MeQal
- Handle: MeQal
- Real Name: Michael J. Pitts
- D.O.B.: Nov. 25, 1969
- Occupation: King of the Rednecks
- Marital Status: Married
- Kids: 3 daughters
- Handle Origin: I was part of a Star Trek club's Klingon division so I had to have a Klingon name. The name means "burns bright" and I have used it ever since.
- Alternate Handle(s): The Red X (mostly part of a running gag and occasional Halloween handle. Click link below for info regarding the gag), Purnell"Dope Smoking"Roberts, GoodKingmeQal (Chirstmas Handle)
- You Can Find Me Capping: I'll tell you later
Personal info
Words Of Wisdom
I was born naked and spent over half my life that way. Never stick Mr. Happy in a light socket. Join me in my endless quest for naked pictures of Ann B. Davis.
Adventures Which Taught Me Lessons
I have been one f those people who's own life is rather strange. Mostly because of my input in it. Often I draw upon these adventures as a basis for my captions and at least one has become a bit of a running gag. Sometimes I swear the TV show "My Name Is Earl" was created by someone who knew me in my younger days. Each of the adventures here have been told to some if not all cappers I know and go towards explaining where I draw some of my captions from. It will also show you inside the mind of this capper in my past and my present. Here are two which have bee shared with several cappers.
The Jehovah's Witness Story
On day, years ago I happen to spot two Jehovah Witnesses canvasing the neighborhood I lived in trying to convert people. Well not wanting to be bothered by them and rather intoxicated at the time, I devised a plan to get rid of them. So stripped naked and greeted the two at my door, asking them which one was going to do it with me first. They fled in panic and I had never been bothered by a Jehovah's Witness at my home since. While it may not be the best way to get rid of someone, it does work.
The Scotty Story
Around the same period of my life when the Jehovah's Witness thing happen, another thing happen involving Star Trek actor James Doohan. A local radio station happen to have him as a guest and set up for a meet and greet outside their station. Again drunk, I happen to heard about this and decided it would be a good idea to go meet him. Well drinking all night and eating who knows what then riding in a car with my brother and 2 other drunks to meet someone famous at 8AM never ends well. We arrived at the station wasted and not really sure where we were anyhow. Well my brother disappeared while I stood in line to get "Scotty"s autograph. Well as I happen to get to the table, the contents of my stomach decided to make an exit, all over the table, James Doohan, the 2 morning DJs, and myself. Meanwhile the station had already called the cops because my brother had walked in and urinated on a potted plant in the reception area. I learned a few things that day. 1. James Doohan did not have a Scotish Accent. 2. He did know several obscenities. 3. Meeting a celebrity after a night of hard drinking is never a good idea. 4. While it is normally alright to pee on a tree, you should never do it in someone's office building. 5. You can dive head first into the open window of a Chevy Nova.
History Of How I became A Capper
Prior to ever becoming a capper, even knowing about MST3K, or even knowing about the internet, there was just me wandering the world. I was an anominally in the world. Both the pushy bully and the geek. The Jock and the brain. The slacker and A B honor role student. People were not sure what to make of me. Yeah I hated authority but demanded justice for all. No wonder I went nuts. I found tht I was living this duality to please those around me. So I first decided to develope a way to deal with the world by saying "Screw everything and stay drunk". I decided to play stupid so people would not depend on me, get out of shape so people would not expect too much from me, and drunk so anyone else would not bother me. While this lead to some of my stranger adventures, it also all but killed me. Dean Wormer was correct when he stated, "Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life, son."
So I cleaned up my life and act. Soon I discovered that the brain, class clown, and geek were more to the real me. I still distrusted authority but saw a need for it. And Is till had a passion for justice for all. So after doing several various jobs, I happen to manage to get into mental health rights advocacy and stayed in it for years. During this time I happen to discover MST3K once my cable system picked up Comedy Central and became a fan. The draw to it was because friends and I use to mock bad movies at home. also it reminded me of days when I use to go see "the Rocky Horror Picture Show" and mock the screen. Only thing was, Joel and The Bots were much funnier than we were. I was hooked. then Sci Fi got the show and my cable provider did not carry it at the time. I moved shotly afterwards into a new place which had a different cable provider about the same time that Sci Fi started on the old one, so I was still without it.
A few years later the new cable company had picked up my area in some big purchase of small rural cable companies and added a lot of new channels. Sci Fi was one. So I was reintroduced to MST3K, not knowing that the show had been canceled and all I was seeing were reruns. Granted I didn't care, I still loved the show. Also I had gotten a new computer for my work. Granted it was on dial up and slow as all get out, yet I was able to get online in my home for the first time.
At first I did only gaming and work related stuff on my comp until I happen to discover Sci Fi's website. Then I found Caption This. By this point several of what are known as "old school cappers" had already began to leave. Also while I enjoyed capping, I was still too busy with work and other intrest to really pursue it at the time. Then my world changed.
First, I had a stroke which was caused by high blood pressure, work stress, and mental health problems. So I was forced to retire from advocacy work, reduce sodium in my diet, and remove stress. At the time I was running a huge gaming guild which was like a second job at home so I had to quit playing Massive MultiPlayer Online RolePlaying Games(MMORPGs for short) for the time. I also had to retire from my advocacy work and go on disablity. IT was either do this, or go insane then die.
So while on the mend and in a search for something to do with my time, I rememebred Caption This and returned there. It was still fun and I found it great at reducing my stress while keeping my sanity. I began to say things to other cappers and then tinaw mention antoehr capping site to me which was GersonK's Invinting Situations. This lead to my being told of Glitter's Cap-Page Board. So my road into capping was strange, rocky, dangerous, and almost killed me, yet the reward has been worth it. I have even returned to playing MMORPGs with fellow cappers.
In October of 2004 the first Cappers Guild in a MMORPG was formed by Scypha, Chebwa, Batqueen, and myself in the MMORPG "Guild Wars" during their beta testing. We have since added my youngest daughter and a friend of mine in real life who is a rare but occasional capper who uses the handle trailer park timmy. We still are around and are now one of the few guilds in the game that has all it's original members. We have been and will always be open to fellow cappers who join the game. We only don't take anyone but cappers, their friends, and family. Yet friends and family will be checked out with the refering capper name given.
So I guess you could say capping saved my life. Strange how something others would write off as a hobby can do something like that. I gues that is why I see the things I do for the capping community so important to me. Be it screengrabbing films, providing info, or overseeing Project Free Form, I pour myself into it as a labor of love.
Personal Views On Capping
Capping is both an art form and a form of expression in my opinion. And like all art or expression, not everyone will apreciate the end result. So like most artists, cappers write captions for the sake of capping for their own enjoyment.
Captions themselves come in a wide range from low brow humor to intellectual jokes. Some captions can be small in jokes between two or more people while others are ones all understand. Captions may often refer to things which require you to understand the mening of some words to get the joke while others don't.
Most capping gags are born because one or two people often find a common humor in something weather they made it up or not. They see an image which might remind them of something that makes them and another laugh. Soon others start to find out the joke and it begins to catch on. Running gags can be based on anything not just something one makes up themselves to be funny in capping.
In many ways capping is a form of comedy. Some captions have set ups and punchlines, others are one liners, and others involve the running gag. However unlike other forms of comedy, capping is not so much played up to the audiance as it is to the capper. Sure not everyone is going to get or enjoy the joke in a caption. Some might even be offended by it But it is for the entertainment for the capper and not others that the caption was written. This is why I often refer people to read a piece I wrote called [No Cow Is To Sacred To Slaughter] when they feel a caption is flat or offends their taste.
Personal View On Cappers
Cappers are some of the most caring people on the internet with a vicious sarcastic streak in them. We will riff on each other but will come to the aid of one of our own if there is any way possible. Some prime examples are the labors of love several cappers have taken own themselves to insure that since Caption This! has passed on into the ages there is still a few venues for capping. Cappers like GersonK, GlitterRock, and Jazzsoda have websites to keep capping alive. Generik and AgentMoldy have kept the spirit alive with their weekly Will Cap for Food e-mails. And even via snail mail capping continues with the Porpoise Project postcards mailed out by [porpoise] and displayed by [W[eird_1]] on his website.
So it is clear that capping is going to be around for some time to come.
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