I have written this essay, as suggested by Ms. Kathleen Hedrick, who we all know and love, taken from her profile page on the canoe website. She asked for my first impressions of meeting all of you good people, I however am writing about only one of you for now and I have entitled this one. Gumby.

What is Gumby? A green rubber fictional children's character with a rubberband for lips and a horse for a friend, sure, but he is also our great big blubbery, more than rubbery, friend.

Gumby....... now you wanna talk about funny, well actually you'd probably talk about someone else like, oh, myself or Marty Short for funny. But what I believe I was trying to say was, furry. Yes, furry. I mean his arm is like an otter. He once used Ryan's hot tub and she had to have scuba people over to do a cleaning, they worked in shifts for hours until they got a call to search for the handgun in the Browns chicken case. One of the divers described the mess in Ryan's jacuzzi and I quote, "It looked like a Shit-zu just exploded underwater." Another said it reminded him of his expedition in Africa, digging up woolly mammoth remains near the Nairobi River. I think it's Robin Williams, Alec Baldwin, and Gumby, that's the big Hollywood 3 when they talk about whose furriest. Robin Williams is near Sasquatch, personally, I would like to see a DNA test done immediately. Gumby kind of reminds me of a little stuffed animal my sister had when she was a youngin, because of his gentle nature, adorable laugh, and soft underbelly, like a Care Bear, that's it. He is generally friendly unless you approach him when he's eating, same rules apply as if he were a dog. Approach slowly and cautiously, speak in a gentle and slightly higher voice, and reach out towards him with the back of your hand towards his face, fingers together and bent towards the ground. Let him sniff you first before trying to pet him with food in front of him. Now I have often heard it said from others who have gotten past this point with a Gumby, that he can be very mean and self-centered, kind of full of himself. And I say, sure after you get to know him, but it's that first impression that he seems to be so good at. Kind of a nice young man attitude from an episode of the Brady bunch, but with a hint of queer in him. So I guess the moral of this story is, if you really want to like Gumby, try not to talk to him for too long, you might get to know him.

Mark Metzel, very opinionated