RALPH

THE following pagelinks are the latest in a series of stories built around the "character" of RALPH, which has grown and evolved over the years to be a tale of epic proportions. But first, a small biography of the one known as RALPH.

RALPH, the 'handle' I went (and go) by on various computer systems, has had a long and illustrious history. It started innocently enough with the use of the name. While logging onto a local BBS, it asked me for a handle. Since it stated "This does NOT have to be your name," I decided that it wouldn't be. Usually, people facing that choice would pick something exciting like "Zephyr" or "BigGuy" or "HamOnRye". But no, not me! RALPH, it seems, was what I wanted to be. On second thought, what I was destined to be. And the world has never been the same.

UNTIL then, I was always using my "real" name on the local scene. Using another moniker was surprisingly liberating - a fact not lost on the many "billions" of wild and unruly AOL users. Self-conciousness flies out the window, when you're not your "self". Of course, already being an odd one, this didn't really make a substantial difference in my style. You could for the most part, tell it was me. I went from signing my messages with "..KARL..." to signing my messages with "..RALPH...", for instance. (Why I started writing my name with all those ..PERIODS... is beyond me. But I wasn't about to give it up.) And so my disguise wasn't much of one, nor was it meant to be. But it was enough.

MANY chats with (and e-mails from) RALPH started with the salutation "Greetings, Earth Creature!" - a message most innocents seemed totally unprepared for. Originally, I was just being silly, but some people seemed to think I was trying to be serious (like one of those "I'm waiting for the Mothership" types) or something. So I kept embellishing it. The resulting confusion led to an adlib story built around "Pelzar, Seventh Prince of the Ordissioners of Ztercon Five, for All the Ozeekian Empire and Sublying Regions of Space," who, on Earth, was going by the name "RALPH." At last, I was home.

RALPH was always ready to hurl sillyness where ever it was needed. And it was needed pretty much everywhere, from my point of view. I managed to be silly, even when being serious. From asinine interjections, to outlandish explainations (the more serious-sounding silliness signed by stoic and staid "Professor Finklestien,") there was nary a message thread untouched. From the general topics, to the technical help sections, nothing was safe. I was everywhere, and loud enough to be noticed. And noticed, I was. Participation in the goings-on of the BBS escalated from general obnoxiousness into a full Sysop account, named (rather unsurprisingly) SYSRALPH. I even wrote a small shareware program to help in the running of the board (to you, my six registered users, I am eternally grateful).

NOWADAYS, RALPH hasn't been up to much. The BBS where RALPH was "born" (Crosstalk, Oracom #34) has fallen by the wayside, and there wasn't anyplace quite like that again. Wherever I looked, there just wasn't any place to be RALPH anymore. And so it faded into the background. The handle still gets used fairly often as a game-name, and there are people who'd rather use RALPH than my real name, but as a whole, it has been fairly dormant... 'Till now. My IP provides me with personal webspace, and after a year of deliberating I decided to use it. In a fit of rampaging silliness, I filled out a few pages using the RALPH "history" I have acquired over the years (embellishing wherever necessary).

Hope you enjoy my little universe, and try not to let the Garfubian Anklebiters bother you.

..KARL...

A Letter to Earth | A Brief History of RALPH | Ozeekian Imperial Fleet | Back Home