(thing) by Tato Tue Feb 15 2005 at 19:56:32
Come home after a long Valentine's weekend in San Francisco. Grab what's in the mailbox by reflex. In the sickly-soapy-smelling elevator (who spilled the Tide, and more importantly, why haven't they cleaned it up yet?), flip past Amex bill. Junk mail. Postcard.

Postcard? On the front, it says in white type over a 2-seconds-in-Illustrator abstract green background:

    TAURUS You are the Toro, and the Toro rushes for no one. With bullheaded stubbornness you plod toward your goals. You deliberate over our extensive menu. You order a wrap..."

It goes on, an advertisement postcard you can grab from many eateries. It is meant to be "viral" text, never clearly stating the name of the place, but it seems to be about a burrito eatery of that sort that likes to elevate its delicious bricks of food by calling them "wraps."

Flip it over.

On the left, descending:

  1. Ad text for flysong.com (no seeming relation to the other side of the postcard)
  2. In crayon:
    1. "Spare the poor fruits-" written in blue, gender-unidentifiable, mixed-case print.
    2. An apple. Archetypical. Swollen lopsided shoulders with small green leaf. Red outline with lighter red and yellow stripes for filling.
    3. A banana, outlined in green, filled with lemon yellow. Squat, a little curvy. Not particularly phallic.
    4. A signature, possibly reading "Chii", "Chil", or "Chie", hard to tell with the cursive and the smudged blue wax.
  3. logo & tagline for Song. (whatever that is)

In the middle, a line of ad text for the free-postcard company, maxcards.com.

On the right, descending:

  1. George Washington stamp
  2. Postal cancellation, Boston MA 02114, 10 Feb 2005, that includes an ad (?!) for the movie Robots covering our first president's stoic face.
  3. My e2 handle, i.e. Tato, followed by my meatworld street address.

Sure, feed the cats, give them some overdue loving. Glance at the catsitter's report card. They were beasts. Clean the litter anyway and check email. But really, really, wonder about the card.

What is this? Few of my friends know of my e2ther life, and they don't live in Boston.

Is the "Toro" an oblique reference to my username? Seems a stretch. Taurus certainly isn't my sign. Was the choice of card, then, random?

Is the "spare the poor fruits" an oblique reference to my 05 Feb rant? Someone who wants to defend our friends the felchers? If so why so sweet and roundabout? Why so anonymous? Maybe one of my other gayish writeups? Who is Chii/Chil/Chie? No users under any of those names. Why sign at all if it's going to mean nothing to me? Could the fruit and statement be a reference to my vegetarianism? A petition to return to old omnivorous ways? Who cares?

Who crossed the sacred meatworld border? How did they get my address? (Kit knows from E2SS2004, but she's not Bostonian.) (And there's only a passing reference to my old photoblog on my homenode. That site might have had this address, but googling it is futile in this regard since it's been down over a year.)

Why?

Is this an e2 stalker? How would that work? Can virtual bunnies be found virtually boiling? Which e2s in Boston or MA are likely? If a he, is he cute? I can't imagine my writeups spurn any kind of passion to warrant this, but yeah, I'm curious and a little weirded. And, at the end, flattered that someone would find me worth the 23 cents and crayolas.

Spare the poor fruits-

Strangest. Valentine. Ever.

WiccanPiper reports he knows another who got the same card...He opines Chiisuta...The mystery continues...

I like it!