Back Havery
11/19/99

Dear App:

I read Jesse's essay about how nobody visited your sight, and it upset me.

It sickens me to see nobody comes to this sight, it really does.  So you know what I did, I sent a link to everyone on my address book - Hurah! By the way, for doing this you must return me a favor.  Please help me in my quest to take Jennifer Love Hewitt to my prom.

Prope

Prope:

If what you say is true…I love you.  And I don't want to sully this moment with a lot of grammatical pickery, but my name is JessI, with an I, and the APP is a SITE.  A lot of people visit my SIGHT-- if they didn't I would either be the Omega Man or Blind.  But I digress.

I WANT to do you a favor now, Prope (looking meaningfully at Carcazoid), because you were kind to me, and have asked for this favor before.  Have you threatened me with "reciprocity"?  No.  Have you threatened me at all?  No.  Simply asked.  And that made all the difference.

Jennifer Love Hewitt.  Do you want to take her to the prom?  Really? Sure, you're first answer is "of course, are you crazy?  YES!"  But I urge you to consider two things…modern cinema and…your looks.  Just tell me…are you cute?  At all?  You can tell me, and believe me, I have a BROAD range of WHAT IS CUTE, so you may fall into it.  Anyway I ask not for Jennifer's sake, but for your own.  If you're cute…and I mean REALLY CUTE, then I'd be glad to send Jennifer a note…BUT…BUT… let's say you look like the kid from Rushmore…(and that's fine), and you bring Jennifer to your prom and there's a kid on the baseball team who looks like Jason Behr or…even worse…Scott Wolf.  Then you're in trouble, because that kid's going to saunter up and steal her right away…and you'll be walking home sad…like in so much modern cinema.  The good thing here is…when you're walking home sad because the movie star dumped on you (and move stars are never as great as they are on Extra)…that's when the little brown haired girl who's been your friend for so long turns up and she looks beautiful because she finally put on makeup, and she says, "hi Prope…you look sad," and you say, "Yeah, Jennifer Love Hewitt just dumped me for that kid on the baseball team," and you look into her eyes while the song ZipLock by Lit starts playing, and you two realize that you're destined to be together forever.

So, my advice is…why waste your time and why give that baseball player ONE MORE CONQUEST?  Just ask out that little brown haired girl and show her a good time…and if not her, maybe Shiri Appleby, the girl on Roswell*, she's less known, and better looking than JLH ANYDAY.

Lovingly,

Jessi

P.S.  You mentioned in an earlier request for JLH that you were considering calling a Chicago morning show host to help you in this quest…PROPE:  LISTEN TO ME…AND LISTEN CAREFULLY.  If the morning show host you're referring to is the beast known as "Mancow" I have to warn you…I will NEVER, EVER speak to you again if you recruit his services. Just a little tip from your friend (who won't dump on you), Jessi.


Dear APP:

Here is my "Ultimate Plan":  To be the world's greatest pokemon master.

I can here you laughing, but here's the plan:

1)  APP gives me a grant.
2)  I build the world's greatest pokemon deck, as "The official Pokemon Trainer of APP".
3)  I win tournaments, donating the money back to my patron orgainization, APP.

Think of the possibilities.

-Sincerely (yes, really)

-Zark "Catch 'em all" Xain

Dear Zark,

We have already looked into backing Pokemon catchers as a source of revenue, and have found that it really doesn't pay as well as one might think.

Chris

P.S.Did you guys notice that the links are now the correct color? HMMM? HMMM?


Dear Jessi:

While I greatly appreciate your take on my Tempest quandary (no sarcasm intended) and while I won't point out that you misspelled my name (hey, it's not like I'm Carc) I'm puzzled by my "signature."  I'll admit that I had to look it up and this is what I found:
    Main Entry: iras·ci·ble
    Pronunciation: i-'ra-s&-b&l
    Function: adjective
    Etymology: Middle French, from Late Latin irascibilis, from Latin irasci to become angry, be angry, from ira
    Date: circa 1530
    : marked by hot temper and easily provoked anger
    - iras·ci·bil·i·ty /-"ra-s&-'bi-l&-tE/ noun
    - iras·ci·ble·ness /i-'ra-s&-b&l-n&s/ noun
    - iras·ci·bly /-blE/ adverb

Now it did occur to me that this was meant as a joke, but I may have been once again confused w/ our friend, Carc A. Zoid.  Please enlighten me.

Love always and forever,

Cort

Dear CORTJstr:

Well, first of all, you're welcome…and thank you for the thank you**. My labeling you as the ever irascible CortJstr was, unfortunately, a phrase that I have stolen from Molly Shannon and SNL.  I call everyone "the ever irascible ---______" because she said that about Mr. Jason Robards as Mary Katherine Gallagher and I thought it was funny.  Which brings me to the next point.

You say that it occurred to you that it was meant as a joke.  WHENEVER you feel that occurrence, I would encourage you to go with it.  ALMOST everything on the APP is a joke…and meant without malice.  When we're being serious…it will be plainly labeled.

If nothing else, though…you learned a new word, one that I'll hope you use often.

Jessi


Dear Chris:

How dare you mislead the readers into believing that I changed my position regarding having one's back.  I TOLD YOU on MONDAY, that I believed the back haver was a fight monitor, and now you deny it?  YOU were the one who said that the back haver actually fights off other attackers from behind.  IF I HAD YOUR BACK, I would call the fight off due to OUT NUMBERING...and that's the whole point of my arguement.  HOW DARE YOU ACCUSE ME OF CHEATING!  If this is the way point counterpoint is going to be, you can bet that it's going to be all out war from now on.

Jessi

Dear Jessi,

Blah, blah, blah. You said Monday that if I had your back, and you were losing the fight, then it was my job to jump in and finish the guy off! Well, I'm sorry, but that's not fair! Fight your own fights! As back-haver, I will watch the door to make sure someone else doesn't gang up on you - YES, I will do that. But I will not finish a guy off for you! That's up to YOU. it's your fight, man!

And you DID change your position on this, damn you.

Come on, readers of APP!! Who has my back in this?

Chris


Jessi:

I find your APP name of "Jessi" annoying.  Is this some counter-ego at work.  Normally, I find you to be a person driven by the ID.  But "Jessi" is some kind of Jungian archtype of the Urban-pissed-off chic. No smiles, just pure spiteful reaction.  Establishing a fake-counterculture against a dominant culture you explain in hyperbole.  Does the name harken you back to the days of Depeche Mode and chasing after feminine boy skaters?

Sent via IM to my AOL screen name:  APPFEED

Dear PETER (just to exhibit my ultimate power in KNOWING YOUR IDENTITY):

Well…(scratching on a little notebook)….I'll give you seven points for Jungian…but two points off for misspelling archetype.  The use of dominant culture vs. counterculture is worth eight, but you precede that with an incomplete sentence, which is five points off.  So that's…eight points.  Also, the sentence in which you juxtapose counterculture vs. dominant, I'm not quite sure what you even mean, so I'm classifying it as "gibberish" which is three and a half off.  BUT, your theories that I listened to Depeche Mode AND was a skater are INCREDIBLY on target, so that's seven points back.  And…I'll give one point for hyperbole…just because you found a use for a word that people only put on vocab tests.

Your final score is a …12 1/2…and that puts you at the 95 percentile of Pretentious Women's Studies Majors.

Thoughtfully,

JESSI


Dearest APP:

Led Zepplin didn't steal bits of songs to call their own? P-Shaw! Go listen to Muddy Waters, Howlin Wolf, Leadbelly.

Really now

Fred Rockwood [zithered@mail.com]

Fred,

I assume you're talking about Mr. Dead's letter from the
last mailbag. Speaking for Mr. Dead, who is not here to defend himself, I think he would say that there is a difference between Led Zeeplin being inspired by and obviously owing a great deal to an artist like Muddy Waters, and a rap star literally lifting melodies and bass lines from other musicians for EVERY SONG THEY DO.

REALLY now.

Chris


Dear APP:

I read the recent point/counterpoint with some dismay.  If this is true, regarding Jessi's unfair play in the point column, I am deeply dismayed.  I originally began visiting the site to enjoy Jessi's work, and aside from some moments where she just seems like another spoiled and whiny girl, I still do, basically.  But I don't know if I can stand by a cheater.  Please let the light shine on the truth and ease my burden.

Conejos,

M

M:

If Chris was a real man, and a real friend…he would show his face here and admit that the Got Your Back Point Counterpoint degenerated into a misunderstanding of original positions.
***

As I am a real woman and a dedicated truth teller, I will admit that PERHAPS everyone in the world MISREAD my position, and so I would like to state it here again, in fifty words or less.

TO HAVE SOMEONE'S BACK IS TO MEDIATE THE FIGHT AND MAKE SURE THAT IT DOESN'T GET OUT OF CONTROL.  IT IS TO PREVENT THE FIGHT FROM BECOMING ASSAULT AND BATTERY AND, IF NECESSARY…CALLING THE FIGHT TO SAVE YOUR FRIENDS LIFE.

More important is what I believe Back Having NOT TO BE, which is:

ACTUALLY FIGHTING IN THE FIGHT.  IF I HAVE YOUR BACK, I'M NOT GOING TO FIGHT WITH YOUR DESIGNATED FIGHTER OR ANY OTHER FIGHT JOINERS.  I'M THERE TO MAKE SURE YOU DON'T GET KILLED.

God DAMN it, I'm annoyed.  Mostly because I KNOW that Chris and I had opposing view points, but the syntax of those positions made this a confusing point counterpoint.  It's enough to make me never do P/CP again.

Whiny?  Come on, bitch, bring it.  Chris has my back on this one
****.

Jessi


Dear guys,

I can sympathize with you guys about the lack of visitors to your site.  I've lately been wondering if my quote page is really worth it.  People used to go, but now it's essentially just storage for my sig rotation.  Since I don't have a counter or anything I have no way to prove that nobody's coming but the lack of feedback is astounding.  What do you guys think, is it worth it?

Kyle McCowin [CortJstr@virginia.edu]

Dear Kyle,

Of COURSE it's worth it! I know that some day, someone will want to read the entire Bob Tallmadge saga, just as one day, someone will want to review all your email signatures!

Chris


*Wednesdays, 9 pm, 8 pm central on the WB…watch December 1st for the most wonderful Roswell EVER

**thank you's - how long do they have to go on?  I received a thank you card from someone the other day with a gift certificate in it…now do I have to thank her for the thank you?  Isn't this exactly what's wrong with the world today?  Can't we all just say Thank You to someone's face and be done with it?  THANK YOU everyone.  THANK YOU.

***I admit that YOU deliberately allowed your original point to be misunderstood, I'LL ADMIT THAT!

****Look, I'll say it again. YOU CHANGED YOUR POSITION ON THIS BEFORE THE COUNTERPOINT. Sure, I'll get your back against Mr. M on the whiny thing, but you can be DAMN sure I'm going to ask for a concise definition IN WRITING of what back-having means to you before you guys start throwing hands. I don't want you expecting me to take on Mr. M - probably a big guy - just because you fold like a house of cards under his first pummelling. I'll jump in only if he calls in Mr. N, Mr. O, or Mr. P to help him pound you.

 

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