The DDT Interview, Part I

Accustoming myself to the dimly lit corridor, I was greeted by a long-haired, bespectacled man wearing a blue turtleneck sweater and blue jeans. He offered me his hand, “Chris Meyer, and you must be Dick Dorkmeier. Mark telephoned yesterday to say you were coming.” “Yes,” I replied, “he said you would be expecting me.” “Well, kind of, I guess. I seldom have guests. Please make yourself at home,” he said, gesturing to the dining room table. “Would you like something to drink, beer, coffee?” “I’ll have a beer,” I said as I sat down, thirsty from the long flight and ready to unwind a bit. In the background, a stereo played The Rolling Stones album, Flowers, from 1967. Meyer went over to the refrigerator in the kitchen just off the dining area and pulled out a couple of Bamberg smoked beers, Rauchbier. “I hope you like Rauchbier, because if you don’t, you’re shit out of luck,” he stated matter of factly, handing me the bottle which he had just popped open. “I don’t do glassware if I can help it, too much fucking washing. Prost!” He struck the bottom of my bottle with his and sat down opposite me at the dining room table. “So what do you want to talk about?” he asked, peering over his glasses in a manner not unlike that of a high school principal talking to a juvenile delinquent.

Dick: First of all, I’d like to thank you for taking time from your busy schedule to talk to us at GBCN today.

Meyer: No problem.

Dick: This week is the first anniversary of the web log, Festung Europa. What made you create this blog in the first place?

Meyer. (laughing) Boredom mostly. No, seriously, I had thought for a while about putting my views and thoughts down in digital format. One, Festung Europa was designed for me to be able to put my bullshit on display for the entire world to see. Secondly, I thought it would be a good idea as a sort of reunion for all my geek friends across the planet, a way to keep in touch. And thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, it’s therapy.

Dick: Therapy? How so?

Meyer: I had for a while entertained the thought of entitling the deal, “My Mid-life Crisis”, but I decided upon Festung Europa instead.

Dick: Why Festung Europa?

Meyer: Well, there are a few reasons, really. Festung Europa was the name given by the Nazi propaganda machine to National Socialist Europe as a way of saying, our Europe is a fortress, and cannot be penetrated by the enemy. Well, that was a lot of bluster really, proven false by D-Day, but the name stuck. And living in Europe, I thought it apt. And, of course, it also made sense for me to call it Festung Europa as it is a take on the name Fortress Immacula, which applied to another fortress familiar to many.

Dick: Ah, yes. Fortress Immacula. That name pops up a lot in your blog.

Meyer: Yeah, mainly as it was the high point in the culture of the Stingray Regime, now 20 years hence.

Dick: How did this whole Stingray Regime thing come about?

Meyer. That is a long story, probably longer than you or I have time for, but let’s just say it was a mutual creation of a bunch of free-thinking, substance-abusing college students back in the mid 1980’s. It would have died out a long time ago were it not for my thinking, ‘Hey, there may be something to this.’ I have tried to keep it alive by fleshing out the details.

Dick: What is the meaning of it all?

Meyer: That’s a pretty fucking open ended question, Dick. What is the meaning of it all? Fuck, if I knew that, I wouldn’t be sitting here talking to you. I’d be on the self-help circuit, pimping my book and my 12-step plan to personal betterment. All I’d need are a Tony Robbins’ haircut and teeth whitener.

Dick: I meant the Stingray Regime.

Meyer: There is no great, secret meaning to be found in it. 95% of it is bullshit, but so is life, isn’t it? I guess if you have to put some kind of meaning on it, it would be a story of the non-conformists against the forces of conformity.

Dick: The Xarlons?

Meyer. Yeah, the Xarlons are the forces of conformity. Come on, look at the life of the average person on the planet. They are being told to conform to the system from day one. ‘Do this. Buy that. Be this. Think that.’ I guess the message, if there is any, to be found in the battles of the Stingray Regime against the Xarlons is: you do have a choice not to participate in it all.

Dick: But that seems like a hard row to hoe. Are you advocating removing yourself completely from society?

Meyer: I guess, Dick, I would be advocating trying to change the way society operates. Or, at the very least, being aware of the pressure that the forces of conformity, the Xarlons, inflict upon you every day, and with this awareness, utilizing it in your decision making.

Dick: But why did you chose Stingray Regime?

Meyer: It wasn’t my choice. One day in 1987, Kevin Brocker returned from the Peterson Pits swimming hole north of Ames with part of a metal pool cue which he had found under the water. Upon surfacing, he proclaimed to Jeff Denui, standing nearby, that he was Stingray and that this was the Staff of Stingray. I suppose the idea came from an ill-fated TV show during that time of the same name. He returned that evening to the frat house where we were living over the summer and declared himself to be Stingray. No one really bought it until once, while using the staff, he deftly deflected an oncoming model helicopter, sending it crashing into pieces. Then we thought, ‘Hmm, maybe there is something to this.’

Dick: That convinced you?

Meyer: Well, you have to consider that we all were under the influences of powerful, mind-altering substances. Plus, he gave us cool names. Again, I think television played an influence in the early naming system, as this was the time of Masters of the Universe, He-man and all that jazz. In this manner, Denui, also known as Beaker for his interest in chemistry, became Master of Knowledge. I became Defensemaster. Scott Tensen, a.k.a. T at this time, later to become Guy, was known as Mystic Master, although I kind of think T gave this name to himself, as I don’t remember any particular proclamation of nomenclature from Stingray himself.

Dick: And this place were you were living was Fortress Immacula.

Meyer: No, the third floor of the Adelante frat house became Immaculate Village, a name most likely derived from the Doors’ song Texas Radio and the Big Beat: “Out here in the perimeter there are no stars. Out here we is stoned…immaculate.” The whole idea with the Immaculate Village concept fits in with what I talked about earlier regarding non-conformity. We were kind of outlaws up on the third floor. During the summer, chicks would rent out rooms in the house. There were a couple of Asiatics plus a black chick living down the hall from us, but by the middle of the summer, we had smoked them out, so to speak. They didn’t really fit in with the whole Immaculate Village concept: hunting, gathering and free love. Anyhow, Fortress Immacula is what came next, after we fled Immaculate Village.

(to be continued)