Chris Pikula covered in Ash (a 9/11/01 Story)

[Rakavolver]

As I prepare to leave card gaming for good (unwillingly, but I have too many personal responsibilities), I reflect on all the many good times this game gave me, including all the fine people I've met.

This story is about an IRC conversation between 2 of Magic's good guys: Chris Pikula of NYC and Oscar Tan (Rakso) of the Philippines that went down soon after the World Trade Centers were hit on September 11, 2001 by a bunch of religious wackos ... this story haunts me to this very day, and probably for the rest of my life:

*** Sleepula has joined #mtgwacky
*** cathyBRB is now known as cathy_n
<Sleepula> HOLY F***ING SH*T
*** Sleepula is now known as Pikula
<Rakso> Was that Pikula?
<Rakso> Oh there
<Rakso> He's alive.
<WakkoCAPS> PIKULA!
<cbrangel> Cathy: no flights in or out for 48 hours but unless they were IN the WTC building they should be 100% ok
<Pikula> that was insane
<Rakso> What happened to you?
<Rakso> Where were you?
<Pikula> Dave is fine, he is in brooklyn
<Pikula> I was about 1.5 blocks away
<cathy_n> cbrangel: Yeah, they were in their hotel at the time, I believe. It was far too early for Victor to be awake, anyway
<Pikula> my building shook and it was black as night
<Pikula> totally crazy
<Rakso> 1.5 BLOCKS AWAY???
<WakkoCAPS> pikula:At work?
<Booch> Pikula: HOLY SH*T!
<Pikula> i was standing outside like 5 minutes before the first tower totally collapsed
<Pikula> like a jackass
<Rakso> Did you see it?
<Pikula> i'm covered with ash!
<Rakso> Really???
<Booch> hehehe, all of a sudden it occured to you to run?
<WakkoCAPS> Pikula:But you're ok?
<Rakso> You're covered with ash
<Dave_Conn> dude thats scary sh*t
<joelf> omg
<cbrangel> Chris: any idea if the Financial Center building is OK?
<Rakso> And your first impulse is to log onto mIRC???
<Booch> Rakso: His friends are here, and it's a good way to get the word out.
<Pikula> i seriously missed chance of greatest picture of all time
<Dave_Conn> btw : get off irc and go shower, good way of ash removal
<Pikula> and looked back at Trinity Church
<Pikula> and there was a firestorm behind it
<Pikula> it was like the end of the world

[mike lopez]

That is a very sad story indeed.

Are you leaving us or just quitting your game? We can sure use your insight in the Music Forum.

[Rakavolver]

I will play Magic once a year, at the first flight of the sealed deck pre-release in September. Otherwise I'm finished buying product until the economy improves and/or my teenage daughters stop buying clothes/leave home.

I've bought enough product, and 4 sets per year (other than the standard 3 previously) isn't exactly enticing me to return. Shame too, because the stuff R&D has come out with the last few years has never been better. Oh, well.

Yup, I'll stay here, for the music and Magic as well, but only as a fanboy. I'm an addict to these exciting ever changin' games, plus the humor, as so:

"Anyone who doesn't pump the fist at his opponent's mulligan is inherently dishonest"
... Chris Pikula in the 90's

Priceless.

What's "sad", Mike? That 9/11 went down? And Madrid? And Bali? And London? And Mumbai? And we haven't caught the jerks yet?

Or Pikula standing outside for FIVE MINUTES ! ? !

I worry about Chris. Click here to see why.

Another sadness: Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Tomorrow is one of those yearly "anniversaries" of the Hiroshima A-Bomb dropping, which by the way ended the largest war in History, and hopefully will forever be so.

The hankies will come out, and jerk Osama bin Ladan and his Doctor #2 scumbag guy who never heard of the Hippocratic Oath of course use Hiroshima to hate on The West particularly America, which goes to show you what an uninformed idiot the two jerkwad brainwashing psychopaths are.

Here's what I put "on the Stack" when Hiroshima is mentioned:

- Dec 7, 1941, and not just at Pearl Harbor
- The Rape of Nanking
- The Baatan March
- Saipan
- Guadalcanal
- Okinawa
- Iwo Jima
- The fact that the German Army was taught to NOT shoot at the enemy's Medics (the guys with the red crosses on their helmets), while the Japanese Army was taught to take the Medics out FIRST !

So, expect no sympathy tomorrow or on the 9th.

But look how far we've come! The wife and I are off tonight to buy a Honda taking advantage of the "Cash for Clunkers" program. So all is forgiven. Just leave the hankies at home.

[mike lopez]

What kind of Honda and what kind of clunker? Too bad I just bought my Van last year and just paid off my Charger. I would have loved to have taken advantage of the clunkers thing.

Glad to see your staying. I am hoping you'll post more cool tunes and educate the rest of us in the Music forum.

As for us not catching the men who terrorize the world, what do you expect from a Country who puts all it's efforts in trying to police it. We are spread too thin and I am glad our Troops are coming home this month.

[Rakavolver]

CR-V, and '96 Grand Caravan

I'm glad the troops are coming home too. We rid the world of Hitler IV, aka Saddam Hussein, and do we get any gratitude? No. Shrug.

Give em a few months off, then send them off again to ... where? What country needs to be policed most? Hmm. Well, ExxonMobil would like to see it be Venezuela, but screw ExxonMobil. Note the rising rising price of gas lately? "Market forces," sure. ExxonMobil is the top entity on the planet. The age of Nations is over. It's all about American (cough) excuse me, "Global" corporations now.

I say we invade Sudan next. Don't celebrate, North Korea, Somalia, and Zimbabwe, your day is coming. First things first.

But it looks like we're going to ramp things up in Afghanistan, the unconquerable land. Lord, what a money pit. Has anyone here ever Google Earthed Afghanistan? Geographically, I can think of only three places on Earth more inhospitable: The Sahara, Antarctica, and the High Himalayas. I'm shocked that people live there at all. Shrug, you can't say we're not a resilient species.