Around the autumnal season of 2008, I was watching one of television's most elegant miracles: SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron. The miraculous elegance the show provides is of an indescribable quality, but I shall save my feeble attempts at explaining it for later posts. Anyhow, I selected from my TiVo an episode entitled "Night of the Dark Kat." I falsely assumed that within the first few frames of hand-drawn animation that followed the final ring of electric guitar that signaled the close of the opening cinematics, I would be observing an attempt by Dark Kat to bring a reign of cataclysm over the metropolis of MegaKat City in a fashion similar to his (failed) scheme that was documented in his début episode: "The Wrath of Dark Kat." (Typing this, I find it odd that he would be wrathful before nighttime.) Instead, the villain who first graced the screen was one who had remained unseen in the previous six episodes of the programme. Dictating with a deviously diabolical demeanor, a kat on the outskirts of a government base made it clear from the moment he dismissed the claims of a couple of guards that "only a fool would try to get into this research center" by referring to the pair as the true "ARROGANT FOOLS!" that his heart was filled with a most villainous intent.
However, his claims were met with silent, thoughtful laughter on my part. How could this kat be a villain? How could a typical tomkat donning red, albeit one cursed with a Mohawk that would make even the staunchest of punks frown, claim himself a villain in the ranks of Dark Kat? But in truth, 'twas truly I, the viewer, who was the most arrogant of fools. Clothing himself in the blue coat with odd features that lay in his suitcase, the kat furthered his argument against the guards by bringing forth the following holler of evidence: "Nothing can stop Hard Drive when he’s wearing his SURGE COAT!" Transforming into a cyber-punk-inspired feline (although still cursed with an unsightly hairdo), the typical tomkat was now one of the slickest villains around: HARD DRIVE. After asking the Tremblay brothers to forgive me for my foolish arrogance, I concluded that Hard Drive would soon prove himself to be one of my favourite villains. All of this intense mental activity occurred within the first ten seconds of his appearance, before even his diabolical laugh. After that expression of humour, however, I knew that he had successfully proved himself.
Filling himself with bluish light until it become the dominant factor in his existence, Hard Drive transformed into a surge of electricity, eagerly traversing the power lines that led to the aforementioned research facility. As each computer screen in the center's lab was filled with the image of his evil smirk, Hard Drive reapparated in a flash of both yellow and blue. Rubbing his hands together in the most unfevered and anticipatory fashion imaginable, Hard Drive uttered the most splendid phrase ever dictated by any man or feline, real or fictional.
"Now HARD DRIVE can get his hands on a few tasty MEGABYTES!"
It is not out of likelihood that I pressed the large yellow pause button on my TiVo remote as to allot the appropriate time required to absorb the unbridled power of the above statement. The statement was of such effortless beauty that it has not even been until now that I realize that Hard Drive was in possession of not hands, but paws. But in that moment, it did not matter. It was the latter half of the sentence that truly rung out in such a sense as to be eternally echoed for all beings to let reverberate through their ear drums (or whatever sensorily auditory organ(s) that an organism may find itself equipped with). Although finding it benignly humourous that mere millions (rather than billions or trillions) of bytes of computational data were considered of such scale in the year of 1993, I could not deny the stylistic refinement that a phrase such as "a few tasty megabytes" brings. (My fingers still tremble in awe as I undeservingly type those words now!) Yet I also must confess that it has aged well, as it is likely that David Ehrhem chose the term "megabytes" so that it could join the infinite legion of words and terms in SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron that bear the "mega" prefix. To be put in (relative) simplicity, I was struck into amazement.
When, after a period of time that likely consisted of a month or so, I found my household to contain a guest known here as The Tech Avenger, I revealed the line's holy presence to him, and he too found it to be the greatest thing that had ever been heard, seen, felt, or in any way sensorily experienced. We concluded that there must be some way in which we could show our undying adoration for the phrase. Suddenly, I found myself with an epiphanal idea: that we could form a tribute blog, using the phrase as our slogan, motto, and motivational tool throughout our lives. We both agreed that such a blog, as humble as it would be, was most likely the greatest offering we could give the phrase in our mortal lives, and swore that the blog's fruition would be imminent.
To our greatest regretful feelings, over a year passed, and no blog had budded, let alone blossomed. In the first few hours of the current decade, however, I constructed an account on a site know as "Tumblr" so I could join a few of my friends in their whimsical regurgitation of the internet uploads of others. Searching even the darkest crevices of my soul for a subtitle to my Tumblr page, I recalled the phrase that I had first heard Hard Drive cackle all those meteorological seasons ago. That night, I slept soundly, hoping that future nights would also be "nights of the Dark Kat." Yet when I awoke, I realized that Tumblr was a mere "scrapbook" compared to the "journal" that blogs offered. No matter how tasty the megabytes, they were still nothing but regurgitations that would end up disgracing Hard Drive's intent. When I saw The Tech Avenger as available for chat, I quickly messaged him my intent to fulfill the promise we made so long ago. He too agreed that it was time to bring such a blog to the masses. After using my Google account to set up a new "team blog," The Tech Avenger made the monumental first post that now graces our blog. With this, my first entry, I have done my part in setting forth what are, in the end, just "a few tasty megabytes" of interesting, thoughtful, or otherwise notable blog posts by a pair of humans seeking a creative outlet by the means of the internet.
Short story long, this blog came up as a joke from SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron.
Sunday, January 3, 2010
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