I used to play AD&D. For you squares, that’s “Advanced Dungeons and Dragons”. I’m sure you’re wondering how much more “advanced” you can get when you’re already rolling 20-sided dice, pretending you’re an elf, and saying shit like, “If I fail my saving throw, I’m going to try to escape these orcs by casting Mordenkainen’s Magnificent Mansion – no wait, Charm Monster! CHARM MONSTER!!!” But trust me, AD&D was heads and shoulders above regular D&D.
Truth is, it was just the same as regular D&D with a different set of rules and some new and even more confusing math formulas to memorize. A couple of days ago I was browsing a website with palm pilot software and I found a program that allows you to calculate all that dice-rolling and THAC0 bullshit (if you don’t know what THAC0 is, don’t ask) on your PDA. This would have been awfully handy back in my day. Only half of the time playing AD&D consisted of actual role-playing. The other half was made up entirely of rolling dice and scribbling utterly illegible figures down onto pieces of scrap paper, making a hurried attempt at arithmetic, secretly giving up and taking your best guess at an answer, and hoping your fellow players bought it.
As usual, I digress. In AD&D there is a ninth level spell which, despite its seemingly pitiful number, is actually extremely powerful. It’s simply called “Wish.” It worked exactly like you would guess – you cast the spell, then make a wish.
Despite its Ockham’s Razor-esque simplicity, sadly, the spell had several drawbacks:
1) Being a very powerful spell, it took a very powerful wizard to cast it, which meant it took lots and lots and lots of time rolling dice, pretending to add numbers, and killing orcs.
2) The actual effect of the wish was determined by a terrible person in real life called the “Dungeon Master,” or “DM” for short. The DM was the person who sort of “steered” the game as the players played it. They decided when it was time to enter a dungeon, fight a bunch of orcs, drink a bunch of mead, etc. The DM also decided various outcomes of events and actions taken by the game’s players. The wording of the wish was inevitably what would come back to bite the wizard in the ass. For instance, let’s say you wished for world peace. The resultant effect might be that every living thing in the world fell into a coma and later died of starvation. That would be peaceful, wouldn’t it? Or maybe you wish for a million gold pieces (the standard generic currency in any fantasy world) – they might appear right in the air above your head and fall to the ground, crushing you. No matter how carefully worded the wish, the DM would use it as an opportunity to screw with you. Only the most carefully worded legalese would keep you from getting skewered by the DM, so in a lot of ways, it was a challenge – you try to make the wish foolproof and the DM tries to find the loophole that might cause your penis to shrivel up and fall off, either in the game or in real life. Either the DM will lose his pride or you’ll lose your hat. You usually end up hatless.
3) It drained the wizard to the point that, after casting the spell, no matter the outcome, a stiff breeze could kill him, another stiff breeze could resurrect him, and then another stiff breeze could kill him again.
So, ultimately, making a wish was almost always a losing proposition, but it kept things interesting.
A while ago I thought about the classic genie-in-a-bottle scenario that we’re all familiar with. You’re in your recently deceased Great Uncle Arthur Von Autumnbottom’s creepy attic where he kept all of his ancient artifacts from his time as an archaeologist/bounty hunter/ladykiller, and you stumble across a brass lamp. You rub the lamp, because hey, let’s face it, if the lamp didn’t want to be rubbed, it wouldn’t be wearing that short skirt and dancing like that, and out pops a genie. And what happens next, kiddies? The genie grants you three wishes, but you have to go pick up his dry cleaning first.
Now I don’t know a damn thing about genies, but something tells me that they’re a bunch of sonsabitches. I know, that’s a totally unfair assessment to make, but I’m sort of an asshole, so there you have it. I just have this feeling that genies have a bit of DM in them. I bet if you wished for something, the genie would just delight in twisting your words and distorting the purpose of the wish.
Now I’m fuming about these genie bastards. But there’s bound to be some hip, laid back genie who wouldn’t pull that shit, right? So, how about:
You’re in your recently deceased Great Uncle Franky Gertrude Wienersteiger’s creepy attic where he kept all of his carnival game winnings from his time as a beat poet/eccentric dandy/schizophrenic funhouse operator, and you stumble across a brass lamp shaped like a hula-dancing lady. You rub the lamp and out pops a very peculiar genie. He’s wearing a Hawaiian shirt and pounding tequila. The genie grants you three silly wishes.
First he explains to you the parameters of the so-called silly wish:
1) It must have a comedic effect.
2) It cannot be utilitarian in any meaningful way.
3) In can’t be used to harm or hinder anyone or provide you with any great benefit.
Now this is my kind of genie. The question here is: what would you wish for? Here were some of my ideas, in no particular order. If I had to narrow it down to three, I don’t know which I’d pick.
1) To be able to make a person fart or belch with one smoldering stare. How hilarious would this be? How many riotous uses would this have? There they are. The mousy librarian with her nose buried in a book. The President delivering the State of the Union. Your boss leading a staff meeting. Your father-in-law saying grace at Thanksgiving dinner. You assault them with one burning glance and suddenly, their asses are on fire. I would develop incontinence fairly quickly with this one, pissing myself during fits of hideous, uncontrollable laughter. The best part would be the stare – they would know that somehow it was you that made them cut the cheese. But they would never, ever be able to prove it.
2) To have the disembodied song of my choice play when I enter a room. I’m mad. I enter the room. Darth Vader’s theme from Star Wars plays from seemingly nowhere. No one screws with me. I’m in a great mood. I bounce into the room to the sound of James Browns’ Sex Machine. My young son just got busted shoplifting a rifle from Walmart and I have to have a stern yet loving talk with him. I walk into his bedroom and one of those corny instrumental tunes from “Full House” begins to waft through the air. The applications are seemingly endless.
3) To be able to insert myself into the background of any photograph or movie. This one requires some explaining. This could only be in the background of the photo or movie (as an extra) and my appearance would suit the occasion or theme of the photo/movie. Some instances: a photo of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie at the Oscars, and I’m in the background in a tux sipping a martini. An old family photo of someone’s family reunion from 1974 and there I am sitting in a lawn chair, talking to your cousin, drinking a beer. You’re watching the immortal Vietnam classic Platoon, and there I am, one of the soldier extras getting mowed down by the enemy, right before Chuck Sheen steps into the frame. This would be hilarious simply because nearly every instance would be so totally inexplicable.
4) To turn any moment into a Bollywood song and dance. If you’re a fan of Indian cinema, you know what I’m talking about. The name Bollywood is a marriage of Bombay (now Mumbai), the film center of India, and Nashville, the home of country music. Sorry, that’s Bashville. Hollywood, that’s what I meant. Bollywood movies are singularly characterized by numerous song and dance routines (called filmi, from Hindi, meaning “of films” – this is actually true, not me being a smartass) by the actors and actresses themselves, which are used to move the plot along. In this way, Bollywood movies are not entirely unlike musicals, except for the fact that they are diabolically fucking twisted. They’re so strange, in fact, that I have a hard time actually believing that most Bollywood movies were actually filmed in this dimension. I could stand to participate in, say, a dozen or so of these a day.
5) To have my own laugh track. You know that look Mr. Furley gave to the camera every time that crazy Jack Tripper give him a swift comedic kick in the nuts? (See figure 1.1)
Figure 1.1: Don Knizzots, bizotch
Christ, they’re both dead. That’s sad. Anyway, remember how he’d throw that look and get a big rise out of the studio audience? Yeah, I want that. In real life.
6) To, at any moment, have a coterie of dark-suited men wearing dark sunglasses and earpieces enter a room, whisper in my ear, and gingerly escort me away. This clearly violates the utilitarian rule, as this could be quite useful in dozens of situations, including staff meetings, blind dates, before a long stretch of yard work, during the first thirty seconds of a Jerry Bruckheimer film, etc. However, it would still be, how you say… brilliant.
In closing: yes, this is how my mind works. Yes, I know I have issues.
