Per aspera ~ This is my beloved [son or daughter] in whom I am well pleased

This is my beloved [son or daughter] in whom I am well pleased

Published 12:50AM, Tuesday, 09/05/2006 in Kittens and Rainbows

I was noodling around at Chris’s Invincible Super-Blog (n.b. the Strunk-and-White-approved s-apostrophe-s), clicking on the “best of” links, and came across his post about Count Dante, who used to advertise in the funny books.

Born John Keehan, he changed his name in the mid ’60s to Count Juan Raphael Dante and explained it by saying his parents were exiled nobility who fled the Spanish Civil War to hide in America. And if you’ve ever done anything that cool, then thanks for reading the ISB, Bruce Campbell. He then founded the Black Dragon Fighting Society and invented a technique called the Dance of Death, which means he did three things that are cooler than anything anyone I know has ever even thought of.

Any normal person would have been satisfied with accomplishments of that magnitude under their belt, but for Count Dante, inventing new fighting styles and claming to be royalty was a slow Tuesday night. According to Massad Ayoob, Dante “developed an obscene fascination with the most brutal part of the martial arts,” and that’s from the guy who founded the Lethal Force Institute and wrote The Complete Book of Handguns. He blasted other martial arts instructors for teaching watered-down styles to non-Asian students (a claim also made by Bruce Lee), got involved in an incident called the Dojo War (SWEET MOTHER OF MYSTERY!) and was arrested for taping dynamite to a rival dojo while drunk.

Let me say this:Â someday, I hope to fall in love with a wonderful woman, marry her, and have children.Â These children, I further hope, will grow to adulthood and pursue endeavors personally fulfilling to them, and if they should all live out their lives having never been arrested for taping dynamite to a rival dojo while drunk, I will die of shame, having failed as a parent.

8 Responses to “This is my beloved [son or daughter] in whom I am well pleased”

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1 Steve Sep 5th, 2006 at 1:11 am

Also, if I may toot my own horn for a moment, I got that Bible quotation in the title pretty much dead-nuts correct on the first try. I missed the “beloved,” and substituted “with” for “in,” but still. As a man who hasn’t attended Sunday School in nearly twenty years, I’m impressed with myself.
2 Eric Sep 7th, 2006 at 6:05 pm

So you’ve never killed a man. Big deal. You showed me how to tie my shoelaces symetrically. Now that’s the mark of a man who wakes up in the morning and pisses excellence. Who am I kidding that guy and “whoever’s dating Jessica Alba” can now both be my heroes.
3 Steve Sep 7th, 2006 at 6:51 pm

If Marine drill instructors aren’t already loudly claiming, on behalf of all Marines, the ability to wake up in the morning and piss excellence, they probably should be.
4 Jennifer Sep 7th, 2006 at 7:38 pm

Yeah, there was a cover story on the guy in the Chicago Reader. Awesome.
5 Steve Sep 10th, 2006 at 2:33 pm

The Reader is home to the Perfect Master, and they do a cover storie on Count Dante? Man, the Boston Phoenix got nothin’ on them.
6 Jennifer Sep 10th, 2006 at 3:06 pm

Well, don’t take my word for it. Come check it out for yourself.
7 belledame222 Sep 23rd, 2006 at 6:54 am

But how did he get the dynamite to stay on? what kind of tape? and what was the dojo doing drunk anyway?
8 Steve Sep 23rd, 2006 at 3:05 pm

I assume he used duct tape. That’s what I’d use. I know they always use black electrical-tape-lookin’ tape on TV, but I assume that’s just because it looks better, in the TV-land context, because it’s not that sticky. Certainly not sticky enough to get dynamite to stay in place on a drunken, weaving dojo.