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[edit] A Notice
On October 9, 2005, the Wiki user formerly known as notstrongorbad became AbdiViklas. I'd always kind of wished I had that name, since to the un-H*R-initiated it simply sounded like some foreign guy. Also it's better than my previous hurriedly-selected, defined-by-negation username. Though for the record, I'm still neither strong nor (relatively) bad. If you really want to see notstrongorbad's legacy, you can still see my contributions at Special:Contributions/notstrongorbad, right back to Sept. 2004.
- Origin of the name: If you're still wondering, it's a conflation of "Abdi LaRue" from some kinda robot and "Viklas" from little questions. The two appeared together in pom pom. Abdi, according to TBC, was one of "10 people who had ever e-mailed them"; in the DVD Commentary to flashback they imply that he e-mailed them "a lot."
[edit] The Life and Times of AbdiViklas
Pardon me while I figure out what I'm doing. You see, I'm looking at this giant, blank text input field, wondering how exactly a user page should be done and what should go in it. The general trend seems to involve talking about:
- your relationship to Homestar, i.e. faves and when you first started watching,
- your involvement in the wiki, and
- optionally, yourself in real life.
Rebel that I am, I intend to proceed in reverse order!! Take that, James Dean!
[edit] Behind the Handle: An Investigative Documentary
I know the simple data of a person's age and occupation don't define him or her--but they're a convenient place to start. I'm 28, and pretty much everything in my world rotates around the violin.
I went to the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY, for four years—which is a bundle of stories, let me tell you. A ca. 800-student school has its own unique trials and joys. I came out with some very close friends, some unfriends who were always a little too close, and a largely unnecessary understanding of hexachordal combinatoriality. I wouldn't trade it for the world.
After graduating in 2003, I taught violin lessons for awhile, got a master's degree in education, made the mistake of trying to use it to teach public school, and discovered that I was neither particularly good at nor happy teaching public school orchestra. I love one-on-one teaching, though, so I'm currently working on a doctorate in violin performance with the ultimate goal of teaching at a university—you know, with a salary! I'm very interested in Baroque performance in particular, and am working on a dissertation about Carlo Farina's Capriccio Stravagante, a 1627 piece in which string instruments "do impressions" of a bunch of other instruments, as well as cats meowing and dogs barking.
As a musician, I'm of course passionate about music. My tastes date from different periods of my life; only recently have I entered the quasi-hip, Pitchfork-informed neoindie aesthetic of the Postal Service and Sufjan Stevens; passions dating from high school include the chamber music of Brahms and Shostakovich and an abiding enthusiasm for world music and ethnomusicology; in college I picked up a perverse liking for the minimalism of Steve Reich, and for hardcore Baroque performance practice, "the last avant-garde." But for all that, I'm not above top-40, especially with the windows down.
While on the topic of interests that verge on obsessions: I am a hard, hard, hardcore fan of the fiction of G.K. Chesterton. (My guitar-playing brother and I even named ourselves Who Was Thursday after his best-known novel.) This has several perks: 1) I get to be wildly enthusiastic about something almost unheard of, and give myself a pat on the shoulder for "eclecticism," but 2) I don't have to suffer through something appropriately obscure to do so; it's FUN!! I tried the same trick in high school with William Blake, but couldn't sustain my interest. Chesterton--man, I can't think of a thing he's written that isn't fun!
My hrwiki activities dropped off substantially in 2007 with the long-delayed introduction of romance into a lonely geek's life; as much fun as Homestar is, he ain't got nothing on marriage. I thoroughly expect my wiki activity to drop even lower, possibly into negative numbers, this fall with the birth of my first child! You can bet his or her first word will be "Sewiously." Possibly "Holy crap."
[edit] Homestar Runner: A History of an Addiction
My first introduction to Homestar was in 2003, when I happened to look over my brother's shoulder as he worked his way up the Compy 386 menu (I believe the exact one that was playing was current status.) Realizing, of course, that this was serious, I intended to do it right, and went straight to First Time Here?, after which I proceeded to start with some kinda robot and work my way straight up.
[edit] HRWiki: Another History of Another Addiction
Finally, the moment of critical mass had arrived: I had seen everything on the site. Hoping to find something, anything, related, I Googled Homestar and found this wiki. My first response, of course, was, "Those emails had Easter eggs?!!!" which provided several more hours of entertainment.
Thus began an era of brief but intense involvement in HRWiki. Or more specifically in the forum; while I adored and depended on the professionalism and thoroughness of the Wiki proper, I didn't feel qualified to actually work on it myself. From September 15 to Halloween of 2004, though, I was on the forum pretty much when I wasn't sleeping or playing for a show. When I started looking for a computer during intermission of that show, I knew I needed help. Seriously, what with school pressures, it was time to cut back, and I simply went cold turkey. (This might explain my sig there still having the, at the time, current "Side effects may include wine, women, and song!")
I still used the Wiki every time a new 'toon came out, but the magic of watching those articles take shape right before one's eyes is too great to witness impassively, and the past few times I've gotten involved myself. I figure if I'm always leaving it to the people who know what they're doing, I'll never be one. Accordingly, I'm busy making well-meaning but frequently embarrassing edits that sometimes actually do a little good. Once I even reverted a troll!
I don't aspire to become one of the prolific, untiring users who, day by day, make the Wiki the excellent resource and remarkably civil place it is; I really oughtn't to be spending more than about a day per week here, but I do intend to step up my level of involvement; if I'm going to partake of the benefits of the Wiki, it's my civic duty to contribute to its upkeep as well. I must say I've been encouraged by the responses that met my first efforts: pros like It's dot com and Some HSR themed username gently corrected my blunders, and I was so warmly welcomed by so many users who insisted on a user page that... well, the epic you've just read was written.
Update 11/13/05: I finally have one of those "things I'm particularly proud of"! I was lucky enough to be on during round two of the NSMC incident; I made 87 reverts during that event, including 70 in 40 minutes. If you need me, I'll be recovering from repetitive motion injury!
[edit] The End.
