Here you are, three posts in as many days. I must have made some sort of minor impact around here 'cuz I was barely back more than a day when I was taged with the latest webernet trend. To be honest, I'm not much more of a fan of these chain games than Chilidragon seems to be, but I guess I have to pay my dues for my prolonged absence. And so, whithout further ado; Five Things You May Not Have Known About Fade2gray...
1)I can write in one of Tolkien's runic alphabets.
It's no secret to those around me that I've been a big Tolkien fan since I was in middle school, so I wasn't surprised when in my freshman year of college someone gave me a really nice high end collector's edition of The Hobbit for Christmas. A few days latter I was perusing it when I stumbled onto Tolkien's note to his readers at the beginning of the book. The letter discussed his runic alphabet and translated just enogh of it to get the ball rolling. The rest he left up to his readers to figure out by translating the writing found throughout the rest of the book. I eagerly flew through the book and had the entire alphabet translated in under a hour. Not only that, but the entire thing was almost instantly engraved into my perminant memory. Don't believe me? See if you can read this
2)I have seen every episode of Star Trek ever aired.
As Further proof that I am indeed a geek I offer up this nugget. My dad is a huge treck fan and owns every eppisode of ever series on DVD. For reasons still unclear to myself one day I asked to borrow a season, and I was hooked. The rest is pretty much history. I watched every signle DVD and then found myself whining at the end of it all about how unjust it was that Trek was off the air. I've never been to a convention, worn a uniform that I or a friend made for me, or discussed the finer points of any of the infamous Trek debates on a discussion board, but I suppose I'm still a Trekie by default now.
3)I was once run over by my own mother.
I don't know, does this make me sound like even more of a geek? Back when I must have been no older than 12 I was hanging out in the parking lot of the local elementary school. I don't know why or who I was with (though I suspect that Graphicartist21 was probably with me) but whatever we were doing got cut short when my mom showed up in her old white Ford Taurus station wagon. She told us all to get in... and most of us did. You see, I had only just open the door and steped towards the car when my mom started to drive away without me. Before I knew what was going on the back tire of the car ended up running over my foot. I was fine but my mom flew into a panic before scolding me for not getting in quicker. OK, so that was a rather anti-climactic story.
4)I've totaled a car.
A few years ago I was just starting on bachelor's at a new universit, but the drive was putting a pinch on my folks' wallet. I was still driving my parents' old Cheve Suburban gas guzler at the time and it quickly became apparent that it was going to bankrupt us in a week if I kept commuting in it. My parents decided to kill two birds with one stone by buying me an inexpensive used economy car (a toyota corolla if you wanted to know) for my birthday. A few weeks later and I was commuting home in the first huge downpore of the year. If you know anything about SoCal drivers then you know we HATE rain. People were zooming all around me on the freeway whipping up a thick soupy fog of mist and it was all I could do to keep up. I still don't remember entirely what happened next, but I do remember a wall of red lights coming at me out of the fog and feeling a complete loss of control of my vehicle. When I woke up my air bag had been deployed, my chest and hips aeched where the seatbelt was, and there was a horible ringing in my ears. I eventualy realized that my car was still running so I pulled it over to the large center medium and got out. I had rear ended a man who had himself only just avoided rearending another driver. The two of us exchanged info while we watched other drivers swearving (sometimes unsuccessfully) to avoid accidents themselves in the same spot. Eventually a fullsized van came cureaning down the freway bouncing off of cars like a pinball and didn't stop untill after it smashed into the backend of my car. If my car had been salvagable after the first accident, it clearly wasn't anymore.
5)I'm British... sort of.
I like to say that I'm 100% home grown American, but that isn't entirely acurate. Both of my folks were in the US Airforce when they married. A short while later they were stationed over seas in England. Remember that these where the days near the end of the Cold War when both sides were actively involved in a massive military buildup. A lot of that build up involved having a large and active Airforce presence in Engaland and Germany, and so that was where my folk's went. Not long after ariving my mom was pregnant with me. She stayed there with my dad a gave birth to me in '84. Because of that I have dual citizenship; I'm both a US citizen and a British subject. My dad ended up hurting his back a little over a year later so he was sent home with my mom and I. I haven't been back since, though we are planning a family vacationto England the summer after next. I guess all I have left to say is God save the Queen ya'll!
There you have it. Five juicy and bloated hidden trueths about the man that is Fade 2Gray. Have I paid my dues now?
One last thing; Arcadius and Graphicartist21, your numbers are up!
-Fade2gray