Story behind your avatar?

[Russell Nash]

I actually switch my avatar quite often.  All of the pics have been images I shot with my new camera.  Except for the cars on the spike. 

Is the lizard your picture also?  It looks like the little beasts (anoles?) I see running around in Mexico and Florida US.

Yeah, this is a little guy I hunted down at the Berlin Aquarium.  The name was in German so I don' know exactly what it is.

looks to me like a "Wasseragame" (Physignathus cocincinus), but I could be wrong...

Next time I go I'll check the name and get the translation.  We have year cards and use the zoo and aquarium like parks.  We're there all the time.

[Thaurismunths]

I was doing some work down in Texas for the Army. Texas had/has an anti-littering slogan of "Don't mess with Texas" and, well, I couldn't help but mess with it.
Weeks and months go by of working 12 and 16 hour days with very little time for messing with a state when on my last weekend there I saw this sign "Please Stay Off The Grass" outside the General's office. So I boldly walked over the lawn to the sign and posed while my boss took the picture.
That was 3 years ago... maybe I should get a new avatar?

[sirana]

I actually switch my avatar quite often.  All of the pics have been images I shot with my new camera.  Except for the cars on the spike. 

Is the lizard your picture also?  It looks like the little beasts (anoles?) I see running around in Mexico and Florida US.

Yeah, this is a little guy I hunted down at the Berlin Aquarium.  The name was in German so I don' know exactly what it is.

looks to me like a "Wasseragame" (Physignathus cocincinus), but I could be wrong...

Next time I go I'll check the name and get the translation.  We have year cards and use the zoo and aquarium like parks.  We're there all the time.

I showed my ex (who actually has two Wasseragamen) the picture and she says she is sure that it is one.

[DKT]

I was doing some work down in Texas for the Army. Texas had/has an anti-littering slogan of "Don't mess with Texas" and, well, I couldn't help but mess with it.
Weeks and months go by of working 12 and 16 hour days with very little time for messing with a state when on my last weekend there I saw this sign "Please Stay Off The Grass" outside the General's office. So I boldly walked over the lawn to the sign and posed while my boss took the picture.
That was 3 years ago... maybe I should get a new avatar?

Dude, you can't change that avatar!  You've had it the whole time you've been posting here.  I might not recognize you next time.

[Thaurismunths]

I might not recognize you next time.

You say that like it might be a bad thing.

[Tango Alpha Delta]

[Edit: yeah, I posted this, and then went and changed the avatar... sorry.]

I thought I played this game, but I guess I didn't...   in the center of the frame [of my previous avatar], was a picture of my sister's family on a pedal boat in the little lake at Encanto Park in Phoenix.  I, too, am in a boat [in that formerly existent picture formerly used as my avatar].

NOW, I'm apparently using a picture of me in Wurzburg, Deutschland, in 1999.  I was visiting an Army buddy over the weekend while I was doing language refresher at Garmisch-Partenkirchen, and something about that storefront was calling to me....

But everywhere else, I've taken to using this self portrait:

[stePH]

Very briefly (a day or less) I put up the picture of myself with C. J. Cherryh and Jane Fancher taken in September 2005.

Now I have Eeyore, because I recognize in him a kindred spirit.

[edit]
And the signature borrows from Episode 16 of the Revolutionary Girl Utena anime, and the "cowbell" sketch from Saturday Night Live.

[Russell Nash]

NOW, I'm apparently using a picture of me in Wurzburg, Deutschland, in 1999.  I was visiting an Army buddy over the weekend while I was doing language refresher at Garmisch-Partenkirchen, and something about that storefront was calling to me....

The first time I visited my gf (now wife) in Berlin I went on a walkabout while she finished her last day at work before going on vacation.  I was walking around the Zoologischer Garten area when I just burst out laughing.  Everybody was looking at this strange guy standing alone and laughing his ass off.  I had just spotted a large neon sign in a store window.  In letters about a foot and a half high it said, "Schmuck".  When you know what the word literally means in Yiddish it's even funnier.

[Tango Alpha Delta]

NOW, I'm apparently using a picture of me in Wurzburg, Deutschland, in 1999.  I was visiting an Army buddy over the weekend while I was doing language refresher at Garmisch-Partenkirchen, and something about that storefront was calling to me....

The first time I visited my gf (now wife) in Berlin I went on a walkabout while she finished her last day at work before going on vacation.  I was walking around the Zoologischer Garten area when I just burst out laughing.  Everybody was looking at this strange guy standing alone and laughing his ass off.  I had just spotted a large neon sign in a store window.  In letters about a foot and a half high it said, "Schmuck".  When you know what the word literally means in Yiddish it's even funnier.

We had taken the kids to the Phoenix Zoo, and there was a punk/goth couple there, admiring the antelope.  He had a spiky, purple mohawk, and while I don't consider that either "good" or "bad" as a personal life choice... I couldn't resist snapping a photo because he was standing right next to the sign that read "PRONGHORN". 

[Darwinist]

Dude, you can't change that avatar!  You've had it the whole time you've been posting here.  I might not recognize you next time.

It would be cool if a person's old avatar stuck with the old postings.  I seem to recall this video avatar of a kitten coming out of some guy's mouth, freaking hilarious.

Also, I miss the giant dead rat sculpture.

[Russell Nash]

I actually switch my avatar quite often.  All of the pics have been images I shot with my new camera.  Except for the cars on the spike. 

Is the lizard your picture also?  It looks like the little beasts (anoles?) I see running around in Mexico and Florida US.

Yeah, this is a little guy I hunted down at the Berlin Aquarium.  The name was in German so I don' know exactly what it is.

looks to me like a "Wasseragame" (Physignathus cocincinus), but I could be wrong...

Next time I go I'll check the name and get the translation.  We have year cards and use the zoo and aquarium like parks.  We're there all the time.

I showed my ex (who actually has two Wasseragamen) the picture and she says she is sure that it is one.

I was at the aquarium today and checked out what the little guy is.  In German: Australische Wasseragame.  In Latin: Physignathus lesueurii.  In English: Australian water dragon.

[Chodon]

I actually switch my avatar quite often.  All of the pics have been images I shot with my new camera.  Except for the cars on the spike. 

Is the lizard your picture also?  It looks like the little beasts (anoles?) I see running around in Mexico and Florida US.

Yeah, this is a little guy I hunted down at the Berlin Aquarium.  The name was in German so I don' know exactly what it is.

looks to me like a "Wasseragame" (Physignathus cocincinus), but I could be wrong...

Next time I go I'll check the name and get the translation.  We have year cards and use the zoo and aquarium like parks.  We're there all the time.

I showed my ex (who actually has two Wasseragamen) the picture and she says she is sure that it is one.

I was at the aquarium today and checked out what the little guy is.  In German: Australische Wasseragame.  In Latin: Physignathus lesueurii.  In English: Australian water dragon.

Dragon, eh?  So how do they keep its fire breath from melting the Plexiglas?

[Thaurismunths]

Dragon, eh?  So how do they keep its fire breath from melting the Plexiglas?

It's a water dragon. Duh.

[goatkeeper]

Also, I miss the giant dead rat sculpture.

I think it was a mole...and I yah I miss it too

[gelee]

Also, I miss the giant dead rat sculpture.

I think it was a mole...and I yah I miss it too

OK, back by popular demand...

[Tango Alpha Delta]

Also, I miss the giant dead rat sculpture.

I think it was a mole...and I yah I miss it too

OK, back by popular demand...

What crime against Russel did he commit???

[goatkeeper]

Also, I miss the giant dead rat sculpture.

I think it was a mole...and I yah I miss it too

OK, back by popular demand...

Hurrah!

[gelee]

Also, I miss the giant dead rat sculpture.

I think it was a mole...and I yah I miss it too

OK, back by popular demand...

What crime against Russel did he commit???

He refferred to a group of Russelites as "Cornies," and was strung up on the spot.  Sensitive bunch, them.

[Tango Alpha Delta]

Also, I miss the giant dead rat sculpture.

I think it was a mole...and I yah I miss it too

OK, back by popular demand...

What crime against Russel did he commit???

He refferred to a group of Russelites as "Cornies," and was strung up on the spot.  Sensitive bunch, them.

They must have been part of the rice-growing faction of TCoRN... the Ricellites.  The TCoRNians in Iowa wouldn't have minded at all; nor would the TCoRN Podiatry Guild, or the Anglican splinter group in Cornwall.  But them Ricellites is Nashty.

[CGFxColONeill]

ok kinda newer to the forum so I dont really know what this TCoRN thing is any one care to enlighten me plz?

my avi comes from an online game I play in which my name is ( no prizes for guessing this one early) is CGFxColONeill ( soon to change but ya )

[Tango Alpha Delta]

ok kinda newer to the forum so I dont really know what this TCoRN thing is any one care to enlighten me plz?

Well.... the long version is buried in this thread here.   The short version is, someone tried to use beloved moderator, Russell Nash, as the deity of his own religion in a semi-Socratic thought experiment on faith.  It kind of backfired because the rest of us are a bunch of smart-assed nay-sayers with hyper-active imaginations (would you expect any less in a science fiction podcast forum?)... and the result has been a running inside joke.  As you can see by my sig and description, I tried to stake out territory as the supreme heretic, but others (such as Heradel) have posed their own (unorthodox) heretical positions, too.

This, in a nutshell, explains the existence of The Church of Russell Nash (aka TCoRN).  Yea, and verily, go now in peace.  (Or in pieces.)

[Darwinist]

What up with the Lego avatar?

[Tango Alpha Delta]

What up with the Lego avatar?

Apparently one of my co-workers was in Toys-R-Us and saw that little guy in his mail van... and decided that it looked like his workplace hero, yours truly. 

He got so excited that he had found a "TAD" action figure, he just had to get it... and his fiancee even added a little "TAD" nametag with a fine-tipped pen.  I, being easily flattered (a foible I attribute to not being a deity in my own made-up religion) decided to swipe the photo from the Lego people and make it my own.  I figure since they "stole" my likeness, I can steal it back... and I humbly offer to pay 4 gazillion percent royalties on every penny of profit I make from it.

[eytanz]

I, being easily flattered (a foible I attribute to not being a deity in my own made-up religion) decided to swipe the photo from the Lego people and make it my own.  I figure since they "stole" my likeness, I can steal it back... and I humbly offer to pay 4 gazillion percent royalties on every penny of profit I make from it.

If any Lego representatives are reading this - I will send TAD 25% of any sum of money you choose to send me, as payment for providing me joy with his avatar. That'll turn into a gazillion percent return on your investment!

[Heradel]

Well.... the long version is buried in this thread here.   The short version is, someone tried to use beloved moderator, Russell Nash, as the deity of his own religion in a semi-Socratic thought experiment on faith.  It kind of backfired because the rest of us are a bunch of smart-assed nay-sayers with hyper-active imaginations (would you expect any less in a science fiction podcast forum?)... and the result has been a running inside joke.  As you can see by my sig and description, I tried to stake out territory as the supreme heretic, but others (such as Heradel) have posed their own (unorthodox) heretical positions, too.

This, in a nutshell, explains the existence of The Church of Russell Nash (aka TCoRN).  Yea, and verily, go now in peace.  (Or in pieces.)

I refuse to accept that my position is not orthodox to the citizens of the planet Tappa Alphi Delter.

I also refuse to accept that my position isn't valid simply because I cannot remember my position.