Blue was tearing out the walls, to search for the artifact (let "tearing out" = "leaning on them for a minute"). Also conceivably, at the time, we were all very much occupied with "What the hell do I do now?", leaving very little room in our brains for "Gee I wonder if I can get Andy's license back?"

I used to have everybody over on occasional Friday nights to watch a movie or to play video games. I recall Andy only coming along once. I had a the electronics arranged so that not only would you hear the sound from the video game through my stereo, but I could also play music through the same speakers. It made the games funnier when you listened to wildly inappropriate music. Anyway, Andy had drunk a few of my beers, then chose to complain about the lameness of my musical choices for the night. I tried to explain that I knew it was lame and that, indeed, that's what I liked about it. I told him it made me laugh, demonstrating a little bit for him: "huh huh!" He wouldn't be deterred. He insisted that "No , man. Bad music is just BAD! There's no such thing as 'so bad it's good!'" He seemed really angry about it. For a smallish sort of guy, he had a big loud voice. My guests began to look concerned. I tried to brush off the subject: "Well, I like it and everyone else seems to be laughing (until he started shouting up the place), so you'll just have to tolerate it." Before I was required to throw the surly kanuk out of my house, I think it was Caroline (bottom photo, middle person) who got him to simmer down and give up the fight. I think he decided to leave shortly thereafter, which was no bad thing.

I'm not spiritual, but throwing his license inside a wall was not only an amazing shot, should he have been trying to, which I know he wasn't. It was also a piece of glorious karmic realignment.

p