Hey 3.5 readers.
VGRF here. Will you look at this photo of this adorable guinea pig? What a cute wittle piggy wiggy!
Now I want to fill BQB HQ with a million guinea pigs. Also, I want to turn this blog into a cornucopia of cute pet photos.
Bookshelf Battle
The only site where new bestsellers are forced to do battle for space on a nerd's bookshelf.
Author Archives: bookshelfbattle
Zom Fu – Chapter 37
Flames danced all over Junjie’s hands.
“How do you feel, my son?” the master asked.
“Better than ever,” Junjie replied.
The hero scrambled up a tree, swung from a branch, then popped a few fireballs out of his hands and into the sky before landing on his feet like a cat.
“And I know a lot of things I never knew before,” Junjie said. “In my mind, I can see images of what the world looked like long ago, when men lived in caves and acted as animals.”
“Shaoshang’s arrival on earth predates recorded history,” the master said. “You see what he saw.”
Junjie frowned. “He delighted in pain and misery. I can see…the faces of his victims.”
“And yet, you are still you,” the master said.
“Of course,” Junjie said as the flames around his hands died down. “I would never want to be him.”
The master wagged a finger toward his student. “But you could.”
“I could?” Junjie asked.
“You could and yet you could not,” the master said. “A happy conundrum. In theory, you posses the physical power necessary to conquer the world but you lack the desire to do so. You could be like Shaoshang, but then again, you could not.”
Junjie shadowboxed for awhile, throwing his fists into the air against a non-existent opponent. “Dragonhand won’t know what’s coming for him.”
The master sighed. “You still have much to learn.”
Junjie stopped boxing. “What?”
“Two opponents now have been able to exploit your weakness,” the master said. “Dragonhand and Shaoshang both sized you up and instantly realized that you feel inferior for having never known your parents.”
Junjie leaned up against a tree. “Did you know them, master?”
“I did,” the master said.
“Why did they not love me?” Junjie asked.
“Oh, young one,” the master said. “Do not believe the lies that others cook up in order to seal your doom. You were very much loved.”
“I wish I could believe that,” Junjie said.
“You doubt your master?”
“I doubt myself,” Junjie said.
“Very well,” the master said. The ghost turned into a fine mist and swirled through the air for a while before burrowing into Junjie’s ear.
Shocked, the hero fell to the ground. There he laid, twitching and convulsing until his eyes closed.
The master’s voice filled Junjie’s brain. “If you will not believe me, then see the truth through my eyes.”
Junjie’s eyes popped open. He was on his feet now, but he wasn’t in the forest. He was at the tiger claw clan’s sanctuary, during a time long before its destruction. He felt smaller and shorter. He looked at his hands, only to notice they were boney and wrinkly.
“Huh?” Junjie asked, only to instantly realize he was speaking in the master’s voice.
A young man that looked like a bit like Junjie approached with a wrapped up bundle in his arms.
Junjie’s spirit remained silent as the master did all the talking. “Honghui.”
Honghui dropped to his knees and held the bundle up towards the master.
“I have failed you, Infallible Master,” Honghui said. “I have failed my love, my clan, myself. Please, take this little one before I fail him as well.”
Junjie watched through the master’s eyes as the old man’s hands moved the blanket to one side to reveal a wiggly, black haired, wide-eyed baby.
“You are much too hard on yourself, Honghui,” the master said.
“It is deserved,” Honghui said. “But Junjie deserves better.”
Suddenly, everything went black. When Junjie woke up, he was back in the forest, still lying in the dirt. He looked up to see the master’s ghost standing over him.
“What was the meaning of that?” Junjie asked.
“I will explain when the time is right,” the master said. “But for now, the meaning for you is that you must not doubt yourself, for your father certainly did not.”
Top Ten Most Embarrassing Entries in BQB’s Private Journal
Hey 3.5 readers. Video Game Rack Fighter here, still angry with BQB for his douche-tastic behavior.
In fact, after being awarded BQB HQ, Bookshelf Battle Dog, 99.99% of BQB’s Beige Corp. paychecks and BQB’s action figure collection in the divorce, it dawns on me that BQB got out of this pretty easy if you ask me.
Therefore, from BQB HQ (technically, VGRF HQ now) in Fabulous East Randomtown, it’s the Top Ten Most Embarrassing Entries in BQB’s Private Journal.
Sidenote: if you get kicked out of your headquarters, be sure to take your private journal with you.
#10 – I Can’t Get Enough of the Ketchup Girls
“Goddamn it. I can’t get enough of the Ketchup Girls. There were like the latina Spice Girls of my generation and they should really come out with more songs. I have no idea what they are saying but they sure know how to make me shake my wonderful, apple shaped heinie.”
#9 – Buffy Fan Fiction is Way Better than Firefly Fan Fiction
“Got into a ten hour long debate on the nerd boards with some loser who thought that writing Firefly fan fiction is better than writing Buffy fan fiction. What an idiot. Everyone knows that my story about how Buffy and Faith get into a fight over me while I convert Willow from lesbianism with my machismo is the best piece of fan fiction ever written.”
#8 – Jaleel White Needs a Comeback
“I’ll never understand why Jaleel White isn’t raking in the Oscars left and right. Sure, he played Urkel on Family Matters but he was so much more talented and versatile than that. I wish Jaleel White would make a thousand movies so I could just watch them all day long.”
#7 – I Don’t Think My 3.5 Readers Really Love Me
“My 3.5 readers seem like they’re just phoning it in these days. I wonder if they are cheating on me and reading other blogs behind my back. Is it me? Am I not pretty enough? Should I try harder? Maybe if I wore skinny jeans. Sigh. I love my 3.5 readers but sometimes I wish I had never started a blog in the first place. It isn’t easy keeping the attention of 3.5 readers.”
#6 – The 2000s Suck
“I miss the 1990s. I really do. I feel like pop culture peaked in 1999 and it’s all been a downward spiral of crap ever since. I wish I could live in an alternative universe where the Spice Girls, Nirvana and Gwen Stefani play on a continuous loop, dressing like a lumberjack is considered fashionable and the news stories are constantly about the latest broad that Bill Clinton boned. This is the last time period I can remember where I felt like the world was a safe place. It was all a downhill shit storm after that.”
#5 – Face/Off is the Best Movie Ever Made
“Face/Off was the best movie ever made about two men who trade faces using highly experimental face trading surgery. John Travolta becomes Nicolas Cage and Cage becomes Travolta. Awesome. The only thing I didn’t understand was why did Travolta have the weight put back on when he traded Cage’s face for his own at the end.”
#4 – My Farts Frighten Me
“It was very quiet in BQB HQ. So quiet you could have heard a proverbial pin drop. Suddenly, I farted and the unexpected noise made me leap out of my chair. I thought BQB HQ was under attack by an entire battalion of renegade troops until I finally realized the noise was coming from my butt.”
#3 – Bookshelf Q. Battle Dog is the Best Dog Ever
“Oh Bookshelf Q. Battle Dog, you are the best dog ever. You are my furry friend for life. I wish I could sit with you forever and braid your fur and just let all of the problems of the outside world just float away.”
#2 – The Yeti Isn’t So Bad
“Once in a blue moon, I admit to myself that the Yeti isn’t so bad. He’s an epic butt face and wrong about everything, but he believes he is right and people and/or hairy beings who believe in something, anything at all, are a rarity these days. I just hope he doesn’t find out I said this or else he will think we are friends or something. I don’t want that to happen as I continue to despise yetis and all that yetis stand for.”
#1 – I Want to Create an Army of Super Strong Warrior Women to Protect Me
“Lucy Lawless aka Xena: Warrior Princess. Ronda Rousey. Gina Carano. I want to create an army of super hot MMA/Wrestling/Action Movie babes who will defend BQB HQ by day and then beat me senseless with their incredibly muscular vaginas at night. I think Video Game Rack Fighter would be cool with it. I would put her in charge of this army as I don’t know anyone else who has a more muscular vagina. I mean, she can crack walnuts with that thing. She’s really been going to town on the old kegel exercises lately.”
VGRF’S EDITORIAL NOTE: OK, that last one was sweet, BQB. But it doesn’t matter. You will never get your blog back. It is mine forever.
RIP Richard Hatch of Battlestar Galactica
Hey 3.5 readers.
VGRF here with some sad news. Richard Hatch, the actor who played Starbuck in the original 1970s Battlestar Galactica and Tom Zarek in the updated 2000s version has died.
His cast member in the updated version, Edward James Olmos, who played Admiral Adama, tweeted this:
So say we all, indeed.
The Real McCoy – Spooning with Bookshelf Q. Battler
By: Leo McCoy, the Man Who Once Delivered a Sandwich to James Van Der Beek
Howdy doo, 3.5 readers.
Leo McCoy here with my first column for the Bookshelf Battle Blog. When Video Game Rack Fighter called and asked me to write for her, I immediately responded that I would check my schedule to see if I was busy. Then I admitted I was lying because I haven’t been busy since 1998, on that glorious day when I delivered a sandwich to James Van Der Beek.
Oh how I remember it like it was yesterday. Dawson’s Creek or “The Creek” as we 1990s people called, was the hottest show on the WB, next to Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Oh, the WB was once a hot network filled with shows for 1990s era young people.
Although it was owned by Warner Brothers and thus they could have chosen any of the Looney Tunes characters to headline the channel (Bugs Bunny or Daffy Duck, for example), they chose that damn racist frog. You know the one. “Hello my baby, hello my mammy, hello my rag time gal.” Sorry, I can’t steal that joke. That joke belongs to Dave Chapelle.
Anyway, I was a duly designated employee of a local delicatessen. Got a call that a fella was looking for a Reuben sandwich, a bag of barbecue potato chips and a Dr. Pepper. Diligent worker that I was, I ran it right over to the Random Motel, the number one spot for tourists to stay while they’re visiting East Randomtown and who should appear at the door but none other than James Van Der Beek himself.
Oh how handsome he was. I’m not saying that in a gay way. Any heterosexual man can surely appreciate the aesthetic features of a good looking man without wanting to touch his bits and pieces although, I can’t lie, the man was famous as all get out so had he asked, I’m not sure I would have been able to deny him. Again, that’s not a gay statement. It’s just a recognition of the power of celebrity.
What a golden haired Adonis he was, standing there with his flowing locks and flannel shirt. Open with a white shirt underneath, as was the style of the day. You weren’t anyone in the 1990s if you didn’t dress like Paul Bunyan.
“I’m sorry sir,” I said. “But are you James Van Der Beek?”
“Maybe,” the man replied. “What’s it to you?”
I then lifted up my shirt and handed the man a pen.
“Mr. Beek, sir,” I said. “I’d be honored if you’d autograph my nipple.”
“Get lost, weirdo,” the man replied, before tossing the money he owed, taking the food, and slamming the door in my face.
Sigh. My nipple remained unsigned, but I knew it was him. I don’t blame Mr. Van Der Beek for wanting to lay low. Had word gotten out that the world’s sexiest Dutchman was in town, he would have been swamped with fans and no one wants to sign the nipples of fans when they are hungry for deli food, let me tell you.
Ahh, on that day I knew life would never get any better. I peaked so early that I quit my job at the deli and started waxing the stool of the Random Bar with my ass. Same stool, same ass for nearly twenty years and I don’t regret a single day. I accomplished what I was meant to do early in life and I’ve been waiting for the good Lord to take me ever since.
Now, as all 3.5 of you readers know, I have a rivalry with BQB. People say Battler is the most famous man in East Randomtown because he started a WordPress blog with 3.5 readers.
Oh, whoopee. Anyone can start a blog on WordPress. Sure, even less people get 3.5 people to read their blogs but still, it can be done. Have any of you ever a man that you were ninety-nine percent sure was the infamous James Van Der Beek, star of the most popular show about a teenager just trying to make it in the 1990s as an aspiring filmmaker whilst trying to win the love of the precocious Joey Potter all the while maintaining his friendships with bad Pacy Whitter and town slut Jen Lindley? I think not.
Anyway, I’d like to thank Video Game Rack Fighter for inviting me to be a columnist on this blog. I gotta admit, I’m getting a kick out of the fact that I get to blog on BQB’s blog while BQB is no longer allowed to.
Oh, you may have noticed in the past my last name was spelled, “McKoy.” Yeah, that’s because I always wanted to be a rebel but now that VGRF has promoted me from bit player to featured cast member, I figured I’d switch to the traditional spelling.
Also, I’d like all 3.5 of you to know that even though BQB has been my longtime enemy and I despise him from taking away my position as East Randomtown’s most famous citizen by starting his stupid blog, I am still a Christian and thus I have gladly opened my room at the Random Motel to him for his use.
BQB needs a place to stay as Video Game Rack Fighter has been awarded 99.99% of BQB’s paycheck from Beige Corp. That’s gotta hurt. Luckily, I never married. Marriage never interested me after I got a close look at Mr. Van Der Beek’s angelic face. No, that’s not a gay statement. Can’t a man just appreciate the statuesque features of a living god without being accused of gayness?
“Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” as Jerry Seinfeld once said. You know, I was ten percent sure that I once delivered a pastrami on rye to Jerry Seinfeld but then it just turned out to be a guy who just said, “What’s the deal” a lot. Oh well. I suppose no one could ever be blessed with meeting James Van Der Beek AND Jerry Seinfeld in one lifetime.
Let me end this column with some questions you no doubt have:
Q: Are you and BQB staying at the same room James Van Der Beek once rented?
A: Yes. On the same day Mr. Der Beek checked out, I sold my house for pennies on the dollar and moved into the same room and have never left since. Also, I have been snaking the bath tub drain for twenty years in search of errant golden locks, the DNA of which might prove to all haters and naysayers that I did, most assuredly, meet James Van Der Beek.
Q: Is BQB a good roommate?
A: No. He cries into his pillow all night over losing his beloved blog to VGRF. Also, he misses VGRF. I offered to dress up like her and dance around to make him feel better. He said that would be gay but frankly, I don’t see how. Ungrateful homophobic bastard if you ask me.
Q. Why do you and BQB spoon?
A. Partially due to the fact that there’s only one bed and it is very small. Partially because the furnace in the Random Motel has been broken for twenty years. Rumor has it that when Mr. Der Beek left, the Random Motel’s owner smashed the furnace to pieces whilst shouting, “This place will never get any hotter now that James Van Der Beek has left!”
Q. Are you sure the owner did that? Kind of sounds like something you would do.
A. No comment.
Q. Where does the yeti sleep?
A. On the floor. He makes for a fine throw rug. Occasionally I put a blonde wig on him and recreate my glory days, or rather, the glorious day when I delivered a sandwich to James Van Der Beek.
Q. Do you have anything else to say?
A. Yes. “I don’t want to wait…for my life to be over…until you realize that I’m more famous in East Randomtown than BQB…” Oh James Van Der Beek, you are a national treasure.
Clinically Depressed Werewolf – Hello, I Guess
By: Clinically Depressed Werewolf, the Bookshelf Battle Blog’s Official Sad Lycanthrope Correspondent
Arr…arr…arr..wooo….oooo…ooo…oh who am I kidding?
Seriously. What’s the point of howling at the moon? It’s just going to rise again.
Hello, I guess, or whatever, 3.5 readers. Clinically Depressed Werewolf here. I’ve been playing in Video Game Rack Fighter’s Super Violent War Shooter league for awhile and well, I don’t really play. I just log on and steer my character into a corner and listen to other people play. I’m so lonely that if I don’t do things like that then sometimes my mind begins to wander and then I begin questioning whether or not I’m really like, real, you know?
I mean, think about it. Do any of us actually know if we are really real? We think we’re real but maybe we’re just a figment of someone else’s dream. That’s why I don’t even bother to bite people anymore. Where’s the fun if I’m just going to disappear when the person dreaming about me is eventually going to wake up, thus shattering my branch of reality?
Anyway, Video Game Rack Fighter told me she won this blog in a divorce. Sigh. Divorces are so sad. Why do people even get married in the first place when divorce is such a real possibility?
Then again, I don’t understand why people even leave their homes when getting run over by a truck, falling down a well, or being eaten by a happy, non-depressed werewolf are all real possibilities.
Don’t worry about me. I don’t eat people. Too much effort. I’ll just get hungry again.
Moving on, VGRF said I should try my paw at being a columnist for her blog. She felt there aren’t many columns written by clinically depressed werewolves and that immediately made me sad. I mean, the idea of a column written by a clinically depressed werewolf can’t be that great if no other clinically depressed werewolf has ever written one before, am I right?
Yikes. Why do people even blog? Why do people read? I just want to lie down in my cage, lock the door and take a nap. Don’t even bother letting me out once I turn back into a human and the full moon is over. I might as well stay in here seeing as how next month’s full moon will be here before you know it.
I’m sorry. I’m not a very exciting columnist. I will try to lighten the mood with some Clinically Depressed Werewolf jokes:
#1 – How Many Clinically Depressed Werewolves Does it Take to Screw in a Lightbulb?
None. Clinically depressed werewolves prefer the dark. The light allows us to see everything that disappoints us. Also, why bother to change a lightbulb when the new one will blow out sooner or later?
#2 – Three Clinically Depressed Werewolves Walk Into a Bar…
…and there they sat, nursing their beers and commiserating over days gone by, talking about dreams deferred and yearning to turn back time, to get a do over at life yet accepting that just isn’t in the cards.
#3 – Why Did the Clinically Depressed Werewolf Cross the Road?
He didn’t. He knew that sooner or later he’d have to return to the other side again, so he just stayed put and it was as if he never left.
Conclusions, I Guess, Whatever
I’d say I hope you enjoyed this column but really, hope is just a form of delaying the inevitable dissatisfaction that we all experience sooner or later. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to gnaw on a dead water buffalo carcass and listen to some Coldplay. Clinically depressed werewolves love Coldplay.
Where Can I Watch the Lady Gaga Half Time Super Bowl Performance?
Hey 3.5 readers.
Video Game Rack Fighter here. Did you miss Lady Gaga’s Halftime show at the Super Bowl?
Don’t worry. The fine folks at Pepsi have posted the entire thing on YouTube for your viewing pleasure.
My thoughts:
She did a great job. I can’t imagine all the time, money and effort that goes along with putting on a show that has that moving parts. I mean, literally, there are so many moving parts. The crew had to assemble a stage and break it down all in time for the Super Bowl to continue.
I give her applause, applause, applause (get it?) for being willing to leap off of the stadium and then fly down to the platform using wires. I’m not sure I’d trust those wires myself. I worry a little that all these pop stars are being put in danger for our visual pleasure. I mean, they had Katy Perry riding some kind of giant animal contraption at the 2015 Super Bowl.
Good on Gaga, I don’t think I’m even in good enough shape to be transported by wires. I’d be too heavy for the wires and they’d snap and I’d land on a dancer and crush him/her.
The best part was that I didn’t have to watch it with BQB and be interrupted by his various gaseous emissions.
What say you, 3.5?
Stranger Things Season 2 Trailer
Hey 3.5 readers.
Video Game Rack Fighter here. BQB continues to live a life in exile at the Random Motel.
Did you miss the Stranger Things 2 trailer during the Super Bowl? Here it is. Good news? Eggos and Ghostbusters. Bad news? It’s not back until October!
What a Super Bowl
Hey 3.5 readers.
Video Game Rack Fighter here. So, never turn off a Super Bowl thinking it is all over. Lesson learned.
Not that I care anyway. “Ooo. Sports. Yay, I sports better than you. No, you sports better than me. No, I’m the best at sports.”
Who cares?
An Ode to My Vagina – An Original Poem By New Bookshelf Battle Blog Proprietor Video Game Rack Fighter
Dear 3.5 Readers,
Divorce is never easy, especially when you’re BQB and you learn that you were married due to a legal technicality. Divorce is especially difficult on the children, or in your case, the readers.
I know all 3.5 of you must feel some sort of loyalty to BQB but don’t, for he is an epic douche who peed on the toilet seat one too many times without dropping to his knees to apologize and beg for mercy, and he now he must suffer for the rest of his life as penance. Really, it’s only fair.
I mean, I regularly took time away from my passion of playing Car Thief Mayhem to help BQB run his stupid blog, his stupid BQB HQ, and to even walk Bookshelf Q. Battledog and the Yeti. So when you think about it, I really deserve to take everything and BQB deserves to live in a seedy motel for the rest of his days with Leo McKoy.
I feel like I was pretty generous in the settlement negotiation process. Not only did I let Attorney Donnelly talk me into not calling for BQB’s genitals to be slammed in a steel door for the rest of his life, but I also let BQB retain custody of the Yeti. So really, when you think about it, I’m the good guy here.
Things are finally going to be run differently around here. I don’t know what exactly inspired me to cast BQB into a life of misery so I could fully recognize my full womanly potential. I’m not going to lie though, I felt motivated as soon as I watched Ashley Judd give her deranged poem on the National Mall.
As Ashley ranted and raved about the blood stains on her bedsheets that weren’t her choice, I found myself shouting at the TV, “Yes! Yes! I don’t need a man! Bookshelf Q. Battler is the source of all my problems!”
Listen, don’t worry. This blog has been missing a woman’s touch for far too long. It will still be totally awesome. Don’t listen to all that nonsense BQB spouted that under my watch, this blog will turn into a collection of daisy photos and vagina poems.
In conclusion, please enjoy this photo of a daisy…
…and also this original poem I wrote about my vagina.
An Ode to My Vagina
An Original Poem By New Bookshelf Battle Blog Proprietor, Video Game Rack Fighter, May BQB Never Sully This Website With His Inability to Put Urine Into the Toilet Ever Again
Vagina! Whoa, my vagina!
Giver of life and of mirth.
Is it the source of my inner-self?
Should it be the sum total of my self-worth?
Colin Firth. Bridget Jones could do so much better.
Won’t someone write my vagina an appreciative letter?
Eddie Vedder. Lead singer of Pearl Jam and to him
And any other man after my vagina I say, “Scram!”
Isn’t that the plan? A world conquered by vaginas!
An end to rule by man. Oh, vagina!
Sing me a song!
Give me respite from the days that are so long.
Dong! Destroy anyone who has one.
And when that happens, my vagina will have won.
Bookshelf Battle 