Looking For Love In All the Wrong Epochs

I was planning on just handing over the entire blog -- lock, stock, and password -- to Blockade Boy, but I just had to get in one last post. Because something important happened. Just a few days after I'd managed to kick one obscure thirtieth-century superhero out of my apartment, two more showed up. Their names are Weight Wizard and Plant Lad, and they're looking for Blockade Boy.

I tried to take a photo of the duo but they didn't register on my digital camera. Probably because they're from the future. Or maybe I left the lens cap on. That happens sometimes. But they were nice enough to pose for a sketch. In case you can't tell from their costumes, Weight Wizard is the scrappy little guy on the right and Plant Lad is the gangly doofus on the left.

I didn't have time to do any colors, but you can get a general idea from how they looked in the comic books. Weight Wizard is blonde, with darker facial hair -- his coloring is kind of Nordic, I guess. And Plant Lad has grass-green hair and skin the exact same color and texture as a yellow bell pepper. Weight Wizard is the cheerfully intense type -- he shook my hand way too long and he was always nodding his head and he almost never blinked. Plant Lad didn't say much and generally seemed pretty out of it. ("Never mind Plant Lad," Weight Wizard explained. "He just went through a growth cycle and now he's in a dormant period.") I made everyone coffee and we had a good long discussion about Blockade Boy and about how their still being alive jibed with what I'd read in "Adventure Comics" #344 and #345 (May and June, 1966). It was eerily like the first time I ever sat down and talkd with Blockade Boy. Here's a transcript of our conversation:

Weight Wizard: First of all, I want your readers to know -- and Blockade Boy, too -- that I'm not proud of my actions in the Super-Stalag of Space -- well, except for that last one where I was a huge hero -- remember that? I rocked, pretty much! Noble and self-sacrificing as all get-out! But the other shit -- pranking Blockade Boy into shaving off his sweet-ass muttonchops and goatee, and letting Nardo use me as a mole (among other things!)... well, I just regret that stuff like there's no tomorrow! For realsies!

[Meanwhile, Plant Lad has found my television remote and is turning the TV on and off, on and off, on and off...! Weight Wizard finally grabs the control out of Plant Lad's hand and gives it to me.]

Plant Lad [slurring his words]: I was using that...!

Weight Wizard: What did we talk about on the way here? Huh? Buddy?

Plant Lad: *mumbles*

Weight Wizard [sharply]: Louder?

Plant Lad [reciting quickly and with a sudden anger]: "That I am to be on my best behavior and to do everything you tell me to do because when I am in this state I am for all intents and purposes a crazy person and cannot be trusted with the simplest of tasks!" Phht. Whatever! Suck my stamen, dickweed. [crosses arms and slumps down on the couch.]

Weight Wizard: Aw, don't -- great, now he's sulking. Jeremy, I don't suppose you have anything for him to read...? Like a book on soil cultivation, or maybe just a seed catalog or something with a guy sticking a rhubarb up his ass?

Me: Um. Nope. Oh, how about "ESPN the Magazine"? It's gigantic, and there are a lot of pictures.

Weight Wizard: Sweet! Let's rock 'n' roll!

Me: And by "rock 'n' roll" you mean, "fetch a magazine for a mentally-unbalanced plant/human hybrid to read?"

Weight Wizard: Hell yeah!

Me: Just checking.

[While Plant Lad busied himself with systematically tearing pages out of the newest issue of "ESPN the Magazine", Weight Wizard and I continued to talk.]

Weight Wizard: Here's the dealio: after Plant Lad and I--

Me: "Dealio?" People are still saying that one thousand years from now?

Weight Wizard: Aw, hells yeah. 'Matter of fact, that's how the revised U.S. constitution reads starting around 2170: "We the people, in order to keep it real, think this is the dealio..."

Me: Yikes.

Weight Wizard: Aaaaannnyyyywwwwaaaaaaayyyyyyyy.... this is the dealio: Plant Lad and I lammed it out of the Super-Stalag of Space! But as far as we knew, Blockade Boy had been killed! Then we got lost in the Galactic Frontier for a couple of months, and by the time we made it back to civilization, we learned that Blockade Boy had survived, but was missing! I was boggled! And how'd he escape the Stalag, anyhow?

Me: Well, he just tagged along with Matter-Eater Lad when Matter-Eater Lad escaped. Matter-Eater Lad tunnelled them both out by chomping through solid rock. But then Nardo and his androids surrounded them. Nardo was gonna kill Matter-Eater Lad, but Blockade Boy jumped in front of him.

Me: Since he had turned into a steel wall, the Nardo's powers didn't harm him. But he knew nobody else there knew that, so he played dead.

Me: They just left his body there. Blockade Boy waited 'til the coast was clear and then he took off.

Weight Wizard: Heh! Blockade Boy and me, we were always on the same wavelength! I faked my death, too! Well, Plant Lad helped! And he faked his death before I did!

Plant Lad [stares at a picture of a University of Tennessee fan who is slathered in orange bodypaint]: Grampa?

Weight Wizard [loudly clears throat]: As I was saying, during one of those times when Plant Lad actually had a functioning brain, he decided the only way out of that damn camp was in a body bag! And believe you me, he put on a real show!

Plant Lad: Jose Reyes is hot. [proudly shows us a picture of the Mets shortstop, then begins tongueing it]

Weight Wizard: That's nice, buddy. [pats Plant Lad's hand]

Me: Check out Adam Timmerman on page thirty-one.

Weight Wizard: Since Plant Lad is more vegetable than man, he can regenerate damaged tissue! But Nardo wasn't aware of that! So all Plant Lad had to do was pretend he was a goner and then let Nardo's androids dump his body outside the prison walls!

Me: Well, that explains how Plant Lad faked his death. How did you fake yours?

Weight Wizard: I just told you that Plant Lad, who can turn into any plant, faked his death and escaped. That was before I went over the fence and supposedly died! Put two-and-two together, man!

Me: Oh, no freakin' way. The giant flower!

Weight Wizard [grins]: That was Plant Lad! Lucky for me, I stumbled into that swamp where he was hiding out! He dragged me inside and whispered for me to let my body go limp! Once again, the bad guys just took off and left us there!

Me: Wait a minute. So three different prisoners on three separate occasions escaped that prison camp by faking their own deaths?

Weight Wizard: Yeah... now that I think about it, it wasn't a terribly well-run prison camp. Huh.

[Just then I hear a hissing sound.]

Me: Wait a minute! Where did Plant Lad go?

Weight Wizard: I'm on it!

[He produces a small whistle from behind his ear and blows into it. No sound comes out, but we hear Plant Lad say "OW!" from the direction of the kitchenette. We run over there and find Plant Lad trying to stick one of my cat Pepper's head in his mouth. I snatch the cat away from him.]

Plant Lad [rubbing his ears]: Gah! Don't do that!

Weight Wizard [slaps Plant Lad on the forehead]: Then don't do that! [jerks his thumb in the direction of the cowering feline]

Plant Lad: I just wanted to see if it would fit.

Weight Wizard: Go back outside and sit in the time bubble. Go! And don't touch anything!

[As Plant Lad flounces out the door, Weight Wizard notices my dubious expression.]

Weight Wizard: Naw, he can't take it anywhere! I got "the Club!"

Me: Wow. The things that are going to last one thousand years--! So, how did you two know to come looking for Blockade Boy here?

Weight Wizard: I overheard that fat fuck Storm Boy bragging to Eyeful Ethel -- his government-designated "fag hag" -- about how he'd found out that Blockade Boy was doing some time-travelling and costume designing, and how he was going to do the exact same thing, "only better," quote-unquote! I did some research and soon enough I found out that Storm Boy wasn't full of hot air! For once! Blockade Boy's face and name are all over the history books. It's nuts! I found traces of this blog on a server that archeologists had recently unearthed, and that's how I knew he was spending a lot of time here!

Me: Yup.

Weight Wizard: But the two of you weren't, er, "shacking up", was he?

Me: Nope.

Weight Wizard: Because you knew we were an item. Right?

Me: Yeah. I gathered that.

Weight Wizard: And the two of you never... did anything?

Me: Uh! No. He did a lot of other people, though. But the only guy he ever talked about was you. He mentioned you a lot.

Weight Wizard: He did? Aw, man, that is-- that's great! That's really fantastic!

Me: I think he misses you.

Weight Wizard: [grunts] Yes! Yes! You just made my freakin' day, my friend! So where's he at? When's he coming back here?

Me: I don't think he is coming back here.

Weight Wizard: I don't follow...

Me: I... kind of. Um. Kicked him out.

Weight Wizard: MOTHERFUCKER!

{Weight Wizard takes a swing at me but I easily duck it because he has like these little T-Rex arms.]

Me: Screw you, Tiny! I kicked his ass out of here, I can kick your ass out of here!

Weight Wizard [a little mortified with himself]: I'm sorry! I'm sorry! It's just... you gotta understand, man, I just need to see him again so bad...!

Me: Right. I'm sorry, too. Anyway, I get it. You two were like "this." [I cross my index and middle fingers]

Weight Wizard: And sometimes we were like this! [He makes a different gesture with his fingers that I don't think I can properly describe]

Me: I... did not need to see that. Look. Why don't we just see if he updated the blog? ...He can do that, right? From the future?

Weight Wizard: Only one way to find out, I guess! Let's rock 'n' roll!

Me: And by "rock 'n' roll" you mean "sit in front of a computer and read a blog?"

Weight Wizard: You know it, dog!

Me: Just checking.

(...And indeed, he had. Weight Wizard and Plant Lad are headed back to the 30th century, where they're going to give a very miserable Blockade Boy a very happy surprise. And he deserves it, the big sweet lug.

This is officially the last post for me, Jeremy Rizza. But if I know Blockade Boy, he'll have a new post for you right here, on Monday.)