The Cerebral Catalyst

Well, Josh's piece got me to thinking, why are people so preoccupied with dinosaurs? The first real encounter with these beasties I can recall was watching the movie Dinosaur! with Ringo Starr, and some other no-name actors, at least that's how I remember it. It was the funniest thing I think I've ever seen, and the way I saw it was purely by chance. See, I used to get these nosebleeds a lot when I was a kid, and for as long as I can remember, or at least it's tied to the last couple of years, I can't ever sleep and I've always liked that groggy feeling you get when you wake up unannounced. I'm not talking about when you've only gotten two hours of sleep and you're hungover and you have a midterm, or you have to get up and go to work, no I'm talking about that feeling when you say have a real mind-fuck of a dream and you can't get it out of your head.

So anyways, we got lost a bit there, but the point is, I've seen and done a lot of things in a fucked up dream state that I really love. Like what, about 24 and 3/4ths of my life now? It was under these bloody circumstances that I remember seeing such movies as The Jerk with Steve Martin, and the Robert Plant video for "The Big Log," which I swear to this day featured a giant turd floating round and round in a toilet. You see what I mean? How many people can say that? That's where I come from.

Also of late, I've been having really fucking bizarre dreams with coherent narratives like robbing a bank with a gun I got out of one of those quarter candy machines. I read once that Dickens had a dream which he based one of his novels on, but I don't remember which. So if some really bizarre shit turns up on here in the form of a short story or a poem, I guess you'll know where it most likely came from. Maybe I'll put a bit of that into these pieces, I mean I don't think the New Yorker will take them, but who knows, maybe there'll be a market for that. Is that "genre fiction?" Well, that's another topic that I need to let gestate for a while, but fear not, dear reader, it'll be in here.

Kids. I mean a big deal is made about the impact of violence on kids. I'll admit I was into a lot of violent things when I was a kid, I mean I had a real preoccupation with those Faces of Death movies and I've watched my fair share of slasher/horror flicks, and anyone who doesn't follow a normal sleeping schedule should know all about that. I suppose a lot of those RonCo infomercials are a lot more disturbing than any violence you'll ever see on TV, regardless of the hour. I mean, "Set it and Forget it" as a mantra? Some freaky shit there, especially that spray-on hair shit they had, or the "Flowbee." I mean that's done a lot more to ruin people's minds than any one of the Sleepaway Camp movies.

But I guess I should have known at an early age that I wasn't like the other kids. Not some sort of brilliant mind, but a really disturbed one. I guess Catholic school will do that to anyone. Allow me to give you some more of Captain Fun's history so you at home can fill in your timelines and so the C.I.A. can go over its notes on me. Hell, they could probably tell me or any one of us more about ourselves than we could, but of course they don't care, right? Well I'm sure some of my fellow Catalystians (If that's a word, If not, I just made one up. Danzig made up at least three, I'm told) would agree given our little "Incident" with the po-po on campus.

Anyways, I was labeled as a crazy from as long ago as I can remember. We had a creative writing experiment once in 4th grade, and I made up this Rambo type character and wrote up a story about him massacring people and I think I even included a little stick figure drawing. I guess that could be a good argument for violence influencing kids if you ignore the fact that I've never killed anything larger than a fly in my life, and even then it requires some true soul searching. Although there was one time I think I decapitated a squirrel on my way to work. I mean I remember hitting something and looking back to see him stumbling, but he didn't go down, so we can only assume he survived to sire many a squirrelly crew.

I used to have to go to the guidance counselor's van, this usually being a place to play games and watch videos. Regardless of the subject matter which was usually "sharing is caring" type shit, it still meant a trip away from class. I also used to be really into drawing crazy shit like scenes from an imaginary video game I wanted to create, or my own band of comic book heroes, the "Skull Crew," which featured overly muscular figures with skull and crossbones insignias on their chest. If Stan Lee is reading this, they belong to me and me only, so keep your grubby paws off them! (patent pending, of course).

So I used to like guns too, my dad had a lot of them at one point in his life, and the crowning accomplishment of my first nine years was shooting his .357 magnum one New Year's Day. (Of course I didn't shoot it myself, but I remember hitting my old sandbox. Talk about a metaphor for lost innocence, right?) I can also remember being used as the butt of many a joke by my 8th grade teacher who was a kind of wit, at least a disaffected one. His name was Mr. Borosky, and I doubt he'll ever read this, but boy, what a surly motherfucker. He hated all of us kids and I remember a lot of kids really digging his apathy, I may have even been one for a time. But I used to have a real crush on this girl, who actually ended up stabbing me with a fork during lunchtime in 8th grade, but that fits under a different column, specifically my terrible luck with women, my obsessive nature, and overall bad luck.

Anyhow, one time at lunch she was making fun of me or trying to claw my eyes out, or maybe both, when I foolishly retaliated by hitting her with a book. Now I'm not some horrible wifebeater or anything because of it, I mean it was just a reaction. And I didn't split her cranium open or anything; it was just a tap, really. But the story got back to Mr. B and he burned me on it. I came back from recess to "My name is Joe Conty and I like to draw guns and beat up girls." I wanted to unleash the fury on him in a way, but mostly I just wanted to get the fuck out of there. I don't think I've ever been burned that badly. He tried to label me as the rest of the school did. It was my first experience with that sort of thing, and all I can say is the obvious, that it's a very small thing to do.

I mean a person's childhood has a great influence on what they become, and I think that, compounded with my parents' reactions to my art, prevented me from expressing who I was for a long time. But I'm getting out of that shell, out of that little prison they tried to create for me. I would like my career to stand as a big "fuck you" to them, but that would be too small. So I'll just try to invoke a bit of the Christian kindness they tried to imbue in us, and let it go. They eventually fired Mr. Borosky, and I've got some other good stories about him buried in a few synapses, but I remember the rumors that surfaced. Naturally, that he was buried near the school, or that the principal herself killed him, but I doubt the woman had even the strength to crush an ant. The moral for today's story, just be weird, and let that freak flag fly!

Visit Captain Fun's Swarthy Archives.

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Joseph L. Conty, Jr. wears a buffalo hide tunic and sips peach nectar from a chalice. Known to drink multiple flagons of mead for breakfast and chew bear fat for gum, he would like to remind the public that anyone else who dares to use the moniker of "Captain Fun" isn't fit to carry his merkin.

Posted 07.16.03

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