Fire! Fire! Fire!

On this day back in Roman times, the Romans got to celebrate Volcanalia, held in honor of the god Vulcan, who oversaw volcanoes, fire, and blacksmithing. At right we see two modern-day acolytes of Vulcan practicing their arcane rituals in Highland, Texas, offering up a meaty sacrifice to their deity. (The blond one is doing it wrong.)

It was a bit queer when Mt. Vesuvius began to show signs of life on this particular day 1,930 years ago, because the Romans living on and around Vesuvius did not know what a volcano was, having never really seen one or thought much about the matter. That was unfortunate, because on the very next day Vesuvius went boom and Pompeii, Herculaneum, and a few other towns in the area simply disappeared. We know better now, as Helen Morgendorffer apparently once rejected the idea of moving to Mount St. Helens, even though Jake said it had her name and so must be a good place to live.

Even if you know all fifty of the United States of America, you probably don't know about the state of Franklin, which came into existence 225 years ago. How that came about is a long story. Today, what was once Franklin is now eastern Tennessee. History is weird, isn't it?

NUZ U KAN YUZ: I've decided to honor those who follow this blog, the dozen of you (love ya!), by adding a Followers gadget to the bottom of the left column. I would love to have more Daria fanz following my rantings and ravings, and you are welcome to join in. Sadly you do not get any money for doing this, nor bonus points or a free clock radio. However, you will have the deep satisfaction of... um, having deep satisfaction. It's worth it. Trust me.

If you are a follower, please drop a note here about what you like about this blog, and I will try to have more of it. Always happy to make you happy. And if you don't like something, let me know that, too.

As a side note, I've subscribed to all the Daria-related blogs I can find, but none of them are currently active except Fortress CINCGREEN, off and on. Dang. Is anyone else interested in starting a Daria fandom blog or fan website, so like we could have drag races and wrestling matches and everything? Never hurts to ask. Another blog would be interesting because it always changes, always has something different. Guess I never got the publishing, writing, and editing urges out of me when I left magazine work.

On a related matter, are there any other animated-series fandom websites? I never checked. Might be interesting to see what they're like and steal borrow something from them.

Moar soon. As promised...

ART UPDATE: Richard Lobinske has once again updated the 2009 Daria Visual Fanworks listing. Thank you!

PPMB

• One Point Perspective, by Roentgen (COMPLETE!): In the beginning of the year Daria Morgendorffer walked into Mr. DeMartino's classroom. And nothing in Brittany's life was ever the same.
• Unnamed story (Crossovers Not Yet Crossed Over), by Wraith (COMPLETE!): Daria slowly and deliberately marked her place with a bookmark, closed the book, and placed it in her lap. She then looked at Mr. Farrier for a uncomfortably long time before sighing. "Mr. Farrier. I'm not sure I made myself clear. Your offer was... curious. But extremely vague. I'm afraid I really can't call what I have "interest" until I know more about it. You do have my curiosity, though."
• Unnamed story (Iron Chef: Crazy Pairing Story), by OverlordMikey (COMPLETE!): Tom and Daria stand side by side. Suddenly Tom has a heart attack and then chickens come out of nowhere and peck at his corpse. [Additional material here.]
  

Ka-BOOM!!!

Twenty-eight years ago today, Mount St. Helens blew up in Oregon. I was in Germany in the Army at the time. One of the suspected aftereffects of the explosion was that in June that year it literally rained, with barely a pause, for over 40 days and nights across Europe. The Europeans grumbled and blamed it on the U.S., of course. It was our volcano.

Sexy image there of fire-breathing Helen. We will refer back to it later when we conduct a purely scientific examination of her, um, physical assets. (I'm working on it, BG.)

MMan has offered a new and intriguing PPMB Iron Chef, called Autobiography. "Timothy O'Neill has given all his classes an assignment: write your autobiography. Pick a Daria teen and show what his/her response is." The Iron Chef has already drawn one remarkable response, listed below.

Now 810 fans logged in at the Daria Fan Club. A little activity there, too. Keep it going.

Ranchoth offers a look into the technical side of his "It's a Job" post-IICY? universe, in which Daria goes to work for COBRA and does pretty darn good for herself. Her helicarrier, the CS Argent Bifid (trans.: "silver forked"), is depicted on DariaWiki in screencaps from old G.I. Joe TV episodes. The helicarrier's name doesn't make sense unless you realize that "silver" and "forked" both refer to "tongue," as in "silver tongued" and "forked tongue." Honeyed words that are all lies: exactly what Daria was hired by COBRA to produce in her flying print factory. Nice work.

What are the most disturbing images in Daria? Richard Lobinske thinks it's Mr. O'Neill's butt.

Got any obscure movie references made on the Daria show that no one else knows? Crossada75 is looking for others besides the one for The Gamma People.


FF.net

• Daria: The Door to safety is shut, by MrPowerpuff (Prologue and Parts 1 and 2): What am I doing hiding in a confessional at the Lawndale Church holding a gun in my hand pointing at the door?
• It's Like the Beginning of an Era, by Kristen Bealer (COMPLETE!)
• A Little Vacation, by Doggieboy80 (Epilogue 1)
  
• Someone Set Up Us the Bomb, by Smileyfax (Parts 2 to 4): This is certainly an unusual avocation for Daria: domestic atomic terrorist.
  

Fortress CINCGREEN

• Autobiography of Jane Lane, by CINCGREEN (COMPLETE!): This is beyond fantastic, it's so good. I dare not spoil it. Read it and hang on.

Lawndale Online

• Apocalyptic Daria, Part One, by Doggieboy (COMPLETE!)

PPMB

• Scenes No Daria Fanfic Should Have: Dawn of a New Nightmare: Nice to see that Daria has a new hobby: gourmet cooking.
  
• Scenes that Should Be: Brains for Rent: Cypher offers an intriguing shipper you won't believe at first, but it totally works. My eyes almost popped out of my head. Good job!

More to be added as the day progresses, plus maybe I'll get some work done on the short story and think of an essay while pulling weeds.