Geek Chic meets Techno-Electro
GrandEclectus as AnitaLife
Oct. 15, 2009
Fandom: Mighty Boosh
Rating: G
Warnings & Spoilers & Slash: None, Zero, Zip, Zed
Complete, stand alone, but please read “Love Potion #Zed” & “Hieronymus Boosh”. They’re funny.
Don’t own the characters or show, just play with them occasionally for fun and no profit.
Synopsis: Being a geek is all the rage and Vince can never resist a trend, but there are some trends it is better for Vince to not follow.
“So what’s it this time, eh?” Howard sighed upon entering the Nabootique.
“What you mean, Howard?”
“This?” Howard gestured over Vince upon seeing that the boy had undergone yet another fashion transformation.
Vince was sitting behind the counter pretending to use a PDA which was not turned on. He had a copy of “Computers Today” magazine opened in front of him. His legs were clad in loose fitting beige Docker brand trousers and his collared polo-style shirt bore the emblem of “Cyberdyne Systems” over the breast pocket that Vince had filled with an assortment of pens nicked from Stationary Village. A Bluetooth earpiece stuck out from his head. Square horn-rimmed glasses decorated his nose, though he had no need of vision correction.
Vince tried to prevent the heist, but Howard quickly snagged the magazine from the counter.
“I was reading that!” Vince objected.
“Upside down?” Howard observed. ” ‘Installing security systems for common gateway interface… Deploying Silver Light applications in a multi-platform environment.’ You must be joking. What does that even mean?”
“It means give it here,” Vince glared.
“Do you mind telling me what this is all about?”
“I’m a smart guy, Howard. I’ve got to keep up with the times.”
“You don’t even know how to use a computer.”
“Well, I can learn,” Vince tried. “Everyone’s got a computer.”
“Yeah. Everyone and their Nana, but I recall that you touched the register computer in Top Shop and it exploded on the spot,” Howard stated amazed that Vince could get sucked into yet another thing he felt he had to be.
“That was a co-incidence.”
“Remember when you went near the computer in the kiosk at Harrod’s and it blew up immediately. More coincidence?”
“Must have been.”
“Then there was the new computer they’re using in that other revolting store you dragged me to, Bumphuk,” Howard observed. “After you walked by it, the thing automatically ordered 174 kilts for the Fall line.”
“What of it?”
“It was early Spring and no one was wearing kilts that season—not even in Scotland.”
“It must have been faulty. Cistern failure is a common octo-curence,” Vince said, mal-appropriately.
“What you on about? Systems failure? Vince, you don’t speak that way. You don’t even speak their way.”
“Yeah, well I do now. I’m a nerd.”
“You’re a what?”
“You heard me. I’m tetch shaa-vy.”
“You mean ‘tech saavy’ and I don’t think so, Little Man,” Howard said knowingly. “Tetched, certainly.”
“I read comic books. Look, I’ve got Sand Man, Green Lantern and X-Men under the counter so Naboo won’t catch me reading them.” Vince produced the alleged contraband then stuffed it back down.
“I’ve watched every episode of Star Track Toss, Next Regenerator, Deep Space Six and Dowager more than once.”
“Star Trek huh?”
“And what ARE you listening to?” Howard said as he winced away from the player.
“Right now, Weezer, but I’ve got Weird Al, Jonathan Coulton, Nerf Herder and They Might Be Giants.”
Howard grinned and started to laugh. Vince just had to keep up with the trend of the moment. It must have killed him to be left out of this one, just by his amazing lack of book-based smarts, his complete disinterest in science fiction and his dearth of even basic technical skills.
“It’s a wonder you can operate a toaster without burning down the flat,” Howard told him.
“Easy on!” Vince shot back. “I can use a toaster.”
“You can’t drive a car,” Howard continued.
“I could if I had to,” Vince lamely defended.
“You stay out of lifts.”
“Claustro.”
“You don’t use escalators.”
“Are you finished?”
“Remember that computerized hair dryer you got?” Howard reminded him.
“That was a sprite in the elecushical lines,” Vince defended, not knowing the right words.
“The fridge with the computerized ice maker,” Howard snuffed.
Naboo entered the shop, and joined in. “Now we know what happens when a fridge explodes.”
“I just touched it.” Vince’s voice strained. “I wanted to get some milk.”
“My point exactly,” Howard stated dryly. “Have you ever heard of King Midas?”
“What? The bloke who turned everything he touched to gold? Yeah, what about him?”
“Well, you’re just like him only you turn every piece of electronics to rubbish.”
“Do not!”
“Bollo cappucino maker?” Bollo reminded Vince.
“I’m still finding espresso grounds in places they’re not supposed to be,” Howard added.
“Vince perfect the way he is. No need to be nerd,” Bollo consoled the wannabee geek. Vince could not help but grin at Bollo’s affection.
Naboo shook his head. He and Bollo went up to their apartment and left the pair to their bickering and usual nonsense.
“What about your party life?” Howard asked.
“Well, I’m going out with my new mates tonight to a Star Party,” Vince announced proudly.
“Now that’s more like it. What stars are going to be there?” Howard asked.
“No, Howard, it’s an Astrololmee gig,” Vince said as if he were talking to a child.
Just then the geek brigade burst into the shop, strapped down with a variety of astronomy and telescopic equipment, as well as a laptop each and some guide books to the heavens.
“We’re going to be doing a Messier hunt tonight,” one of the geekier ones told him. “You’re welcome to come along.”
“Astronomy, is it? Well, Howard Moon knows his way around a telescope sir,” Howard chimed in.
“Oh really,” Vince shot skeptically. “Which end do you look through?”
“You don’t always have to look through a telescope, Vince. Sometimes a telescope looks through you.”
“Is that so,” Vince snarked.
“An adventurer needs to know how to navigate by his wits and the stars alone.”
“Leaves you out then, don’it,” Vince shot as he rolled his eyes.
“Vince, I know the night sky in several hemispheres like I know the back of my hand, sir,” Howard stated with pride.
“Really. What’s that hair growing out of there?”
“What?” Howard regarded his hand like he had never seen it before.
Suddenly one of the laptops began to smoke and the nerd who owned it went into a panic as he ripped open its bag and extinguished it.
“It was brand new,” he said in dismay. “Barely had it out of the box!”
A whirring sound ‘bizzed’ from one of the telescope cases. It’s owner threw open the case to find his prize was running itself and grinding delicate gears.
“Looks like the tracking mechanism failed. I know I turned it off before I put it away. This is very strange.”
Howard lifted an eyebrow in Vince’s direction.
“Ah, I think I’m going to beg off for tonight,” Vince told them.
“Sure, sure,” said their leader. “It looks like we’re going to have a bad night in any case. We’re down one computer and the largest telescope.”
“My smartPhone6000 says it is going to rain after all,” one geek announced. “I guess the night’s a wash. Sorry Vince.”
“Hey, catch you next time,” Vince lied.
The Astronomy group left. Howard watched Vince as he continued to pretend to read the techno-babble in the computer magazine, which he still held upside down.
“Fancy a drink, then?” Howard asked.
Vince eagerly bopped off his chair like a high strung jack-in-the-box, nearly toppling it over. The magazines, comics and PDA were left behind without a thought and the pair of mates went off to the pub.
fin
Noel has made it clear that he’s a “simpleton” when it comes to machines of any kind, but everyone has got a computer. It’s all very trendy. So many people are geeks and nerds that ironically we’re the trendy ones. That’s got to play with his fashion-conscious brain.
Before going to SDCC Noel said that comics were for “nerds”. Upon arriving at SDCC, he reverted to complete fanboy, stole a golf cart and went to chase down Gene Simmons of KISS. Bless his heart!
“Geek Chic v Techno Electro”
@JanieHop sent me the most wonderful reviews of my fiction. Her comments are in Purple. Mine are in Rust. Quotes from the story are in Italics.
- Howard’s already so used to Vince’s fickle tastes, he doesn’t react to the fact that he changed, just what he’s changed into.
- I had to Google “Cyberdyne Systems” to confirm that it was a reference to the Terminator films, which I still have not seen. Nerdfail… (-_-)
Oh no! They’re really good flicks. My dear departed had a Cyberdyne Systems embroidered polo shirt that we got at Universal. He wore stuff like that all the time, so it would have been a cool joke to wear that on one of his jobs. Everyone he worked with would have gotten it too. (My husband was an Alpha-Geek, we called him.)
- It’s clever that you haven’t made Vince’s sudden interest in geek chic manifest itself as something too obvious. That is, he’s doing what he would be doing anyway: dressing up and reading a magazine, but in a way that’s relevant to geekdom.
Wow, hadn’t thought of that consciously, but that is what Vince does mostly.
- The name “Bumphuk” just brings a smile to my face. I’m imagining that newer customers have to be told to pronounce it “bum-fook.”
I have always loved that word, but when it was a store in Nathan Barley, I darn near fell over.
- Hooray for a Weird Al reference! J
Always. I love getting ref’s to Al in whenever possible. I’ll have to take the fact that I’ve never gotten a cease and desist letter from his legal department as a sign of approval.
- I like that Vince knew who King Midas was. He may not know who a particular jazz singer is, but everybody retains at least a little of the Greek mythology they learn in school. You’ve kept his shallow nature, but not made him uncharacteristically oblivious.
They talk about Narcissus in the radio show and Vince knows who that is. Those come out on into the laptop when I’m doing this. I also have Polly Headra looking like that bloke Atlas who held up the world.
In the radio show when they speak of Narcissus falling in love with his reflection and falling into the water, Vince says “We have mirrors now.” Of course Vince falls through a mirror in “Bollo”, off to save Howard from Monkey Hell.
I love how they took so many concepts from the radio days and reworked an wove them into the TV show. In my defense of my fan fic, I dash this stuff off with limited rewrites; I haven’t taken 10 or so years to refine it. Of course it’s not in their league!
“Vince perfect the way he is. No need to be nerd.” This is so in-character for Bollo.
I LOVE that Bollo has a bit of crush on Vince. I attribute some of his hostility toward Howard to this, a tad of jealousy, because obviously Vince is Mrs. Moon.
Spot-on arguments, here. J
- “What?” Howard regarded his hand like he had never seen it before. I can picture this so clearly.
Going for some dumb Boosh style humor. I love that Boosh goes for that sort of sledge hammer humor things.
- I like it that Vince went to the pub without changing back into something fashionable. It shows how keen he is to hang out with Howard, without him having to say so.
Yeah, I wondered about that, if it was a mistake, but I liked the idea that Vince has a “pop” I gotta get outta this, zoom moment. I also like the buddies going off to a pub together.
- “Gooble Gobble, one of us!” We accept him, we accept him…!
Oh yes! Reference to Todd Browning’s masterpiece “Freaks”, one of the greatest flicks of all time. “Gooble Gobble” has become the mantra of my people the Geeks everywhere. We do feel like the freaks in the movie, yet we band together in a loose conflagration (sic) of allies.
Hieronymus Boosh 