Fat Man, Thin Skin

Regular readers of this humble “weblog” know that we, the crack young staff of “The Hatemonger’s Quarterly,” spent a recent “post” taking aim at the disastrous city of Buffalo, NY. In short, we concluded that this horrendous upstate New York hellhole, as they might say in Texas parlance, needed killin’.

To see what kind of response this vitriolic entry might receive from the few unfortunate wretches who still inhabit Buffalo, we humbly sent our humble “post” to a “website” named BuffaloPundit. As far as we could intuit, this “weblog” attempts to cheer up the benighted souls who live in a city only slightly nicer than Utica.

The fellow in charge of BuffaloPundit kindly offered a “link” to our work. In essence, he said nothing of substance about our “post,” save for the fact that our reference to Timothy McVeigh was “flat,” because he hailed from an area close to Buffalo, rather than Buffalo proper.

Well, whatever. To us, that’s much like folks from Waco urgently insisting that the Branch Davidian compound was technically on the outskirts of their city, not in the city itself. To which the proper response is: Who gives a rat’s behind? We didn’t realize that critics had an obligation to keep their attacks limited to a city’s pomerium. God forbid anyone catches a bus and realizes that the suburbs of an s-hole are actually as awful as the s-hole itself.

Anyway, to our surprise, some of those leaving comments at BuffaloPundit were genuinely enraged by our “post.” Why, that’s yellow journalism, claimed one wounded reader, seemingly oblivious to the fact that we aren’t exactly The Wall Street Journal. Clearly, the residents of Buffalo have very thin skin. Which is unfortunate, given the weather.

But nothing shocked us as much as a semi-literate response to our humble animadversions penned by one Kelly Sedinger, the proprietor of the Thomas-Kinkade-esque Byzantium Shores “weblog.” It seems as if our musings deeply upset this fellow, who took time away from his hectic eating schedule to write his attack.

Now, we, the crack young staff of “The Hatemonger’s Quarterly,” could have a field day with this nerdy chap. We could mention that he looks like a corpulent über-dork—the kind of fellow constantly prattling on about the fact that his flail does three-to-six points of damage. We could note that his opinions on anything are suspect, since his “weblogger” profile advertises his love of the Chieftains, who are as cheesy as the label “Irish adult contemporary” sounds.

Or we could inform you that the fellow’s first name is Kelly, which demonstrates that his mother didn’t love him very much. (Perhaps this is the source of his binge eating and odd sartorial choices?)

Yet all of this is beneath us. Rather, let us take aim at the heart of Kelly’s angry response.

First, Kelly rages about our claim that Buffalo’s weather is none-too-good. He says:

Well, if you think Buffalo's too cold, then you must not like lots of cities in the US either, like Cleveland, Detroit, Chicago, Minneapolis, Des Moines, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Portland ME, and so on. None of those cities has an average temperature in January more than two degrees higher than Buffalo's, and a few of them are lower. If you think Buffalo is "miserably cold", then don't come here. But don't blame Buffalo for the fact that you're a damn wuss.

Uh, we’ve already got reason to suspect that Kelly is a few snaps short of a full pair of overalls. In our humble “post,” we claimed that the weather was one reason to detest Buffalo, not that the temperature was the only nail in the coffin. To us, the weather is but the tip of the iceberg (so to say).

For the benefit of this portly oaf, we’ll try to spell out our point even more clearly:

Chicago: Bad weather + nice city = nice city.
Minneapolis: Bad weather + nice city = nice city.
Buffalo: Bad weather + complete s-hole = complete s-hole.

We also savored the fat man’s “you’re a damn wuss” retort. Now, never mind the fact that many of us don’t possess the 200 lbs of excess body weight that surely makes Kelly warm in inclement winters. Stooping to the “wuss card” should demonstrate how pathetic is his response.

Just imagine Kelly’s further objections. “Buffalo is a dilapidated mess.” “Oh, yeah, shut up, you faggot!” &c. Real convincing.

Like Mr. BuffaloPundit, Kelly gets all hot and bothered by the fact that we linked Niagara Falls and Buffalo. Why, of course: They’re two different places that are very close together! Gee, why would criticism of both of them be apropos?

Well, perhaps, Captain Bulge, the good people of Buffalo have cars and can travel a few miles to the surrounding area. If they’re so lucky, they’ll note that Niagara—like Buffalo—is a total s-hole.

Now, to be fair, we must admit to one mistake in our original “post.” When we referred to the boring Buffalo Symphony, we meant Buffalo Philharmonic. We apologize for mixing up the name of the crappy, third-rate symphony in town.

None of this detracts from our overall message. Buffalo is a complete mess. One stroll down the ghastly boarded up stores on Main Street, one ride on the city’s pathetic pseudo-subway, one trip around its colorless suburbs will amply demonstrate why Buffalo is one of the fastest shrinking cities in the US.

But, hey, if you’re a morbidly obese loser with a passionate regard for the Chieftains and this withering hellhole, suit yourself. We also hear Syracuse is really lovely, you bloated moron.