POST Control: rmgroup alt.slack Newsgroups: alt.slack Path: alembic.acs.com!entropy From: mjd@gradient.cis.upenn.edu (Mark-Jason Dominus) Subject: FIFTH ANNUAL MIGHTY MARCHDAY ALT.SLACK RMGROUP X-Motto: Violence and Stupidity X-Subliminal-Catchphrase-1: ``Tohu Vavohu'' X-Subliminal-Catchphrase-2: ``Lysergic Lemonade'' X-Subliminal-Catchphrase-3: ``Growling Fungus'' Message-ID: Sender: news@mintaka.lcs.mit.edu Organization: Noble and Enlightened Seekers After Truth Inc. By the Holy Claws of Klortho the Magnificent, this IS a Fine Anniversary! Welcome to the First day of March, also known as MARCHDAY. As before, I celebrate MARCHDAY by issuing an rmgroup message for alt.slack. Welcome Bobbies! Welcome Discordians! Welcome Gnostics! Welcome everyone! ESPECIALLY, welcome News Admins! Welcome to the FIFTH ANNUAL MIGHTY MARCHDAY ALT.SLACK RMGROUP Five years! Imagine it. On 1 March 1990, I grew disgusted with alt.slack. I was reading it at Columbia University, and the alt.slack people were in the middle of a big noisy argument about which of them had the most slack. In a spastic fit of disgust, I launched the First Annual Mighty Marchday alt.slack rmgroup. But. BUT BUT BUT! Disgust no longer. Today is the start of alt.slack's fifth year of entertaining me mightily. FIVE YEARS? YOU GOTTA BE KIDDING. Who could have thought that the tradition would still be going strong after four years? Consider: * On 1 March, 1990, Edgar Garagiola, a Wyoming chicken farmer discovered that a mongoose egg, which had lain under his porch unnoticed for a year and a half, had hatched and let loose a fourteen-headed chicken. * On 1 March, 1990, Betsy Pilaster, a housewife in Tunguska, Iowa, was serving whortleberry Jell-O to her family, when suddenly the confection burst into flame. It was consumed in seconds, leaving only a lump of charcoal that resembled the lumbar vertebrae of Dick York. * On 1 March, 1990, Bob Carlin, a New York executive, got in a taxicab with the license plate GEN-11, and was devoured by giant centipedes which had been put there by Branch Davidians as part of an attempt to assassinate Bess Meyerson. His remains were rushed to Bellevue Hospital, where he brain remains alive in a vat. * On 1 March, 1990, Harry Gearse, noted guru, Grand Vizopteryx, and official Avatar of Cheese for the greater Hartford Area, dies of a heart attack while brushing his teeth. WHY RMGROUP ALT.SLACK? Take your pick: () No reason at all. () This time of year, in this part of the world, is the SPRING. (My Apologies to those not in the North Temperate Zone.) SPRING is a tradition time of change and rebirth. Time to clear away all the old dead stuff that was hiding under the snow all winter, and plant new flowers and all that jazz. Just like alt.slack! I'm doing the clearing-off. alt.slackers will arrange for the replanting, just as in the past. () Most practical jokes are just stupid, like putting salt in the sugar bowl or nailing someone's shoes to the floor. But the best practical jokes hit someone right in the chink in their flawed armor and go straight to the heart, leaving the victim changed fundamentally. Consider: The master Gutei made a practice of raising his finger whenever he was asked a question about Zen. A very young disciple began to imitate him, and every time Gutei raised his finger when he preached, this boy would raise his finger too. Everybody laughed. One day Gutei caught him at it. He took the boy's hand, whipped out a knife, cut off the finger and threw it away. The boy walked off howling. "Stop!" shouted Gutei. The boy stopped, and looked at the master through his tears. Gutei raised his finger. The boy raised his finger. Then suddenly he realized it wasn't there. He hesitated a moment. Then he bowed. They never tell you what those Zen masters were masters OF, do they? Gutei was a master of the practical joke. I've just cut off your alt.slack. Now what are you going to do about *that*? () Life is infinitely delightful in its bountiful multiplicity of unpredictable detail. This control message is part of that delightful bounty of unexpected details. WHY NOT RMGROUP ALT.SLACK? You're asking the wrong guy. IF YOU'RE MAD Follow this procedure: 1. Go to bathroom. 2. Still mad? If so, proceed to step 3. Otherwise, halt and succeed. 3. Feel like complaining to someone? If so, proceed to step 4. Otherwise, skip to step 6. 4. I invite cheerful comments and angry comments. Here's a sampling of the comments I received last year: ``What better way to prove that we are the collective "Bob" than to kill us all via rmgroup alt.slack. Talk about wheels within wheels...'' ``I suppose your right. If I had a choice, I'd probably forgo the alt groups. But, my users like them, so they have to stay.'' ``you should, for the next year, rmgroup alt.slack EVERY day until march 1.'' ``You are seriously silly.'' ``Mr. Dominus, it is my unfortunate duty to inform you that an account holder on your system, one Mark-Jason Dominus, is intentional attepting to cause wide spread havok within the Usenet society by the unrestricted and inappropriate use of controll messages... I am writing you to respectfully request that you revoke Mr. Dominus's internet access.'' There were some irritated comments, be we worked out our differences. The Third Annual rmgroup draw hardly any comments. Send me some silly comments for next year! If you want to send me mail about it, halt and succeed. Otherwise, proceed to step 5. 5. Well, you have a gripe and for some reason you don't feel like taking it up with the real source of your problem, namely yourself, or even with me. If you're going to write to my system administrator, jump to step 7. If you're going to write to my news administrator, jump to step 8. If you're going to write to Dave Mack, jump to step 9. If you're going to write to Bill Clinton, jump to step 10. If you're going to write to Dr. Stang, jump to step 11. 6. Aha! You don't want to complain, and yet you're genuinely angry! At *me*. YOU are that rare, rare prime candidate for POSITIVE ACTION. Here's some suggestions: () Send out a newgroup message for alt.slack () Post a ranting rebuttal () Print a zine () Dance an interpretive dance () All of the above () None of the above After you finish, terminate this algorithm successfully. If you're angry, you don't want to complain, and you don't want to do something constructive, please jump to step 11. 7. Surprise! *I* am my system administrator. Jump to step 4. 8. Don't do that. After the Second Annual rmgroup, someone wrote to him to complain. He was very upset, because there was absolutely nothing he could do. He has only met me twice. He can't cut off my news access. He can't complain to my sysadmin. He has better things to do with his time than answer disgruntled mail. I had to take pains to disguise the source of my rmgroup message in 1994 because of that one pink boy in 1991. What a waste of time! If you somehow track down my news admin and complain to him, terminate this algorithm unsuccessfully. Otherwise, jump to step 6. 9. Dude! I've never even MET Dave Mack. But sure, complain to him; I'm sure he'll get a hoot out of it. Halt this algorithm and signal success or failure depending on what Dave tells you to do. 10. You have my blessing, as long as you promise to share the reply with me. The algorithm terminates successfully. 11. Guy! Don't take it so seriously. It's JUST A JOKE! Halt. Successfully. (I better say successfully, or you're like to consume yourself with bile.) 12. If you write to Stang to tell him you're pissed off, you know what he'll say? No? I can save you some time. Play the official PISSED OFF AT MARCHDAY GUESSING GAME and try to attribute this passage: I hope this does piss you off, you DUMBASS ZEALOTS! Hell, go ahead, bring on those psychic curses! Beg your god to destroy me! I fear none of your pitiful witch-doctor hexes, based as they are on patently absurd superstitions, for the power of the almighty "BOB" gives me Dominion over you. Begone, unclean spirit! You have one guess. What, you gave up already? Terminate unsuccessfully, and KILL YOURSELF. I haven't got the time. BYE BYE See you next year at this time. Mark-Jason Dominus Grand Vizopteryx, Discordian Society entropy@alembic.acs.com (Dick Feynman Epopterie) . QUIT