Poster #666 wants to know: What the hell have y'all done with this place? Are these curtains new? WHO'S THAT IN MY ROOM?

[Lorizael]

In 2018, it's the 10 year-olds who have the worst mouths.

[JohnT]

Hell, we had the worst mouths in 1978 as well.

[Giancarlo]

You should meet kidiot... He has taken over as forum clown. In the past decade, I have grown up.

[JohnT]

So, yeah, the phone book thing is kaput. Dead. An ex-parrot.

My father passed away in October, 2007 (and, holy ****, are there stories there:

1. When your obd't host had to beg the priest officiating the funeral not to quit because said priest considered my stepmother to be a heretic
2. When my Dad, in a morphine daze, accused my sister of trying to kill him, the last words he spoke to any of his kids. Where would he get this idea? From my stepmother, who thought my sister wasn't doing enough to get my 76yo father a lung transplant.
3. The lack of a headstone, still not resolved by 2013 (last time I was in Knoxville).
4. The will change.
5. How my stepmother insisted on burying my father on his daughter's birthday.)

... anyway, Dad passed away in October 2007, but the business recieved a mortal blow earlier that year when Apple released the iPhone. As y'all might remember, I didn't work well with my stepmother (I told y'all about the time I quit the family business, bought out a competitor, launched bids at my parents clients (winning some), and then was bought out... right?), but I stayed for a year, helping with the transition, more out of a sense of duty to the other employees (over 100 of them) than a need to help my stepmother.

So the economy was crashing, had crashed, by January 2009 when I threw out 5 resumes to various distribution companies... and 1 actually hit, ADS Direct Media in San Antonio. I was flown out for an interview, nailed it, got the job, and moved to San Antonio early February, with the family following in April (Sophia's spring break).

MDS (the family business) went under in 2012 because of mismanagement, market conditions, and mismanagement. My stepmother was congenitally incapable of running anything, was a terror to her employees, and spent money like a drunken sailor (she had a full-time staff person whose main job was to keep track of all her Craigslist purchases. Swear to God.) The collapse of the directory market didn't help, nor the refusal to branch out into any other services/offerings (I proposed back in 2006 that we turned the call center into a revenue generator, but that was shot down. Nowadays, I receive 2, 3 phone calls from the 865 area code with people trying to sell me ****. C'est la vie!)

I ran into Jan (stepmom) in 2011 @ the Knoxville airport. We didn't speak to each other, but she immediately got on her phone to call the office to see why I was there (or so I heard). That was the last time we saw each other and, to be frank, I haven't spoken to her since 2009.

No longer with ADS, no longer in the distribution industry. Now I sell insurance for AFLAC, am completely happy, and have a career which won't be taken over by a machine in the next 2 decades. But it wasn't easy!

[Broken_Erika]

You should meet kidiot... He has taken over as forum clown.........

[JohnT]

Holy ****balls, it's John mother****ing T!

Dinner is still Oerdin; he's just confused. I think when you left Mark and Dan still owned the site. It's gone through a couple ownership changes since then, and even had a schism. So it's more like you went back to your parents' house, found the keys didn't work, broke in, and surprised the hell out of a couple potheads squatting in a dilapidated, rat-infested dump.

But... since many here are the same, does that make my parents potheads?

[pchang]

Only if you are lucky

[The Mad Monk]

Hello! I moved to Kansas. Then I bought the farm. Then I worked at a rubber plant. Then I ran the rubber plant. Then I packed up the rubber plant and sent it to Michigan. I stayed in Kansas, on the farm. Goodbye!

[SlowwHand]

Good to see you again, John.

[ixnay]

Is this where all the old people post after randomly remembering this forum exists?

man I joined this place when I was a sophomore in high school and now here I am with a kid and another on the way

its been a long time but I still remember a lot of you. Your usernames at least

[Lorizael]

ixnay! Woo!

[Broken_Erika]

Now if only some of the old Scenario league members could check in.....

[JohnT]

Ixnay! Wassssup?!?

[Elok]

Lessee, JohnT ... I remember two things about you:

1. Your small daughter liked Barney.
2. I did not approve of this.

I'm guessing your kid has maybe outgrown the whole Barney thing, but in my defense, it turns out the guy who plays Barney also runs tantric sex classes, so I had a point about that mofo being creepy. Anyway, welcome back.

[Ben Kenobi]

Wow. Ixnay. Some real old timers here.

Let's see, quit my job in the States teaching to go back up to Canada to help manage things up here.

Got promoted at my other job and kicked upstairs into management. Business quietly wound down just this month.

Went back to school and got kicked out but pulled a Kevin Spacey, and they ended up paying for me to do something else.

Finished my school, got engaged, we had our date and everything. Had crazy mother in law break it off...

I think that about sums it up.

Ended up back writing again. Life is strange. It has it's seasons and each of them is different. But it's good now and better than it's been in a long time.