Jan 18

As I get fed up with this computer I have been graced with I realize that it’s aging; I’ve had it since mid-2006 and included on its hard drive are backups of folders from as early as 2004. I’m running a system with seven years’ worth of stuff crammed into it and here I am complaining about how it doesn’t seem to be working as well as it used to. Go figure, right? I’ve had MSN Messenger for as long as I’ve had a computer because it’s my preferred method of being annoyed by people at all hours of the day. With the use of MSN Messenger you can send files to people and likewise let people send files to you, and in the past I’ve told stories about how people have accidentally sent me pornography instead of what they intended. I’ve had this computer since 2006 and not once have I cleaned out my “Received Files” folder, so there’s about four years’ worth of random snippets and trinkets sitting in there… stewing.

When someone sends you a picture via Messenger it’s usually relevant to your conversation, for example “here’s a picture of my new car”. In four years I’ve been a part of many websites and communities and talked to hundreds of people, most of whom have sent me things via MSN Messenger. As years go by I lose contact with these people but the artifacts of our conversations remain on my computer either for eternity or until I delete them, and I’ve deleted nothing. Everything in that folder had some kind of context to it but as long as 4 years later I have since completely forgotten whatever in the hell it was in the first place. I decided that digging through my Received Files folder and finding my favorite bizarre pictures would be a fun way to waste an evening writing and wouldn’t you know – it was. Below are seven pictures that were sent to me from various people with whom I’ve talked to, their context is just as much of a mystery to you as it is to me.

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Dec 25

Good morning! If you’re reading this then it’s either Christmas Day or it’s sometime after Christmas and you’re just slow in keeping up with my column! Just on the sole basis that I’ve inadvertently become the lead writer for this website that also kind of means that I’m in charge of the holiday-themed content. Last Halloween I put out Afterlife TV (Revisited), a serious look at Ghost Hunters… and because of a personal emergency I missed Thanksgiving and/or Black Friday (and even Cyber Monday) so now it’s really crunch time for me to pull something out of my rear for Christmas (and likely New Years as well). I’d be lying to you if I said I had a single ounce of a clue as to what I want to write about this holiday season because I don’t, so we’ll just see how that goes. New Years, though, I’ve got that under control – a quick retrospective of this crappy decade appropriately called “The Double Zeroes”. :3

But that’s beside the point, I’ve got a whole week to ponder over this wacky and pathetic decade, it’s all about the jolly red fat man today so I should get busy talking about Christmas…

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Nov 12

Dracophile12

vaporware (vay – poor – where) n. A term used to describe massively hyped or advertised software that is excessively delayed and ultimately never released.

Game not included.

Game not included.

Yes this is an article about a dragon-related computer game, and yes I am actually satirizing it. Just because my name is “Dracophile” doesn’t mean that anything with dragons in it instantly gets five gold stars and a Dracophile Seal of Approval. Quite the contrary, actually; I have taste in what I like. Simply dropping a bunch of random dragons in front of me actually won’t keep me occupied unless you managed to find what I like. DragonPlay, a game that can best be described as “a complete Club Penguin rip-off with dragons” and worst described as “Yahtzee with letters on all the dice”, does not fall into the category of things that I find pleasing.

Of course, I would be lying to you if I said I wasn’t originally on the game’s development team at one point in time. When the project was announced in 2006 by the dev team they also asked me if I’d like to hop aboard and do graphic design work for the game which I agreed to do and also offered to design the website and host it on my own servers. Normally I’d charge for a service like that (because graphic and web design is my job) but I waived all of those fees because “hey, dragons!” They kicked me out about two weeks later because it was readily apparent I was the only developer with a head on my shoulders and a generous helping of common sense and Internet business practices.

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Oct 08

Dp3_banner

AUTHOR’S NOTE: This article was originally written for the late GatorAIDS.com. It has been edited for content.

If you’re this far into VitalViper.com and my articles you may have picked up a subtle hint that I’m a dragon fan. Actually this is still a pretty new website so maybe you haven’t been able to really read into this place yet, but regardless of that my penname is Dracophile so that has to be worth something. If I told you I didn’t have the gayest man-crush ever on Spyro the Dragon then I would be lying to you completely, and liars go to Hell. When The Legend of Spyro: Dawn of the Dragon was released in 2008 a bunch of various merchandise tie-ins came out with it including a couple of theater-sized poster prints of Spyro the Dragon himself. I wanted those posters. Really bad. Various online retailers and sellers on eBay had some for sale but at the time I didn’t have the funds to acquire them.

When I finally had the disposable income I had put away specifically for “super smexy dragon posters” I found that not a whole lot of people were selling them anymore, which was depressing. I dug around and then I finally found a seller on eBay who had not only both of the posters but had them at a few bucks cheaper than I remember them being. I was floored when I checked out the listing; it seemed like everything matched up and that I was going to get those nifty Spyro prints I wanted.

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