Do you really want to make me cry?


Tonight is one of those nights where after wading through page after page of mindless crap, I see something that makes me so happy...
Monday, May 02, 2005
Maddy as Stephen Hawking etc...
posted by Neil Gaiman 5/2/2005 08:36:00 PM
Maddy has just discovered the speech function on the iMac. "Do you really want to hurt me? Ooh do you really want to make me cry?" it said (how on Earth does a ten-year-old discover Culture Club?) immediately followed by "Maddy Gaiman is awesome" and as a follow-up, "But Neil Gaiman is kind of weird".

Oh god, now she's using it for communication. "Would you like to watch some TV before it gets too late?" the computer just announced in a voice like a prepubescent Stephen Hawking. "Er. Sure," I said, a little nonplussed, "um. What would you like to watch?" "Whose Line Is It Anyway? Or are you bored of that? Ha. Ha. Ha. Dad. Answer me." "Er. Okay. "Are you sure? Why don't we see if there's anything else just for a change?" Now it's sounding like a female HAL 3000. "Maddy is laughing," it stated, which is both better and worse than the dead-sounding Ha. Ha. Ha. It's still doing it. "Daddy. We have to go. We have wasted seven, now eight minutes, doing this. Your fault I'm sure. Father, dear, please."

Now everyone (This is Maddy for your information) I suppose you think Dad's blog is wonderful and want to read it every day and wait for the marvelous things he says like that thingie up there. But, really I must tell you I am the inspiration for all this things! Plus, I can make computer cats and fish. Wanna see? Fish: ><)))"> and Cat" =^..^= Meow! Thank you, thank you, thank you very much.

There. I've got control of the computer back, by cleverly putting on a previously unwatched Bugs Bunny DVD. (Why does Maddy at age ten remind me of Holly at 15?)

Apart from the fact that the post itself is so damn cute, there is the fact that this is written by Neil freaking Gaiman.
In 1994, when I was working late night shifts at Kerbey Lane, there was this adorable young man named Marcos Marquez. I had never really gotten into comics or graphic novels, but he leant me some of the Sandman volumes and I was blown away. They were incredible. Reading them now takes me back instantly to a time when my friends and I would stay up all night playing chess and insolently serving gingerbread pancakes to drunks and cops, or taking herbal smoke mixes to a coffee house and smoking pipes in public and discussing Pret-à-Porter and the other patrons would freak out thinking we were smoking pot.

DanE leant me Neverwhere and I was so grateful to be able to read his story in text. I still appreciate that Gaiman turned me on to graphic novels in the first place, but textual-based novels and poetry are still my preferred reading materials. OK. And MacAddict.
I paid the favor back to DanE by giving his daughter The Day I Swapped My Dad For Two Goldfish.

Posted: Wed - May 4, 2005 at 10:20 PM        

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