Hey, look, it's my Gimp Stick! Okay... this doesn't really have anything to do with the convention, but I had two pictures left on my roll of film that I needed to use up before I took it in to be developed, and I had promised some people online a picture of my Gimp Stick, so here it is. I hand carved this Gimp Stick myself. It's made out of a piece of ash dowling. I have a number of nicely carved canes. I refuse to walk with one of those generic metal adjustable canes. I figure if I am going to have to walk with a freaking stick, then I'm walking with a stick with some style. The only problem is, I'm kind of tall and most carved canes are made for shorter people. So I decided to make my own. How hard can it be. I rather like this stick and if you see me out and about then in all likelyhood this is the stick you will see me walking with. The other nice thing about this stick is it is very hard and makes a hell of a weapon. This is handy because there are too damned many crackheads living here in Hamilton. Any of them get near me with their freaking screwdrivers (the weapon of choice for crackheads where I live because they are legal to carry) I'll be beating their ass with my Gimp-Stick. Don't fuck with me crackheads. I'll fuck you up but good! The truth is, I've never needed to use it as a weapon. I've used it for lots of other things but never to beat someone. I've only once had a crackhead try to mug me and that was when I was returning from the KFC with my arms full of fried chicken. The guy was across the street from me and when he saw me coming he ran across the street at me. I actually smelled the guy before I saw him. I kid you not. He was that filthy. Anyways, he came running at me with this 12 inch piece of glass in his hand with a towel wrapped around the one end to make a handle and I'm thinking "Fuck! Now I got to fight off a crackhead armed with a glass shiv, and my arms are full of fried chicken!" So I'm getting ready to ditch the chicken and beat this guy's ass. I was a judoka at the time (I've since had to give up judo because of my arthritis... hence why I need to walk with the Gimp-Stick) so I was pretty confident I could beat the fuck out of this crackhead but I was really dreading having to drop my chicken and I was dreading even more having to touch this guy. He smelled like shit, and I don't mean that figuratively. He reeked of human fecal matter. I was almost throwing up because he smelled so bad. Anyways, he runs at me, hits his foot on the curb and falls face first into the sidewalk and knocked himself out cold (and broke his glass shiv). I just walked past him with my chicken in my arms and shook my head with disgust. Ran into a cop car at the corner and told them about the incident (wasn't really anything he could be charged with since he didn't actually get to attack me) and they said they'd go check him out. Then I went home and had some chicken with my family. Lots of Louisianna Hot Sauce on it too. That's the only way I can eat KFC is if it's smothered in Louisianna Hot Sauce. Anyways, true story that. It's the closest I've ever come to being mugged and this was a year or so before my arthritis got so bad that I had to walk with the Gimp-Stick. Now I don't have to worry about being mugged with an arm full of chicken because I can hold the chicken with one hand and beat the fuck out of the crackhead with my Gimp-Stick in the other. Matthew Mohammed, the creator of Black Bastard seemed rather impressed with my Gimp-Stick and when I told him I made it myself he asked me if I had a card. He thought I made these things for a living. The truth is you couldn't pay me enough to make another one of these things. It's a hell of a lot of work to make a carved cane for something you really can't sell for an awful lot of money (unless you're some famouse sculptor). There's a reason why all those carved canes you see for sale are all made in third world countries. There's no way anyone here would be able to make a carved wooden cane like that for you and sell it for $20. It just wouldn't happen. And the market for people who will pay $200 for a carved cane is just too damned small. Anyways, I liked his comic so much I'm now tempted to carve him a Pimp-Stick version of my Gimp-Stick to use with his Black Bastard costume.