@DadBoner

As many times as the phrase @DadBoner has come out of my mouth in the last six months, it's still no easy task to articulate what exactly old Cap'n Karl Welzein is, or does. I guess it's a "fake" Twitter feed helmed by an unknown writer guised as a man-child. His life is little more than derelict alcoholism, absentee fatherhood, and more radio rock from the past five decades than a man should be allowed to digest unless he owns at least one pair of Maui Jims. He lives in Grand Blanc, Michigan. His tastes are that of a sophisticate with a simple palate. He finds some way to be the worst employee--who can somehow teeter on the brink of staying employed--you've ever seen.

Karl is a master abbreviator--second only to "Jon" from Delocated (which, as an actual skill, lends itself to wide speculation Jon Glaser himself might be Dad Boner)--and has offered up tasty breves like "celebraish", "D'reets Locs", "BL 'Nums", and countless other syllabically managed nuggets. He's also rife with catch phrases. His signature "Really looking forward to the weekend, you guys," surfaces like a lighthouse on the craggy weekend shore every Thursday afternoon. When it comes to "flavors" or "power moves", bold is the only way the Cap'n knows how to live. And nothing signifies a Karl in full like, "I feel like I could drink a thousand beers right now, you guys." Through this idiot savant like command of the english, he's blossomed into a one man insight/quote generation oracle.

This gem--or what I call 'Monday through Thursday, and then Friday though Sunday'--is one of many aphorisms Karl dispenses like some new millennia, lush Mark Twain.

Karl has opinions on health...

...social issues...

... and the complexities of inter-sex relations.

It's funny. It's silly. Stripped of context, it's lowbrow humor for a generation of dudes devolved into bros, but all of this is the simple answer. Free of conjecture, all subjectivity removed, @DadBoner is genius, and dare I say...important.

This is a pure, and daring creative effort fully realized in every facet of the creation. There is a body of work here that has blossomed into the epic poem of the common man blasted into web space one tweet at a time. Twitter, as a medium, is stupid, but writers go where the venue lends itself to their creative intent. This writer is in the perpetual act of creation. A real time novel--delivered in bits of disjointed narrative, irrational self-aggrandizement, and crude sagacity-- about the self inflicted plight of the lowest common denominator American male.

Over time, the voice has taken on profound depth. The characters who populate this universe cast a shadow with almost no physical description. Even Peanut (RIP Peanut!) had his erotic fiction posted to Craigslist in a tone so very Peanut, it bordered on upsetting. Rich story arcs have risen and subsided, while other plot points grind on into perpetuity. Yes, you're not mistaken, this is a "fake" Twitter character, but Karl has more humanity than an AMC's worth of scripted dramas.

Everyone I know has a fake Twitter account. In this anonymous, yet overexposed, medium the person behind the keyboard has the license to fashion themselves in whatever way they see fit. If a friend was to follow you around for a week and use your feed to share their impressions of your existence, the shift in tone would be stark to say the least. To that end, the list of people I adore in real life whose social media persona needs to be swung on with impunity is insufferable innumerable. This is part of what makes @DadBoner so exceptional. The author uses Twitter to be the mouthpiece of the myth Karl has fashioned around his existence, while the subtext is dense with a far more tragic reality.

Everything Karl touches turns to shit. He has destroyed his marriage. He's alienated almost everyone around him. The homeless man, Peanut, he took off the street in a misguided attempt to help him died in his Sebring. He's been kicked out of every chain restaurant in the Grand Blanc area. The only coworker who takes an interest in him as a person, he has demonized as Nosey Lady. Karl is like Midas, but instead of gold, it's a wake of destruction and disaster.

Folded in the spaces between the words, the six magrs and trunk liquor, and the slurred, "Not supposed to drink," uttered far too late is a one act tragedy.  A recovering alcoholic collapsed under the weight of Karl's self delusion. A fantasy with gravity so dense, it crushes this man's pity, his abhorrence, and leaves only his exposed frailties to be sucked into the @DadBoner vortex.  Meanwhile, Karl can only see a man he has done a favor. Each drink an affirmation of friendship. The mention of his near termination interpreted as some hint he's about to be fast tracked up the corporate ladder. The grand illusion where he is both illusionist and audience rolled into one gluttonous drunk who roots for the Detroit Tigers. Everyone else is merely and incidental passerby expected to marvel in all that is Karl.

But all this overwrought analysis just ruins the joke. At this moment, I'm the guy who has spelled out the obvious punchline, and trying to shoehorn Karl into all of this psuedo-intellectual ass-hattery would reduce me to a mere corncob in the Cap'n's eyes. Despite, or perhaps in spite of the nuanced subtext, the aptly formed universe (I mean...just look at the list of people he follows on Twitter, it's brilliant), the easy laughs I get from Karl's transmissions from the satellite booze, @DadBoner represents the highest form of art. Karl is my mirror.

Karl is happy. He's a drunk, and a malingerer, and a morass of selfishness, but goddman if he isn't happy. He rides the highs of being ready for the weekend and the lows of being really steamed, you guys, but so is the human condition. Karl is very mortal, but overall, Karl is pleased with his place in the world. Where this project could be seen as an attempt to ridicule someone who thinks it makes sense to refer to Bud Light Platinum as BL'Nums, or a person who really thinks Guy Fieri is the best chef in America, it's as much a psalm to the uncluttered existence. There is a Chauncey Gardner like truth and optimism to Karl. I admire his cock-eyed patriotism for this idyllic USA that is all Seger and cold ones. I wish I could solve the worst of my problems by listening to Bruce Springsteen's "The Rising" on repeat. I long for a day when I fit in my skin as comfortably as Karl fits in his XXL frame. Perhaps he is unconscious behind his liquor colored glasses, but sometimes the struggle for self-awareness nets more reasons to distrust yourself than the other way around. It's all solipsism, but the Karl's of the world seem to squeeze more irrational joy out of living than the set who writes self-effacing missives that accomplish little more than worrying their sister very much.

Karl's is not the only answer, or necessarily the correct one, but it is a meditation on life as a state of mind. The journey of drinking 1000 beers begins with the first cold one, but if anything, Karl has impressed upon me it's not the 1000th beer, it's the 999 before it that make the journey worth taking.