Author's biographies
More interesting than you might think
By: M.H. "Call me Ishmael" Torringjan and Craig "Black Seventeen" Norris
Craig "Black Seventeen" Norris was born in a boxcar to a pair of traveling circus freaks who found solace in each others' deformities. After repeating the fourth grade seven times, he set out to seek his fortune by accepting a job at Dunkin' Donuts. He was forced to quit soon afterwards after discovering he had an allergic reaction to Bavarian crème. So he took the $87.46 he had made and went to Vegas where he earned his nickname of "Black Seventeen," betting all his money on that number in roulette and winning three times in a row, ending up with almost 4.8 million dollars. He lost most of it, however, after investing in such ventures as Enron, the XFL, and the Steve Forbes presidential campaign.
Michael Hamish Torringjan was born the son of a fishmonger and a John Lennon impersonator in Peoria in 1975 at the age of 20. He later shortened it to M.H. upon the realization that the name Hamish was about the gayest name his parents could have given him. He received a primary education at the School for Kids with Bad Haircuts just outside of Peoria, where he was voted "Most Likely to Eat a Ham Sandwich by Age 30." His extracurricular activities included vice president of the Club for People Who Don't Like being in a Club and assistant wood-gatherer of his boy-scout troop. He received his BS in Advanced Pygmy Psychology in the year 1984 from Phoenix Online University and his MA in Kicking People in the Groin in 1988 from Bob Jones University, followed by a PhD in Slacking Off in 1993 from Princeton.
Taking the little money he had left, Craig went to Japan, after becoming angered and frightened upon learning that the country's people ate with sticks. He spent five months standing on street corners loudly shouting out the benefits of forks before remembering that he couldn't speak Japanese. On his way back to the airport, he saw an episode of Tenchi Muyo! on an electronics store monitor, and became instantly captivated by the pretty colors. After watching the English version he discovered how much shows like Captain Planet and The Smurfs sucked by comparison, and how incredibly hot female anime characters could be. He decided to share this discovery with the rest of the world.
After two years of getting high and wandering around aimlessly, M.H. discovered a videotape of Astroboy in the gutter outside of an IHOP. Upon watching it, he decided that he wasn't going to let it scare him off, and he moved on to better things. Since then, he has gone back to school to earn a PhD in Catgirl Fanservice from the University of Ecchi Online. He was also recognized at Otakon 2001 as the only male who could successfully pull off the Sailor Neptune cosplay.
Craig's first reviews were grammatically atrocious, poorly organized snippets of worthless opinion scrawled in red crayon on scraps of paper he found in the gutter. His first pamphlet, entitled "Anime Chikz R HOT!!!" only sold three copies, but eventually became the literary standard for propping up wobbly chair and table legs in restaurants. M.H. began writing reviews of anime after watching Hello Kitty and becoming extremely angry at his television. Numerous attempts were made to sell his reviews to legitimate forms of media, but all were rejected due to gratuitous use of the term, "tinklebunny." As a result, he turned to the next most legitimate form of media, the Internet. Shortly thereafter, while walking through a flea market, Craig met M.H., who was trying to sell his used bath towels to raise money to retrieve a rare picture of Aya Hisakawa's left armpit (the only piece he needed to finish his 
life-sized model). The two became involved in a heated argument over which anime chick's breasts were softer, and punches were exchanged. They later reconciled their differences, and Craig bought three bath towels for $20 each. They pooled their resources together in an attempt to bring their love of anime to the public, and thus "M.H. Torringjan's and Black Seventeen's Anime Reviews" was born. After the infamous "Dork-fight," as it has come to be known in the flea-market circles, M.H. abandoned his hopes of completing his masterpiece and returned to his review-writing, now with the help of Black Seventeen.
Craig currently lives in a tool shed next to the home of Frank Wong in Newark, New Jersey with a bag of wood chips he calls Humberto. He works at a barbershop sweeping the hair off the floor, which he saves and attempts to sell on eBay. His hobbies include eating cheese, cracking his knuckles, and playing "MacArthur Park" on a continuous loop. His favorite color is clear, and his favorite food is the jelly surrounding canned hams. He is often mistaken for Bigfoot.
M.H. is now working as a Twinkie inspector in his hometown of Peoria. He has no wife or children, but he does own a cat named Homie G Fly Skizzill. His hobbies include trying to catch his own shadow, re-enacting Jerry Springer episodes in his shower, and blackmailing squirrels. His parents died in 2001 in an incident involving two alpacas, a cream pie, and the president of Peru. His brother is a senator of the state of California (for which he'd like to most sincerely apologize).
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