Happy Fucking Birthday To Us

Skeletal Grace and Marlboro Red roast the Dead Rebel Society (and each other)

OK… A year has passed. One year of truthful motherfuckery and fluffy nonsense, all served to you, the easily distracted DRS crowd, on a nice big ole silver platter. Do we make a difference in the world? Fuck, no. Do we care? Fuck, no. Are we an elitist clique of arrogant fucks? Hell, yeah. What are you gonna do about it? Cry us a river? Too bad.

I think we have had some fun. We have published 306 articles and creative chapters since December 5, 2004. On average, we get about 2,000 unique hits per week and we are still having fun. Sometimes. I hate it when you cry and whine though. I never cry and whine. That’s entirely in the eye of the beholder. Calling Trump a cry baby only does so much for your career after you’ve already been fired. Get my hint? What the fuck more do you need? A paycheck would be nice.

Sure, we have had some downs… Remember Blackie? I wash my hands of that whole fucking debacle. That was YOU and B coming up with the brilliant idea to string him along for the ride. Umm... NO… That was me telling Brandy that we were making a mistake and allowing her to go ahead with it anyway.  Sometimes you have to let go and allow your children to learn their own lessons. Well, lesson learned or not, it didn’t work out so well now, did it? “Black Christmas” my ass. I hope most of our readers are new enough to not even remember who the fuck he was.

The beginnings were humble and our site was ugly as fuck. But only because we were – and still are – too cheap to hire a professional web designer. Speak for yourself. Just because you don’t turn heads at the annual Ozark Pig Roast, it doesn’t mean the rest of us aren’t getting some. Pig Pickin’…not pig roast. Get it right or don’t attempt the lame insult. By the way… I don’t even remember who came up with our name (so it obviously wasn’t me), but I love it. I think it says it all - The Dead Rebel Society. Aren’t you lucky?  I happen to remember the very moment we were “named”.  You and I had been going back and forth for about 2 hours on IM, trying to come up with something decidedly brilliant.  We failed. Brandy walks by the computer, asks what we’re doing, and then blurts out “Dead Rebel Society.” Neither of us could type for a full 20 seconds because we were so stunned. I have no recollection of that, but the name is still great. We pay tribute to the truth, controversy, great thoughts, and ballsy people who went against the grain – but we are also paying tribute to the fact that we are now, ourselves, Dead Rebels. We were once young and cool, shoving our fingers in the faces of everyone. Speak for yourself. I’m a nice Southern girl.  It’s rude to shove fingers in faces. Now we’re old and gay… i.e. Dead Rebels. I AM NOT GAY! No you’re just corporate as all fuck sometimes. What’s wrong with that?  Didn’t you just compare yourself to Donald Trump? I just like the firing part.

When we first started out we only had 6 writers: Me, B, Joe, Blackie, TC and Red.

Fuck did we struggle to make it look even readable. Neither of us had any web site experience whatsoever. I can’t even manage my own fucking Outlook Express without deleting half the shit. Bullshit.  That’s no excuse. You never know what’s going on because you don’t take the time to read e-mails carefully. Because you write epic sagas about shit that happened 5 weeks ago. Snap snap snap, girl. Just because you’re on a Morse Code Internet connection it doesn’t mean you have to think slow. I have DSL now, thank you very much. I write the sagas because you can’t seem to understand basic explanations sometimes.

Anyway, since then, we fired Blackie, because he sucked, we fired you because you didn’t write, I was BUSY! How many times do I have to tell you that?, we fired Joe because he wanted to quit and we fired TC because she was moving on to better things. Didn’t we hire you back as Rhoda? Where is she again? Oh, that’s right. She was demoted to a tiny corner of Linda Adam’s column. Confused yet? Are they all the same? Only when the moon is full.

At least we got the graphics somewhat fixed up. I think the site is easier to navigate these days. And with all the extra shit we are continuously adding. it had better be fucking easy.

Crazy Seb, cynical Carman, milfy Succ, quirky Elise, grouchy Grace, political Nona, street smart Rosie, Southern smart Linda, clever Manimal, insane Beppo and the distinguished Dr. Githa F. Overitt… I think that throughout the year we have assembled a well balanced team of writers. And we use the term “balanced” lightly. Yeah, they balance each other, at least, if not by themselves so much. Sometimes I wish we had somebody with bigger balls, though. Somebody who steps up everybody’s game even more. Can I fire you again and hire some radical nut? I know this chick, Lizzie Boredom, she was a crazy fuck. Maybe you should give her a call? I thought you wanted a “balanced” team? Well, if we put the rest of the writers on one end of the scale, and Lizzie on the other by herself, it would probably balance like a motherfucker. A furious 400 lbs lesbian can take care of herself. What does Lizzie’s lesbianism have to do with anything? Are you flying the homophobic flag now? According to B, I do.

I think what has made this year so cool, is that we have the same kind of people reading the site as we have people writing it. We’re all warped in the same way, more or less. Sometimes I wonder if our arrogant format is too cliquey to appeal to the grey big mass out there? Since when have “rebels” been welcomed with open arms to the mass audience anyway? DOH. And sometimes I wonder if we are not too pointless, and downright candy ass lame, to even be worthy of the slogan “The Truth Hurts Like a Motherfucker”. Do you at least remember coming up with that slogan? Because you did. And I am the only one living up to it. The rest of you are fags. What was the slogan you wanted? “On a break – Be back soon”? Don’t flatter yourself.  No wait. Somebody has to do it.  I know for a fact that you said just this week that Manimal is always good to ruffle some turkey feathers around here. No, that was B, but I agree. He should write more.

Now, let me interpret that last paragraph for everyone out there:  “sometimes I wonder” means “sometimes I totally flip out and rant and rave for days about shutting the site down because I have no patience with anything or anybody, especially myself.” Drama king. So? I have fired every single writer on the site at least twice each, me included. You have NEVER fired yourself. You just quit a lot. Most of the time you stop me before it actually happens though. See? I am misunderstood. No, you’re arrogant and impatient. I am very good at staff management. And Saddam Hussein is good at democracy. What’s so hard about it? You pick them up by the scruffs of their necks, dangle them in front of the computer and scream at them to WRITE DAMMIT! What’s to misinterpret?

And they do write. Great articles, once they get around to it.

Who would not want to read articles about the upsides of drug abuse, edible pets, reviews on what it feels like to have a finger bitten off by a spaniel, the dark side of childbirth (is there a lighter side to childbirth?), a true angle on rape fantasies, people who piss you off, the injustices of our society, why Bush is a fuckhead, why he’s not a fuckhead, September 11th bullshit, Internet stalkers, recipes on Southern specialties and articles on everything that is wrong with the world of music today. Take your pick.

What do you think is the most memorable event? Or the most memorable article?

I honestly don’t have many “favorite” contributions, in the sense that everybody has done a remarkable job. Our writers – both regular and guest – help to define the site.  In the beginning, Grace, Brandy and I only had a general idea of the type of site we wanted to create.  We’ve had our ups and downs – and every down has pushed us to evolve just one step further. I’m proud of everyone – we’ve grown far beyond anyone’s expectations in one short year. I still think we could get WAY heavier, and hit WAY harder, though. That’s for 2006, I guess.

That said and done – I think Tip Toe Rosie’s “Rape Fantasy” article grabbed me the most. Yeah, that was good. I remember being in surreal shock while reading it. It was an extremely powerful piece.  Also, during this year I discovered that Nona Polichik is a hell of a good fiction writer.  When she submitted the first chapters of her novel to me, I actually wrote her back with the question, “Are you SURE you want to publish this with us? Don’t you want to send it to a publisher?” She gave us the go ahead and we continue to publish her e-novel chapter by chapter. As if she couldn’t send it to a publisher AS WELL? Do we own her now? Nona, you’re fucked.Those are only two examples of the multitude of quality writings we’ve had the privilege of publishing over the past year.

I personally love the Fuckheads Anonymous section. I think that will catch on big time eventually. I love how Beppo’s Motherfucking Blitzkrieg caught on in the metal communities. I think all our writers have it in them to generate their own cult following down the line. Especially Sebastian. He's German you know, AND a fuckhead. Cult following… hey, that’s a good idea.  I’ll get the flyers printed up tomorrow.  They can pass them out at the airport and Wal-Mart and places like that. What the fuck are you talking about?

Some things we have had, just didn’t work. Remember when you said that blogging is the key to the Internet? Blogging IS the key to the Internet.  Too bad I can’t get you to understand exactly what it is. Maybe because it’s fucking GAY? Do I need to remind you that the whole “Advent Calendar Blog” thing was YOUR idea? No, it was Sebastian’s idea. But I liked the calendar idea, not so much the gay blogging. Everybody's a damn blogger these days. And he’s the one who could start his own cult? Great. The Advent Psycho cult. I don’t even know what Advent is. It sounds like something you’d clip out of the Sunday newspaper and take to Wal-Mart. OK, so, we from DRS wish everybody ONE BIG GAY DECEMBER. You’re one big gay December, Red. Anyway, I wrote that Afterlife Blog for you, from a fictitiously dead Skeletal Grace’s point of view, opening up doors in the Hall of Memory to the afterlife and dealing with past life stuff.  B fucking freaked and made me pull it. Said I was playing with fate and shit. I blamed it all on you anyway. I thought it was good. It couldn’t have bothered her too badly because she never called me to yell at me. Either that or she’s afraid of me. I told her she should pay closer attention to her husband’s cyber activities if she wanted to prevent recurrences in the future. HAHAHAHA. Yeah… She’s about as afraid of you as the spiders are of me. She WILL make you scream like a little girl. Better you than me, kid.

One section that has rocked is the Guest Article Page. There have been some major fucking pieces in there. Half the writers on staff originally submitted stuff as Guest Writers. See, peeps? Keep sending shit in, and you can too be given a contract into DRS slavery. We don’t pay shit, and most of the time I bitch about deadlines on stuff I asked you to write against your will anyway, but then Red always kisses and makes nice nice with everyone (and then gets accused of “going corporate”).

So what do we have in store for the next year? Hopefully to get better and edgier at what we do. Hopefully to add some outrageously funny and controversial features.

Bottom line: We started DRS for two reasons. 1) For the love of writing, and 2) to have some fun with people just like us. I think we have accomplished at least that.

Thanks to our eminent Guest Article editor, Stretch, and to Stoner and OD for creative input and for policing our fucked up boards.

A big THANK YOU to the DRS writers, who so richly deserve your utmost admiration, and also to you, the DRS readers, basking in all our glory. Without us there would be no you. (Ditto. What he said.)

You’re very welcome.

Stick around.

Chat 10/11 - 2005:

MarlboroRed:

It's the right way to go about it.

Skeletal Grace:

Writing a fucking diary? Like some troubled teen? Who's gonna give a fuck? I don't even give a fuck.

Marlboro Red:

Blogging is an in for a lot of sites. It generates traffic.

Skeletal Grace:

So does a fucking car accident. Doesn't mean I want us to crash the fucking site.

Marlboro Red:

No, if we blog on all the right places on the internet, we can generate the right kind of traffic.

Skeletal race:

And who is gonna write these blogs? You? Don't you have to be somewhere writing an article?

Chat 8/9 - 2005:

MarlboroRed:

What's the matter now?

Skeletal Grace:

I just wanted to let you know that I am firing everybody and starting a new site.

Marlboro Red:

What? Is it Monday already? How the time flies.

Skeletal Grace:

Shut up, you're fired too.

Marlboro Red:

You can't fire me. I am one of the site owners. And me and B vote against you on everything anyway,  so there will be no firing anybody.

Skeletal race:

Well, whatever... Don't you have to be somewhere, pretending to struggle with an article I never get?

Chat 12/24 - 2004:

Skeletal Grace:

I want Blackie gone. I don't even know what the fuck he is talking about.

Marlboro Red:

I know. I don't think a single person gets him.

Skeletal Grace:

"Black Christmas - Part 4"? Is he gonna prolong this suffering until fucking May?

Marlboro Red:

So what do you wanna do?

Skeletal Grace:

I told you. I fired him.

Marlboro Red:

You said you WANTED him gone. Not that you fired him.

Skeletal Grace:

Oops...

Meet the Family:

Chat 7/2 - 2005:

MarlboroRed:

You're driving me ffukin nuts!.

Skeletal Grace:

Why are you stuttering? Suck it up kid.

Marlboro Red:

You are just THE most IMPOSSIBLE MAN EVER! I PITY B TO HAVE TO BE MARRIED TO YOU!

Skeletal Grace:

Hold, on. I'll break out the Pity Contrabasso here. OK, go ahead... You were saying?

Marlboro Red has left the conversation.