Me, Myself, And Beefy

I’m only really writing this because there are some people I know who never got the Beefy side of me. And I feel as if maybe I should lay it all out there.

Back when I was in school for broadcasting, I interned at a local radio station which happens to be one of the biggest in the world, 700 WLW. Their tower is the strongest in the world, and since regulations happened they only turn it up a small fraction of the way for normal broadcasting. Once a year they fire it up all the way to make sure it still works, and it does. It’s so powerful that when it’s on all the way, the broadcast can be heard around the world. I heard some people say when they were in Vietnam, on some nights they could tune their radios in to WLW to listen to Reds games. That’s some serious power.

Anyway, I interned for Gary Burbank, who is a huge name in talk radio. Well, he was when he was around. He finally retired a few years back. But because he was such a huge radio guy, and WLW was such a huge station, they had a ton of interns all the time. Gary could never remember all of the names of the interns, so he would give them all nicknames, because he could remember those. And because he was into food (he once had a restaurant called Burbank’s that served awesome food), and I’m a fat guy, he nicknamed me Beefy Bouillon. Because I never wanted to spell “bouillon,” I changed the spelling to “Booyawn.”

He told me that usually the names stick, and mine did. A short while later I finally got my first computer, fully equipped with AOL dialup internet. I needed a handle, and I remembered the nickname, so I became Beefybooyawn. That was somewhere around 2001, 2002.

Shortly after, I discovered I could build my own cheap website, so I did just because I wanted one. Not because I had anything to put on it, but because I was new to the internet thing and I wanted to learn and do it all. It was around that time that I discovered The Best Page In The Universe, discovered that websites could be used for bitching, and so I started writing my own pieces about stuff that pissed me off.

When I got through all of the things that actually pissed me off, I needed more to write about, so I started looking for stupid shit to bitch about. The more I looked, the more I saw, the more I got pissed. It was literally me looking for stupid shit that pissed me off, that got me into hating everything legitimately. If I had never started that site or writing about things that made me mad, I probably wouldn’t be such a cynical asshole now. Funny, I did this to myself. Well, somewhat. Actually interacting with people would have eventually turned me into an asshole, but it would’ve taken a bit longer probably.

So, what does this all mean? Well, basically Beefy was my alternate personality. It was the hate-filled side of me. The asshole side of me. I could use that site to let off some steam. If something pissed me off, I could go there and vent it all out, no matter how neurotic it might be, no matter how thoughtless it was. I could let it all out there and be done with it. If I didn’t have that, all of those little things that I bitched about would have stayed inside me and would’ve ate me alive. That Beefy side of me would have become me permanently.

Like I said above, some people didn’t understand the Beefy side of me, and here’s one of those stories. Two years ago a guy lost his belongings while riding a roller coaster. Once off the ride, instead of telling personnel, he scaled the fence around the ride while the ride was still in operation and he went to get his shit. Then the roller coaster came around and hit him, killing him. I wrote a piece about it and said how he deserved what he got because he was a dumbass.

One of my internet friends read that and went off on me, not understanding the point, or reason, for all of my anger. The thing is, what I said about that incident in particular is how I really feel about it. The person who couldn’t understand it, I guess just won’t ever understand. While he constantly bitches about people he doesn’t like on his Facebook page. But I digress. If I had written about that as myself and not as Beefy, I probably would’ve been a lot less harsh about it. I would have chosen my words better.

But in the past there were many pieces I wrote about things that I actually didn’t believe. I would go off on some random subject just to piss people off and get a reaction. In that respect I would’ve been a great candidate for a job at Fox News.

Anyway, the point is, since I’ve decided to be done with the Beefy blog and that persona, and handle everything AS ME, like I should have been doing all this time, I’ve felt better. I’m trying my hardest to think things out before reacting immediately and then regretting it later. That still happens, but it happens a lot less. Just today I apologized to a friend for going off on him and unfriending him on Facebook a while back because of that very thing. It was my fault, and I had to make it right. Another friend, however, owes me an apology for the same thing and I’ll probably never get it and honestly, I’m not that tore up about it. I’m too old for that. But when it’s my fault, yeah, I do feel bad and I try to make it right, now.

So there it is. I think I’ll eventually delete the Beefy Facebook page. I’m still going to hold on to the Twitter account, because I have fun with that. But that will be all that is left of Beefy. If you’re an old fan of the Beefy stuff and miss it (I can’t imagine that would be anybody), follow me on Twitter.