From: [j--r--y] at [pwa.acusd.edu] (Jerry Stratton)
Date: Mon, 10 Jul 1995 16:37:53 GMT
Subject: Re: Desert Peach 23

Anonymous by request wrote:
>Jerry Stratton ([j--r--y] at [pwa.acusd.edu]) wrote:
>: about the Peach's handling of that situation as well, but, identifying
>: as I do with Leutnant Kjars (there are, after all, times when
>: "half-breed syphilitic cunt" is the appropos thing to say), I can't
>No doubt you think so.

I've responded to -- via e-mail since she seems offended 
by this, but it gives me an excuse to relate my experience 
at the Donna Barr reading in 1993. She'll be sorry she ever 
brought it up.

I'd only been introduced to the Peach the preceding year at 
the con, and at the time Peaches were coming out at about 1 
per year. I'd just picked up my third Peach a few hours 
earlier, and hadn't had a chance to do more than glance 
through it. Donna announced that this wasn't going to be an 
author-only reading: we were all going to take the role of 
one of the characters. She, of course, took the Peach, and 
went down the list of other characters and called for 
volunteers. I don't think Rosen was in that comic (I'm sure 
I'll be corrected if he was, boy did I get it for my mis-
attribution in my *last* post), and Udo was gone before I
got the courage to raise my hand. Yes, raise me hand, mate.
We were still quite civil. It was kindergarten all over again.
Warm and fuzzy.

Ya gotta realize that the main reason I was reading the 
Peach was that I had, at the previous convention, happened 
onto a large number of panels that included Donna Barr. I 
had been impressed with her intelligence and wisdom. Maybe 
she was on prozac at the time, I don't know. I'd heard a bit
about this "Peach" guy on the net, but hadn't paid any 
attention to it until then. After picking up the latest issue in 1992, I
was hooked--as are most people, it seems, who just pick up an issue to
"check out this gay Nazi leather thing."

Anyway, I end up with Leutnant Kjars. I don't particularly *look* the
part. He's blond, blue-eyed, tall, and looks great in leather. I've got
blue eyes... but my knees are a little too knobby for leather.

So we're getting set to read along through Udo and Falila's 
wedding (if it turns out that Falila is the horse, I'm going
to be skewered by the Rev. Mom), and it promises to be a 
wonderful affair. I mean, it's a wedding for Christ's sake,
right?

We open up to the first page. This is long before the hops 
started flowing and the general kameraderie built up that 
would have made the whole thing easy: Leutnant Kjars has 
*the opening lines*.

Say that in all uppercase, son: LEUTNANT KJARS GOES FIRST!
Not only do I got to go first, I have to say:

    Disgusting... It's enough to bring a true, clean man to 
    vomiting. Germans--who should be aware of their obligation 
    to pure German womanhood--squirming in sweaty sheets with 
    halfbreed syphilitic cunts!

This was not in the contract. This was before I started writing the
"Fear and Loathing" con reviews--this was probably the catalyst for the
Fear and Loathing reviews. Once you start saying things like that, it's
hard to stop, you know?

I don't recall how I made it through the first page. I doubt I did it
justice. But the reading as a whole is one of my best con memories.
Everyone involved seemed to have a lot of fun, even when we tripped over
the German.

Jerry
[j--r--y] at [acusd.edu] (Finger/Reply for PGP Public Key)
------
"If you can't trust Hitler Youth, who *can* you trust?"
         --Leutnant Kjars Winzig