We left the ruined city at dawn, gathering the meager knowledge we had salvaged into our packs and wagons. As we proceeded westward, I turned to gaze a last time upon the crumbling spires of the once mighty metropolis. What a glorious era, so long ago, when ignorance was deemed conquered for all time and knowledge was as plentiful as air and dirt. But ignorance had risen again and washed over this blasted land that had once been the SDMB, leaving the few remaining tribes to fight and die over the little knowledge left.
And little it was too. Every post we had come across was rife with mis-spellings and atrocious grammer. But when I looked at the rag-tag and motely crew I led, I could think of little more they deserved. Not a man or woman among them could spell “stereoscopic” or “mezereon,” and the few posts they generated were full of dangling modifiers and improper uses of pluperfect verb forms. Had it been my choice I would have abandoned them all, and struck out for the west myself, with only my trusted armorer Lectoris–keeper of the sacred Webster’s new collegiate dictionary and the Chicago manual of Style–by my side. But I had sworn an oath on the graves of my ancestors to lead them to the western hills, where Cecil Adams himself is rumored to neither dead nor living lie. Where he awaits those who remember knowledge to raise him from his dreamless stasis.
My reveries were interrupted by the sight of one of my scouts returning at full speed. I knew the lad, a boy more bright than most in my sorry horde. He reined his steed beside me and approached with a breathless and excited mien.
“A post!” he cried, waving a piece of parchment, “a post such as I have never seen!”
I took the parchment and read it. By god, the boy’s excitment was justified! Not a word in this post was mis-spelled. The argument it laid out was spun from flawless syllogistic reasoning, bolstered by rhetoric that would not have shamed Cicero, or Demosthenes. This could only have come from the keyboard of ExecutiveJesus himself.
Ah, Executive Jesus! Long have I cursed the cruel fate that made us mortal enemies. Together we would have made an indomitable team and perhaps brought knowledge back to this benighted land. But it was not to be. Our differences in politics, religion and philosophy would keep us opposed till that one terrible day where we must meet in intellectual combat till only one remains. I know that when that day comes niether you nor I shall give or expect quarter. But I also know that whether it be you or I that leaves the field it shall be in sorrow, not in anger.
Now more of my horde had gathered, curious as to the consternation. One fellow, more slack-jawed than most was staring at the post, moving his lips in a vain attempt to decipher its meaning.
“Whut dood rote this” he mumbled “Why, thar aint no wurds made wrong and lookee here, he even got a semi-colon.”
I could take no more. Swiftly I grabbed the ruffian by the throat.
“You want to know who wrote this? I’ll tell you. A MAN wrote it! And…by God I wish I was with him!”
(with apologies to Edgar Rice Burroughs and Sam Peckinpah)
