Rob Gunther [Gunther - Mostly Autobiographical

Mahine Party Press

Copyright 2013 by Rob Gunther

All rights reserved

Library of Congress LCN: 2013921972

ISBN: 978-0-615-92548-6

www.strictlyautobiographical.com

Foreword

Hello, there, dear reader. Please allow me to introduce myself. I am Jose Vargas and I am here to do the foreword.

Who exactly am I? Well, unless you spent much of the early 2000s patronizing bars in or around Albany, New York, chances are you have no idea who I am. If you did meet me back then, I probably dont remember you. If you happen to be one of the twenty-three young ladies that knew me in a more biblical way, let me assure you, I have been tested many times since my wild oats" period concluded, so it probably wasnt me. And if you think I had anything to do with that child walking around in your living room right now, well, I dont have much taxable income, so do yourself a favor and dont waste your time trying to get at it. Also, heart disease and nearsightedness run in my family. Just a heads up.

Luckily, I did manage to gain some notoriety that didnt come from drunken decisions made in Albany during Bush Jr.s first term. If you know me - or of me - its because you visit the website, reddit, where Im known by my reddit username, /u/_vargas_ (note the underscores). For those of you who may not be familiar with reddit, here is a brief description from Wikipedia:

Reddit is a social news and entertainment website where registered users submit content in the form of either a link or a text (self) post. Other users then vote the submission up or down, which is used to rank the post and determine its position on the sites pages and front page. Content entries are organized by areas of interest called subreddits.

Those votes up or down (known as upvotes and downvotes) are a big part of what make reddit so addictive. The site keeps track of each users upvotes, known as karma. Some users will do nearly anything for karma: dress up their pets, publicly shame their children, photograph themselves or others immediately after sustaining a gruesome injury, and - worst of all - repost content thats already been submitted.

Karma doesnt just come from posting content, though. Commenting on posts is the other way. Thats where I come in. Over the past half year, I have commented my balls off. Dick and fart jokes, personal stories of sexual miscues, graphic depictions of bowel movements. All of this and more has made me the owner of the sixth highest comment karma total of all time (I dont think Im telling my parents anytime soon).

I guess thats why our friend, Rob, choose me to do this foreword. I think he may be under the impression that Im more famous than I am and by simply having me attached to his book, its going to somehow reach a wider audience. Im telling you right now, Rob, I think you might have overestimated my fame. Ive always said, Youre not really famous until someone has sex with you for no reason other than your celebrity. But you asked me this favor Rob, so Ill do my best.

Anyway, Im done trying to justify to myself to you, the reader, what business I have being in Robs book. Speaking of Rob, lets talk about him.

Right off the bat, I have to admit that Ive never actually met him. Based on his writing style (Ill get into that in a minute,) I can guess what hes like. Im picturing an impressive specimen of a man. Square-jawed and stoic. He has the beefy paws of a crab fisherman and the broad shoulders of a coal miner. He walks upright and with confidence, without thought to conceal his massive bulge (like such a thing could ever be concealed.) When he makes eye contact with a woman, it puts a twinkle in her eye, a skip in her step, and song in her heart. In short, he is everything that most men are not.

You might be thinking to yourself But how can he evoke such thoughts, Mr. Vargas? Well, I guess I should explain how Rob came to be viewed in my minds eye with such veneration.

I first encountered Rob just a couple months ago. It was in one of the most popular subreddits: AskReddit. Basically, its a place to ask thought-provoking questions. Some of the answers are pretty great. Unfortunately, most are generally cheap attempts at humor. Its a free-for-all of users trying to outdo each other by reciting puns, movie quotes, and sex jokes (my bread and butter.) Seriously, its like a bunch of spider monkeys simultaneously trying to hump the same football. Most responses show little effort. Rob managed to set himself apart from the crowd.

In the middle of reading a popular submission, I saw a massive wall of text (reddit-speak for any comment over a couple hundred words.) Home to redditors with the average attention span of a Chihuahua, AskReddit typically isnt very receptive to longer comments like this. Something was special about this one, though. Despite being the reddit commenting equivalent of War and Peace, this sucker was getting upvoted, a lot. Got to read this one, I said to myself. But first, I scanned the replies to this comment.

Oh my god this is hilarious!

Dayum sun! (sic)

I just want the opportunity to say I am glad you wrote this ;)

I read that in Dennis Learys voice.

What the hell? Dennis Leary? No one ever compared me to Dennis fucking Leary. Pauly Shore? Sure. Andy Dick? Yeah. But never Leary. After all the tremendous effort Ive put into my comments. All the tears I cried, all the blood I shed, all the sweat Ive swat? Sweated? Never the Leary-comparison stamp of approval. I was practically writhing with jealousy.

Scrolling back up to the beginning of the comment, I settled in, ready to hate. I was there to dismiss whoever this /u/Rob_G character was. He couldnt be as good as me. No way. I need not remind anyone of how much karma I have accumulated (in case someone was wondering, its 1,129,056 as of this writing.)

Fifty words into Robs diatribe about Starbucks, I became a fan. It wasnt good, it was outstanding, such a departure from the typical banal AskReddit comment. Robs writing style reminded me of Dave Barry, only if Dave Barry had chronic back pain, $100,000 in debt, and no wife (I mean that in a good way, Rob.)

After reading through several more of Robs comments, I did what any fan would do: try to take him down. I spent the better part of an evening copying portions of his comments into Google. I wanted to know if Rob was a fraud. Maybe he was stealing material from some obscure blogger from Des Moines? Some guy that doesnt blog anymore.

I searched and searched but, like Halloween in 2002 when I went trick or treating dressed like Bin laden, I came up empty. It was all Rob. It made me kind of hate my own comments. Next to Robs, mine are positively sophomoric. By the way, thanks for that, Rob. Thanks for taking away one of the first and only things I thought I was truly good at. Ill be going back to Twitter now.

As for everyone else, enjoy Robs book. Thank you.

Jose Vargas

/u/_vargas_

Another Foreword

When Rob asked me to write a foreword to his book, I agreed without hesitation. How could I say no when Rob literally saved my life? If it werent for Rob, I would be decomposing in a ditch somewhere outside of Ciudad Juarez right now. The story of how Rob saved my life is a testament to his personality and courage.

It all started several years ago, when I was set to go on a week long vacation to Cancun with my girlfriend at the time. We had a great deal on the price of the vacation. The resort was actually free because my girlfriend just swiped these tickets that were supposed to be part of a promotion for the company she worked at. All we had to do was pay for a flight from Philly to Cancun.