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kukla_tkoI think that I am still going to try to put together that web-comic. I intend to base it loosely on the people and circumstances of the Infamous Brad Parties.
But in order to tell that story, I have to organize my thoughts. Fortunately some unknown person wanted to know how I became friends with Brad Hicks, since we are not the same age, gender, etc.
The short answer:
Dude, I’m a fan. A convention-goer. I am a sci-fi geek. If you are any of these things than you probably know that age, gender, generation, race, religion, etc does not divide fans. You can even have what the rest of the world would call poor social skills and still find friends in Fandom. I met him and got to know him at local conventions. Once, at Conflation, I had to show him my ID to prove that I was under age. (At 18 years old I was an invited guest (not to be confused with a Guest or Guest of Honor) of Conflation, so I had a legal badge. I just wasn’t able to drink.) We found things in common and stuff to learn from each other.
What more do you need to know?
The Long Answer:
Yeah, I know. You want more. I would, too, so here’s my LJ equivalent of one of my interpretive dances:
As I stated above, I met Brad at the local cons. I was in my late teens before I had much of a chance to talk to him. I made a lot of friends at conventions. Everyone wanted to talk to me, so it wasn’t that hard. (Let’s be fair: at the time I was wearing about a size 9, only because of my incredible rack, had long red curly hair, wore fabulous costumes and glasses, and talked nonstop about my favorite books. I was a chick-gamer, too, and friendly to most people. In the real world I was known to stop traffic from time to time. At conventions I was a GOD.)
Brad was a kind of God himself. He had been at it for so long that he was probably thought of as one of the first people to go to cons. He’s far from inconspicuous, at 6’ tall and about 270-300 lbs. At the time, he was sporting what Allura refers to as the Bald Guy Mullet: Hair past his shoulders and a receding hairline. He also wore a full beard in a great burnished gold color. He spoke well; he dressed well, and loved fun.
It is true that some people were put off by him, even then. He’s loud. He’s opinionated. He’s well educated and some people take this trio of traits to mean that he’s a know-it-all. None of the above is necessarily a negative trait to me. Remember, my father is Mr. Scary. My beloved Grandmother Nonnie (may she rest in peace) was a woman with ideas, opinions and stories, just try to stop her if you’ve heard it before. My mother talks a mile a minute and unless you have a good verbal crowbar, you aren’t getting in a word edgewise when she gets going. “Scary” people don’t scare me at all. Scary? You don’t know from SCARY. I wear Scary for underwear.
I will admit, sometimes the label “Scary” intrigues me and I find that I want to get to know that person and find out what the fuss is about.
And I rarely find someone scarier than me. On the occasions when I do, it is even rarer when I find someone scarier than my own parents, and I love my parents.
In fact, the only people who really scare me are the ones who are a danger to others due to their untreated mental illness. (The Red Scare springs to mind.)
But I digress.
I sort of knew Brad, and heard about his parties from someone or other. It may have been my mom, come to think of it…
It was during the period of The Red Scare that I went to my first Brad Party. Here’s a silly aside: I got my directions over the phone from Sevenstar while I was at TheSigOther’s house. But he wasn’t my SO at the time, he was too busy being married and a father and domestic and tranquil and stuff. But even back then I liked him and wanted to spend time in his presence. Interesting, eh?
That would put this in 1995.
I started coming to the Brad Parties. And here’s the deal: I went to the parties and (gasp!) socialized with the host (when I could.) As with many things, if I participate in something that I think is really neat, I immediately want to be involved on a deeper level. I wanted to not only attend the parties; I wanted to contribute to them, be part of the magic.
As a result, I started hanging out at Brad’s house a lot. He and I had some reasonably similar attitudes about hospitality, so it was cool to stop by and hang out for a couple of hours unannounced and without a call in advance. Since I was living at home and commuting to the house of my (then) SO and Brad’s was somewhere in between, I found that it was a comfortable place to make another home. Plus there were always great people there, living, visiting, stopping by, etc.
Was I romantically attracted to Brad? Well. Not particularly. I didn’t find him unattractive either. I was just mostly really busy with what was already on my plate. Besides, it took a while to work out what his personal entanglements were, too. It seemed that his female roommate might also be a kind of SO or maybe they were “friends with benefits” or something. Turns out that they had attempted something like that and then she decided that she liked someone else instead. She always seemed vaguely uncomfortable about her relationship with Brad. Not that she didn’t like him, but the circumstances were the kind of thing that drives her crazy. She doesn’t like to feel indebtedness, and is hypersensitive about who she owes what. But this isn’t about my friendship with Sevenstar.
So hanging out at the Brad Parties and hanging out with friends at Brad’s House turned into Hanging Out With Brad, or vice-versa. He did have a hot tub, and a wicked cool computer and stuff, but I mostly went there for the atmosphere and the conversation. He loaned me books, we talked about ideas. We cuddled on the couch. We invented art together. He had crazy ideas; I helped them come to life. I had crazy ideas, too, and he helped me along with those, too.
Then there were the games. Brad hosted a lot of games, mostly White Wolf stuff, but other games got played. I participated in the long running Changeling game that survived the demolition of the Brad Davidian Compound, and I guest starred or was a spectator for the various Mage or Shapeshifter-based games going on over there.
Circumstances shifted, I moved a couple of times, and was back at Mom’s. Needed to get out on my own, couldn’t afford to do it alone.
Brad’s roommate moved out, and he suddenly needed someone to help with the rent. I moved in during the “waiting for the house to sell” period, and was his only rent-paying roommate. I was also his messiest and most annoying roommate, just ask him. I lived under his roof for 10 months. For stories, see The Leopard Pit from previous posts. (Yes, I am too lazy to link.)
Then Brad went on the Shaman’s Path and few of us got to see him. He pretty much wanted to kiss St. Louis goodbye and a lot of people were pretty pissed off at him when he left.
But not me. I was only annoyed that other people seemed to want to fight with him through me. Once I figured out what was going on, I fired the Stop That! Cannon and I didn’t have to deal with it any more.
And I stayed in touch with Brad via Email. We visited a few Lothlorien events simultaneously.
When he crashed and burned, and crawled back to the STL after living in KY for a while, I was one of the people who supported him. Ok, I didn’t have anywhere for him to sleep, but I helped him find an apartment and move into it. (All by myself, too.)
Brad is family. Despite recent… stuff… if he showed up on my doorstep needing help at 3 in the morning, I would let him in. (If someone turns him into a vampire I am royally screwed.)
But in order to tell that story, I have to organize my thoughts. Fortunately some unknown person wanted to know how I became friends with Brad Hicks, since we are not the same age, gender, etc.
The short answer:
Dude, I’m a fan. A convention-goer. I am a sci-fi geek. If you are any of these things than you probably know that age, gender, generation, race, religion, etc does not divide fans. You can even have what the rest of the world would call poor social skills and still find friends in Fandom. I met him and got to know him at local conventions. Once, at Conflation, I had to show him my ID to prove that I was under age. (At 18 years old I was an invited guest (not to be confused with a Guest or Guest of Honor) of Conflation, so I had a legal badge. I just wasn’t able to drink.) We found things in common and stuff to learn from each other.
What more do you need to know?
The Long Answer:
Yeah, I know. You want more. I would, too, so here’s my LJ equivalent of one of my interpretive dances:
As I stated above, I met Brad at the local cons. I was in my late teens before I had much of a chance to talk to him. I made a lot of friends at conventions. Everyone wanted to talk to me, so it wasn’t that hard. (Let’s be fair: at the time I was wearing about a size 9, only because of my incredible rack, had long red curly hair, wore fabulous costumes and glasses, and talked nonstop about my favorite books. I was a chick-gamer, too, and friendly to most people. In the real world I was known to stop traffic from time to time. At conventions I was a GOD.)
Brad was a kind of God himself. He had been at it for so long that he was probably thought of as one of the first people to go to cons. He’s far from inconspicuous, at 6’ tall and about 270-300 lbs. At the time, he was sporting what Allura refers to as the Bald Guy Mullet: Hair past his shoulders and a receding hairline. He also wore a full beard in a great burnished gold color. He spoke well; he dressed well, and loved fun.
It is true that some people were put off by him, even then. He’s loud. He’s opinionated. He’s well educated and some people take this trio of traits to mean that he’s a know-it-all. None of the above is necessarily a negative trait to me. Remember, my father is Mr. Scary. My beloved Grandmother Nonnie (may she rest in peace) was a woman with ideas, opinions and stories, just try to stop her if you’ve heard it before. My mother talks a mile a minute and unless you have a good verbal crowbar, you aren’t getting in a word edgewise when she gets going. “Scary” people don’t scare me at all. Scary? You don’t know from SCARY. I wear Scary for underwear.
I will admit, sometimes the label “Scary” intrigues me and I find that I want to get to know that person and find out what the fuss is about.
And I rarely find someone scarier than me. On the occasions when I do, it is even rarer when I find someone scarier than my own parents, and I love my parents.
In fact, the only people who really scare me are the ones who are a danger to others due to their untreated mental illness. (The Red Scare springs to mind.)
But I digress.
I sort of knew Brad, and heard about his parties from someone or other. It may have been my mom, come to think of it…
It was during the period of The Red Scare that I went to my first Brad Party. Here’s a silly aside: I got my directions over the phone from Sevenstar while I was at TheSigOther’s house. But he wasn’t my SO at the time, he was too busy being married and a father and domestic and tranquil and stuff. But even back then I liked him and wanted to spend time in his presence. Interesting, eh?
That would put this in 1995.
I started coming to the Brad Parties. And here’s the deal: I went to the parties and (gasp!) socialized with the host (when I could.) As with many things, if I participate in something that I think is really neat, I immediately want to be involved on a deeper level. I wanted to not only attend the parties; I wanted to contribute to them, be part of the magic.
As a result, I started hanging out at Brad’s house a lot. He and I had some reasonably similar attitudes about hospitality, so it was cool to stop by and hang out for a couple of hours unannounced and without a call in advance. Since I was living at home and commuting to the house of my (then) SO and Brad’s was somewhere in between, I found that it was a comfortable place to make another home. Plus there were always great people there, living, visiting, stopping by, etc.
Was I romantically attracted to Brad? Well. Not particularly. I didn’t find him unattractive either. I was just mostly really busy with what was already on my plate. Besides, it took a while to work out what his personal entanglements were, too. It seemed that his female roommate might also be a kind of SO or maybe they were “friends with benefits” or something. Turns out that they had attempted something like that and then she decided that she liked someone else instead. She always seemed vaguely uncomfortable about her relationship with Brad. Not that she didn’t like him, but the circumstances were the kind of thing that drives her crazy. She doesn’t like to feel indebtedness, and is hypersensitive about who she owes what. But this isn’t about my friendship with Sevenstar.
So hanging out at the Brad Parties and hanging out with friends at Brad’s House turned into Hanging Out With Brad, or vice-versa. He did have a hot tub, and a wicked cool computer and stuff, but I mostly went there for the atmosphere and the conversation. He loaned me books, we talked about ideas. We cuddled on the couch. We invented art together. He had crazy ideas; I helped them come to life. I had crazy ideas, too, and he helped me along with those, too.
Then there were the games. Brad hosted a lot of games, mostly White Wolf stuff, but other games got played. I participated in the long running Changeling game that survived the demolition of the Brad Davidian Compound, and I guest starred or was a spectator for the various Mage or Shapeshifter-based games going on over there.
Circumstances shifted, I moved a couple of times, and was back at Mom’s. Needed to get out on my own, couldn’t afford to do it alone.
Brad’s roommate moved out, and he suddenly needed someone to help with the rent. I moved in during the “waiting for the house to sell” period, and was his only rent-paying roommate. I was also his messiest and most annoying roommate, just ask him. I lived under his roof for 10 months. For stories, see The Leopard Pit from previous posts. (Yes, I am too lazy to link.)
Then Brad went on the Shaman’s Path and few of us got to see him. He pretty much wanted to kiss St. Louis goodbye and a lot of people were pretty pissed off at him when he left.
But not me. I was only annoyed that other people seemed to want to fight with him through me. Once I figured out what was going on, I fired the Stop That! Cannon and I didn’t have to deal with it any more.
And I stayed in touch with Brad via Email. We visited a few Lothlorien events simultaneously.
When he crashed and burned, and crawled back to the STL after living in KY for a while, I was one of the people who supported him. Ok, I didn’t have anywhere for him to sleep, but I helped him find an apartment and move into it. (All by myself, too.)
Brad is family. Despite recent… stuff… if he showed up on my doorstep needing help at 3 in the morning, I would let him in. (If someone turns him into a vampire I am royally screwed.)
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no subject
Date: 2004-11-23 09:35 am (UTC)Clarification: I never intended to "put St. Louis behind me." You'll notice that I returned for some pretty unprofitable events. What I wanted ... and until the Libertalia disintegrated around me, had ... was to be everywhere else that the fannish-type people were hanging out in any given year, too. I never wanted to be out of St. Louis for good. I wanted to be out of Mundenmark for good.
Gee, nobody ever mentioned to me that they thought I was snubbing St. Louis. Christ, that explains a lot. If I thought that, I would have been annoyed at me, too. They thought the author of the original Low BS Guide to St. Louis was anti-STL? I love this town! Do people pay no attention at all?
Snubbing the STL
Date: 2004-11-23 06:13 pm (UTC)You had been ranting about hating this town (or at least being fed up with it) for the whole period between when the house sold and your left in the RV. Now, I understood that you were sort of psyching yourself up for the "road" lifestyle, and that you didn't hate St. Louis, but I remember your horror at having to move back here. You wanted to stay somewhere else, that's why you tried to have a go in KY. You set up your permanent mailing address in another STATE. Yeah, you came to local fannish events, but made it clear that STL was *not* the place for you to be.
I was delighted when you moved back here. You were horrified and depressed that you would have to live here again.
You've come around since then, but you really did go through a "HATE STL" period, dear.
Underwear
Date: 2004-11-23 10:35 pm (UTC)Ummm . . . come to think of it, I've worn your underwear. Talk about walking a mile in someone else's shoes . . .
Re: Underwear
Date: 2004-11-24 06:09 am (UTC)At any rate, I was pointing out that what most people qualify as "scary" is no more scary to me than my own underwear. Which is pathetically normal, when it isn't pixie panties.
Re: Underwear
Date: 2004-11-25 01:36 am (UTC)Entering into the Bradlands
Date: 2004-11-23 10:44 pm (UTC)