I must be doing something right, for I am already in Geek Heaven. Not only have I met the co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons, but today I got an e-mail from Dr. Demento! Oh…my…gawd…. (If you wind up reading the rest of this with a teenage girl’s voice stuck in your head…”what-EVerrr”…I do apologize.)
Since I am a practising geek, I sometimes have to undertake out-of-the-blue, insane projects with self-imposed deadlines to maintain my standing in society. So, one Sunday afternoon I decided to set up a spreadsheet and key in all 800+ entries to Dr. Demento’s annual Funny 25. I assigned each entry points based on its standing (25 for first, 24 for second, etc.). From that, I produced a Top 100 (or so) Demented Hits. I posted this list on the web site this weekend and as an afterthought sent Dr. Demento a note about it.
He wrote back! What’s more, he asked me questions about how I came up with the rankings. I may have even caused him to stop proclaiming “Fish Heads” as the Number 1 most requested song. Oh…my…gawd…
Now, I’m not usually a fanboy (I’m a bit old to be any kind of boy). But, people, this is DOCTOR DEMENTO!! This is the guy who taught me about lumberjacks and spam and albatrosses…about fish heads and dead puppies…double entendre…Irving and Kinko and Marvin…and sheer stupidity. He introduced me to Weird Al and Tom Lehrer and Napoleon XIV. Some of my favorite high school memories are of listening to the show on Sunday night, then spending Monday discussing the Funny Five with my friends. “Deteriorata” was on my English teacher’s wall next to “Desiderata”. I can still sing every word of “Existential Blues”.
A while back, I went looking for an Internet broadcast of the show, so I could let my kids in on this bit of insanity. The first station I found was WKIT in Bangor, Maine (my old hometown)! And in an even further twisted bit of history repeating itself, the kids like to listen to it on late Sunday night…so they can spend Monday discussing it with their friends.
Oh…my…gawd…