Letters from adoring fans. Edited for brevity. My witty responses. Prolonged for your annoyance. Name that author. Another way to kill five minutes.
This page features letters and e-mail received by me, the Grand Poohbah of Davison Lodge. To assure the instantly concerned, all writers (excepting yours truly) are anonymous unless prior permission for use of their name has been granted.
- “Ya know, DS had a very good idea. I am going to set up your page as my default home, too. Only took about 5 minutes to figure out how to do that. I rarely read anything off the Sprint home page and usually just click to check yours so why not start off with it? Sprint has a button on the Netscape bar so if I want it’s just click away.”—D.V., 6/16/97
You’re exactly right. In fact, there are even programs availble to customize Navigator’s buttons, too. But home page is where the heart is, and I couldn’t be more gratified to see this Davison-web-site-as-homepage idea take flight. I think those who are willing to make this sacrifice deserve at least some degree of recognition. Hence, The Royal Court. [UPDATE: The Royal Court has been discontinued. Too few Knights.]
- “I actually put your homepage down as the ‘home’ page for Netscape to log onto when I start the program. Figured since I check it all the time, and there are not many other pages I mark every day, I’ll put it down. It’s also easier to read that than ask you all the time how things are going. I’m sure it’s also easier for you to update that page than to answer every person you correspond with how you’re doing with the physical therapy.”—D.S., 6/14/97
I’m terribly flattered, even if you have grossly over-estimated the number of people who pay any attention to me, let alone my web site. With all the whining I’ve done about physical therapy and my back in general, it’s a wonder anybody visits at all. But they do, and since a friend in need is a friend indeed, let’s all win this one for the Gipper, and put down the Davison web site as our Internet homepage.
- “Holy Cow, Backman! How’s the back? Just got home and checked out your site and the chin hit the floor. Have you had the MRI yet? Hope you’re not too claustrophobic; although, they will give you a Valium or two to relax ya.”—D.V., 3/19/97
Good Lord, man, they’re gonna need an elephant gun with tranquilizer darts. The prospect of surgery has me utterly terrified. Of course if I can just keep my mind on other things maybe I can make it through the MRI tunnel okay. Who knows, maybe it’ll be good news. And maybe Charlie Brown will kick that football someday, too.
- “Your web page is the best! The fact that you are brave enough to bare your soul with such wit and elegance is truly the ultimate artistic endeavor.”—G.R., 2/22/97
Now, see—and I’m not disputing you here—I always thought that my ultimate artistic endeavor would involve more nudity and more money. Outside of a couple risque jokes, there’s really been no nudity whatsoever. And outside of, well, outside of nothing—nobody’s paid me a dime. So I guess I kinda expected (hoped, dreamed) that my “ultimate artistic endeavor” (I’m using that in the press release; I hope you don’t mind) would garner me a little more fame and fortune. Like, say, any. So folks, the name on that check should be “Ty Davison.” Give ’til it hurts, because I’ll be waiting here in the nude until the money arrives.
- “Loved it! I read everything. I especially liked your “review” of AOL. Boy am I glad I did not ever jump on that bandwagon!”—J.K., 2/19/97
No kidding. I’ve received about 25 disks and 7 CD-ROMs from AOL without ever asking. Man, what a waste of plastic. Those could’ve been credit cards or something. But I’d be lying to you if I told you that I hadn’t ever considered using AOL. Somewhere around the 16th free disk my willpower started to buckle, and I began thinking, “What can it hurt? It’s free for the first 15 hours!” Talk about insidious. Of course at that point I didn’t know that they censor everything, that their web browser was lame and that they’d soon be the nation’s number one reseller of busy signals. Fortunately, in a move I can only put down to self-preservation, my Mac wouldn’t recognize the disk and instantly spat it out. God, these computers are amazing.
- “I had a chance to look at your homepage. I thought it was great. Of course, the last time I saw it was the day you sent a notice to everyone that it was up and runnning.”—J.K., 2/19/97
Okay, see, now that’s a common problem. I update this worthless bunch of cyber-trash frequently, and if nobody returns, well, then I’m just sitting here laughing at my own jokes. Lord that paints a pitiable image. Come on, help me out here. Check back at least a couple times a month.
- “I just found your web page…Sorry about your back. Did you raise the attendance at the basketball games?”—E.L., 2/13/97
You’d think, wouldn’t you? Unfortunately, that particular News section passage was more grounded in fiction than reality, though I have no doubt that if it were the other way around attendence would sky-rocket.
- “I finally saw [your web site]! Looking over D.’s shoulder…I really liked the reviews; ROTFL, both of us. You do have a dry wit!” —G.M., 2/12/97
Thanks! I’ll try to remember to water it more often.
- “Loved your web site and in particular the article about Medical Mary Jane. Tremendously well thought and written…”—E.D., 2/8/97
Yeah, originally I had some concern about doing a relatively pro-legalization editorial on medical marijuana. After all, I’m not some latter-day Timothy Leary trying to push the youth of America into recreational drugs. That’d mean there’d be less for me.
- “Enjoyed your web page last night. Especially liked the Political and Theological sections. Will you be able to ramble a little about Original Sin…[I don’t] believe in it…want to argue. Your political ramblingings reminded me a great deal of H L Mencken and I loved it.”—E.D., 2/1/97
I’m sort of an H.L. Mencken-lite. Same great wit, no anti-semetic tendancies. Glad you enjoyed the web site. Hate to burst your bubble on Original Sin, but I don’t believe in it either. Perhaps we can argue about something else? Windows 95? America On-Line? Bill Clinton as the next Wilt Chamberlain?
- “Enjoyed the web page…By the way, where’s the photo of Erin? I’d guess that she didn’t want to be on the page.”—D.S., 1/29/97
Would you want to be associated with a web site like this? Yes?!? Hmm…well, Erin’s currently far too busy to be able to spend any time providing content for the site. There is talk of putting up an “Erin” subsection come summer, but the lawyers are still negotiating the details.
- “Ya kook, you should’ve made this site sooner. You have a special writing style that always makes me laugh out loud.”—G.R., 1/28/97
Thanks, same here. It’s amazing I ever get any work done. Laugh, laugh, laugh—it’s all I do when I’m writing this stuff. Some of it’s actually funny, too.
And you’re right, I really should have made this site sooner. Fear of the unknown is a terrible thing, and I think it caused me to delay putting this site up for quite a while. But we can’t worry about what others think of our artistic endeavors, can we?
Okay, well, maybe a little.