Frequently Asked Questions

What's with all the Gargoyle references?

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, I was a lowly frosh at the prestigious California Institute of Technology. After a grueling week of a torture called "Rotation" in which poor frosh are forced to mingle and meet hundreds of random upperclassmen (most of whom they will never speak to again...), I was selected into that glorious Hovse known as Fleming. Early in my time there, the newly formed Fleming-frosh had a "confrontation" with a certain member of the sophomore class... THE TASKMASTER!

Over the course of this confrontation, I was called upon to display courage in the face of unreasoning animosity. Having spent the last month and a half struggling to conform to the latest military standard, I stepped up to the plate with my best military pose, and faced down that powerful force of nature...

Of course, some silly senior was snapping pictures like crazy, and in the heat of the moment, I didn't realize that my image had been captured on film... Several weeks go by, and that self-same silly senior has finally developed the roll of film, and is sharing the remembered experience with a slightly inebriated junior who shall be known only as "Di" (the names have been changed to protect the innocent... yeah right!). So Di is flipping through these pictures, and being in her slightly inebriated state, stops on the picture of me in my militaresque pose. She immediately applied the caption, "He's a GARGOYLE! But he's a babe..." And the rest is history

What exactly is a Drunken Ewok?

In another wonderful story from my glorious freshman year in Fleming, I obtained what will undoubtedly be my monikor for the rest of the conceivable future. It all started with a simple game called Subspace...

Being a good little frosh, I didn't get sucked into Subspace when it first started its craze, but after watching many of my friends while away their scant free time at this strangely addictive game, I decided to give it a go. For those of you who have no experience with Subspace, it can be described as a large multi-player space fighter simulation, somewhat akin to the Atari classic, Asteroids! (and for those of you too young to remember Asteroids!, I don't need any emails telling me how ancient and decrepit I am...)

When you first play Subspace, you are asked for a call-sign. Being an avid fan of Top Gun, and other super-cool fighter jock movies, I resolved to pick the coolest call-sign I could. I don't recall the specifics, but suffice it to say, the name was cool at the time, and I delved into the game. Unfortunately, to my utter dismay, my Subspace skills were pitifully lacking. I died far more often than I killed, and I simply couldn't get the hang of how to get better...

Now, to fully understand my depravity, I have to explain some of the scoring methods in Subspace. When you are first "born" you have a pitifully poor ship, with puny guns, no missiles, and dismal maneuverability and speed. You gain a more powerful ship by "greening," or picking up little green boxes on screen that improve your ship. The number of little green boxes you pick up is counted as your "bounty," or the score that is earned by the player who ultimately kills you. Many of the greatest Subspace players were ranked on various statistics, the most highly esteemed being "Average Kill," which is an average of the bounty scored for all the kills they make. Any score over 100 is respectable, and scores over 400-500 were superior.

Now enter me, a frustrated player who can't seem to "get good." On a whim, I create an alter-ego by the name of Drunken Ewok, and enter the world of Subspace. (For those of you who have been in a coma since 1977, an ewok is a sickenly cute teddy-bear-like creature from the movie Return of the Jedi) Instead of trying to make myself more powerful and going to kill people, I chose to keep my ship at zero bounty, by never picking up a "green." I would then throw myself like a lemming in the path of a powerful super-player, in an effort to degrade their esteemed "Average Kill." Oh how those super-players flamed and screamed at me, and I drank it in like sweet sunshine. I had found my niche!

Now, Drunken Ewok affords me the ability to enter new games and learn the skills necessary to be a good player, because I am not expected to be good at the outset. If I do miserably, eh, what do you expect from a Drunken Ewok?

What does IACCOFH stand for?
Or, my life in Fleming Hovse...

Coming soon

What are you gonna do with your life?
Or, things I want to do before I die...

Jorge Avelar's "Cookie" Story

Jorge, Caroline Gibbs and I are all on the Fleming Hovse Waiting staff, and we're all pretty good friends. Every Tuesday night is Ice Cream Night, where we get gourmet (yeah right) ice cream and fresh, warm, gooey chocolate-chip cookies. (yum)

So one Tuesday night, Jorge and I are waiting, and Caroline has the night off, so she's sitting down. Caroline's table mysteriously runs low on cookies (let's just say that they're popular...) so Caroline asks Jorge to bring some more cookies, a simple request.

But Jorge, the audacious flirt combined with lazy bum, doesn't really want to walk all the way to the kitchen to fetch a couple cookies. Instead, he utters a now immortal line:

I'm a cookie! You can eat me!