The Final(ish) Characters—Still Super

Not a great deal of new information to report today. After three days of being stuck in the house thanks to the four-odd inches of rain we’ve gotten since Sunday evening, Gabe is FINALLY reverting back to his insidey ways. And not a moment too soon. He’s been nothing short of stir crazy this week so far—forcing us to make about a dozen trips a day upstairs where, after ten minutes, he realizes there really isn’t much more to do up there than there is downstairs. And, in between trips, I’ve had to patiently explain to him that “We can’t go outside because it’s rainy/sloppy muddy and cold” while he stands in front of me, shoes in hand, yelling “Shoes! Shoes! Shoes!” at me to get me to put them on, which, in our household, means it’s time to go outside.

Or maybe he’s a little sick. He’s had a bit of the splatterbum off and on this week, so maybe he’s under the weather. Hopefully it’s not swine flu. I DID catch him licking a wild hog last week, and then he also ate a live chickadee Monday, and then he did sneak off to Mexico to check out the post-Spring Break party scene, but I still sort of doubt it’s swine flu. There just aren’t THAT many cases of it yet—not that you’d know that from the coverage it’s getting by the news sources.

On a story-related note, you might be happy to know that I’m almost out of unnamed stuffed animals. I think there are only two or three left. Of course, we have a slew of other animal toys that I could still name, so there’s no guarantee that I won’t keep doing it, just because I find coming up with the back stories for each more fun than just about anything that doesn’t involve sex or alcohol. But, for now at least, you all are off the hook.

The Final(ish) Characters—Still Super

Udder Nonsense

Udder is a little cow doll. Again, I can’t remember where Gabe got it. Maybe it’s because it’s been coming up on two years since he got most of these toys, or maybe it’s because I’m a flaky scatterbrain, but I’m finding that most of these last toys—the ones that didn’t get named immediately because they weren’t popular with either Gabe or me—just sort of “appeared” in his room as far as my memory goes. I’d find it a troubling sign of getting older if my memory hadn’t always been crap.

Udder Nonsense is the only “professional” superhero in the group, meaning, before joining up with the team (which I haven’t named yet, and probably should), he was PAID to be a hero. She was sponsored by babblefish.com and was their spokescow for nearly a year before the online translation service finally realized that, in fact, Udder’s super power really didn’t jibe all that well with the message the website was trying to get across to the public.

See, Udder has the Power of Babel. She can make anything, or anyone, completely incomprehensible. And, as anyone who has ever tried to do a direct translation of a large passage from one language to another with an online translator, “completely incomprehensible” is pretty much the end result that you get. You might recognize all or at least most of the words, but there won’t be any discernible message in them. And since her ability just sort of drove this unpopular notion home to people who saw her, she had to be let go.

Shortly thereafter, she was added to the team, not because anyone thought she would make a good addition (in fact, she’s almost completely useless since, as a super power, this one is about as terrible as “really bendy thumbs,” for all practical purposes), but because they thought she’d make a great scape-cow. Whenever an assignment was botched or an order was ignored, they could blame Udder’s ability. “Sorry, Udder must have been in the room, we didn’t receive anything but gibberish when you contacted us.” And, for her part, she grudgingly accepts this role because, really, where else could she get three squares a day and a comfortable bed without having to do much more than apologize profusely on a regular basis?

Animal Planet Presents: The Meerkat Major

The Meerkat Major is an “alert” (I use that term because I have no idea what to call an animal like this who’s standing up on its rear feet—possibly “being stupid” would be a better description since most of my experience with animals that do this is with our cat Typhoon, and, invariably, she is just being stupid when she stands up on her rear legs) meerkat that I’m pretty sure Libby bought at the zoo. Christ, she buys something every time she goes there, doesn’t she? We must have five or six of these toys that came from there. Oh well, I guess I shouldn’t complain, they give me an ample variety of characters to use for my own devices under the possibly erroneous auspices of entertaining Gabe.

The Major is another bad guy, but he USED to be a hero. Technically, he ranked higher than Captain USA! USA! USA!, but nobody ever paid any attention to him, favoring orders given by the Captain. They did this because, being a meerkat, a typically comical animal, nobody could take him seriously. Eventually, he snapped. Specifically, he lost it when the superhero team forgot his birthday but, in the same week, helped the Captain remember that he had a dentist appointment that he’d scheduled six months earlier. From then on, he dedicated himself with the type of megalomaniacal focus that only a fictional super-villain can muster to destroying the team that he once was technically the leader of.

The Meerkat Major has a complicated slate of super powers that could, in all probability, rival the Captain’s. He received them thanks to generous donations made by the scientific community in the form of radioactive cosmetics that were designed to make women’s face parts glow in the dark. The cosmetics worked wonderfully, giving off an eerie and entirely disconcerting green glow, but they had the unfortunate side effect of killing 99.9% of all test subjects. Only the Major survived.

Specifically, the Major can fly, we do know that because ALL of our superheroes can fly (after all, what fun is a stuffed toy acting like a superhero if you can’t throw them all over the place to simulate flying?). Beyond that, he will likely have whatever super power I decide fits the specific circumstance.

The Cranky Cracker

Or just Cracker for short. The Cranky Cracker is an albino polar bear. How can I tell? Shut up, that’s how. I’m not sure where this bear came from either. I can’t tell if he’s a Beanie or not because he no longer has his tags, but he’s the same size as most of the Beanies. If he IS a Beanie, then chances are better than average that Gabe got him from my Grandma. She can’t possibly have many of those things left if she’s giving them away like that to every toddler that comes into her house. We must have five of them.

The Cranky Cracker is the “brains” behind the supervillain organization, and he is a completely dickish racist. Specifically, he hates everyone in the bedroom who isn’t a white bear. Unfortunately, though, he’s the only white bear in the entire room (well, except for Captain USA, who is probably white with flag “stripes”—but maybe he’s really flag colored with a white background, which wouldn’t be the same thing at all—but they obviously don’t see eye to eye).

This means that he hates everyone, but he doesn’t just hate them, he wants to destroy them (but in a vague, Solomon Grundy from the Super Friends kind of way that doesn’t specifically involve killing, because this is a kid’s oriented toddler’s room, but instead focuses on picking up whatever he can find and hurling it at his enemies only to knock them down but never really hurt them. In fact, I like to say “Cranky Cracker will DESTROY the Super Friends,” in my best Solomon Grundy voice when I play with this guy, even though my group isn’t actually called the Super Friends).

But it’s tough to destroy your enemies when you’re a powerless moron hillbilly, so Cracker had to recruit a group of eager go-getters to do the dirty work for him. And like Lex Luthor and his Legion of Doom, Cranky Cracker comes up with some diabolical scheme and sends his lackeys out to do it, only to see his plans go down in flames because he’s surrounded himself with the most inexcusable kind of imbeciles. Though, his Legion of Mean People is currently in contract negotiations to bring The Faceless Stalker in from the League of REALLY Mean People (same kind of group, but they don’t mess around when they throw things at their adversaries—they’re a grittier, 80s style super villain group that’s not afraid to get its hands a little bloody), which could turn the entire dynamic of the super-rivalry on its ear. It all boils down to whether Cracker can offer the Stalker something it wants, and all the Stalker wants is your soul (yes, yours), so you better watch your back.

Molly the Moose

Yeah, I know, I already covered her. But once we got started with the pictures, Gabe wouldn't stop. So I'm including a new picture of her, just because.

Stupid Dog

This little plastic dog isn't a character, yet, but, as I said, Gabe got a little obsessed with the picture taking there for a bit, and when I put the camera down, he kept saying "Cheese" through his binky and picking up new toys for me to take pictures of. After this one, I just pretended and he didn't seem to know the difference, even though the flash wasn't going off any more. Some day, I won't be able to fool him like that anymore, and I will be sad. It's like when your dog finally figures out that you're not REALLY throwing the ball when the ball doesn't leave your hands and it's really just hidden behind your back. Suddenly, all those fun times messing with its mind are gone, and all you can do is look back fondly on those memories. Sad. But not sad YET. I've still got plenty of months of mind-messing ahead of me!