The Nixxon Story in Five Installments -- Part 3

ARTICLE 3: An Infinite Number of Monkeys, Given an Infinite Number of Instruments, Eventually Creates an Nth-Dimensional Quantity of Swill.

As is typical in the analysis of Dr. Nixxon's life, there exists yet another gap in our knowledge of his whereabouts from the demise of League Indigo until the late-1980's. Scant clues have surfaced, however, giving rise to what are perhaps only rumors.

For example, it is fairly well-known that Nixxon was a protege of Dennis Ritchie of Bell Labs fame. Tales from scientists (then mere college grad interns) at the phenomenal Bell System invention factory corroborate a singular event that took place during 1968. Presumably disgusted with his failure to partake in the previous year's Summer of Peace and Love, Nixxon accepted a position in the computer labs where he befriended Ritchie. Some say it was his desire to unravel the mysteries of Isis' autogenic self-replication and rapid evolution into an optical-gate-based neural net "brain" that led him to the labs; some say it was merely a convenient place to hide out. At any rate his friendship with Dennis took an historic turn. Late one night, while working with a frustratingly inadequate operating system called MULTICS, Ritchie threw a beer can at Dr. Nixxon who was reeling from too much LSD-laced No-Doz® pills, and said, "You, yah, You, Nix'... get yer psychedelic butt outta that funk and help me with these wires." To which Nixxon was said to reply, "...wow, uh, YouNix, YouNix, he he he, YouNix YouNix....", and of course the rest was history. To this day few people in the inner circle of systems development can claim knowledge of the arcana associated with the birth of perhaps the greatest non-acronym known to modern technology.

It didn't take long for such a great mind as Dr. Nixxon to become jaded and bored with the Labs and the offbeat O/S that now blazed a path of glory through the departmental beaurocratic maze in Jersey. Disgusted with the "weenie-weenies", Cecil set out to find his runaway experiment and disable her once and for all. History testifies this has not yet occurred. The trail of blood Isis has left along the Gulf Coast over the last decade proves such a rumor rings hollow. And Nixxon resigned his fellowship at the Labs.

It is believed that Dr. Nixxon met up with a secretive pipe-smoking individual locals say was made practically in the image of Ward Cleaver. They spent several years in the Adirondacks camping and telling stories. These series of Tall Tales Told by Giants Among Men still circulate amongst the grizzled oldsters Up East. Could it have been that Nixxon, knowing the connections this grinning comrade held with the supernatural, might have held the key to tracking down and finally pulling the plug on Isis? We may never know. One thing's for sure; a sketch found scrawled in charcoal on the wall of a weathered privvy near an old hunting camp clearly illustrates that Cecil and "The Smoker" were thick as thieves; comfortable with each other's company as a friendly old pair of slippers.

Nixxon re-emerged from the Adirondacks hairier and somehow far more youthful than his sixty-ish countenance should have betrayed. The experience must have rejuvenated him, for he immediately went to retireve the old trombone from storage and re-established his standing in the Musician's Union. Shortly after Nixxon had built up his mighty chops he established an experimental electronic music studio, locating it in a nondescript suburban hovel near St. Louis, Missouri. Cecil longed for musical companions -- musicians not unlike the League Indigo boys who were not afraid of foraying well outside of the boundaries of musicianship, convention, and good taste.

Then the unexpected miracle occurred. After receiving his divination at the hands of Reverend Stang in '87, Nixxon started receiving flyers spouting ostentatious brags about what could only be the answer to his dreams. Could it be, a real-life SubGenius band of fellow doctors? The Mavrides poster, his friend hanging by the neck, stratocaster unplugged and swaggering akimbo, and that name -- THAT NAME!

The Swingin' Love Corpses

Nixxon was immediately thrown headlong into psychotropic flashback reverie. But pulling his aura up off the floor and shaking it out vigorously, he resolved to meet these fellow Doctors. This he did indeed, on a warm summer evening in 1989. At the Little John's Pub, a seedy Northside St. Louis tavern, Dr. Nixxon met and befriended The Corpses. His mentor Stang did not steer him wrong! For several years this was to be one of the most productive eras in Nixxon's long and prodigious career.

Stay Tuned for Part Four....