It was soon clear to me that Ben and I had grown up on the same authors, TV shows, cartoons and probably even had (or were) the same bullies.
Throughout all our correspondence Ben has never once failed to get my pop culture references; that's important to those of my generation, a subset of people that can communicate by reciting naught but lines from commercial jingles, contextual clues and Seinfeld quotes.
Case in point, when I wrote Ben to suggest releasing a Harmeggedon record, I likened it to my second favorite story arc in the great Bloom County comic strip (my first being the death of Bill The Cat and his subsequent resurrection by the cloning of his tongue).
I explained that in 1986, Bloom County author Berkley Breathed solicited fan made songs for Bill the Cat and Opus’s punk metal band “Billy and the Boingers” and had his two favorite submissions printed on a thin vinyl sheet record that could play on a turntable to be included in the next published compilation of the daily strips (all Herculean tasks back then).
To my surprise and delight, not only did Ben know what I was talking about, he actually owned the book and had played the record! I had found a kindred spirit.
"Not that there's anything wrong with that.."