Some excellent points were raised—most importantly, just imagine what a troll would do with your real name—I must admit that I hadn’t considered that angle.

I still think that the WoW forums are a cesspool of the nastiest sorts of trollish behaviour. But perhaps making everyone reveal their secret identities is not the way to go. At least, not yet.

Unless you wrote a complaint to the ESRB—in which case, everyone already knows who you are.

What do you do when it’s Thursday night and you find yourself in downtown Toronto and you want to re-enact a 1989 Fred Savage movie? Why, you go to an art gallery for skaters and play Mario Kart, of course!

Confused? You won’t be after this week’s episode of Things that Sound like Mad Libs…

Here’s the preamble: When I was writing for Torontoist, I would rarely come across events in the editors’ story feed that appealed to my own interests enough to write about and, when I found something on my own, I’d have to pitch the hell out of it in order to appeal to theirs. Needless to say, I was rather surprised when I heard from the editors about a Mario Kart tournament in December of last year called “Relive The Wizard” (because of the lack of italics, it didn’t occur to me until later that they were referring to The Wizard). Unfortunately, I was unable to attend and, because nobody else was interested, no coverage was provided.

Since I’m no longer with Torontoist (and therefore get to write about things that interest me), I figured that the second iteration of “Relive The Wizard” (my italics) deserved a little love. And not only are Dave and I going out of our way to attend this one, but I’m also competing. And I have every intention of losing.

So I shot a quick note to the kids at Offshoot Inc (who’s hosting the shindig) with a request for a few deets and a sound bite or two…

“We laid a solid foundation for future events with the first Relive the Wizard,” replied James Hamilton, Offshoot’s managing partner. “It was a great night for both our friends and the new faces we met. I didn’t know what to expect going into the first event, but the night was a very memorable experience for us and for everyone that came out.”

Well, that takes care of the ambiguous PR quote… so here are the deets:

This Thursday, February 25, a bunch of people are going to be at The Baitshop, a gallery space located at 358 Dufferin Street (Suite 117), to play and/or watch people playing Mario Kart. There will be prizes. And cookies. And $4 drinks. And a DJ. (Dear lord, please let this not be some sort of hipster scene fest…)

Anyway, if you want to compete, you’ll have to show up at 7 p.m. in order to sign in and ready yourself for the mad ass kicking you’ll likely experience from everyone but me. If you want to simply observe said ass kicking, you’ll need to be there at 7:30. Either way, registration at www.relivethewizard.com is compulsory or your name won’t be on the list and you can’t get in. And you do want to get in, don’t you?

(Oh, and because I’m sure you’re just itching to know, “The Creeper” is the pseudonym of last year’s champion Chris Woodford. Yes, kids, you too can have a potentially inappropriate nickname if you attend!)

I hope he exists in real life, though… because I just bought a pocket watch from him.

Okay, it’s not so much a pocket watch as it is a pocket tree. But I digress.

From what I’ve gleaned through the regular stalkerish Google-esque avenues, the man behind the mask is one Thomas Girard, a twenty-five-year-old mild-mannered web developer by day who has called Toronto his home for the past three years.

You’re probably wondering what the hell this has to do with a site about relationships and gender-based gaming. Well, if you must know, he’s married. And he likes video games. Unlike some married gamers, however, sometimes he gets all artsy about it.

And this is one of the myriad results.

According to Steel Bananas, the catalyst that turned Girard’s vivid imagination loose upon the unsuspecting world of art was a gift from his wife. “It was a pair of felt robots mounted on paper and hung with ribbon,” he writes, “and I just loved it so much that I wanted to turn some of the images swirling around in my head into something physical.”

Okay. Before we go any further, let me be honest here. I’m not a fan of the art scene, especially in metropolitan settings like Toronto. In fact, I find many downtown artists pretentious and selfish (and I’d rather poke myself in the eye with a sharp stick than have to talk to one). But there was something about Thomas’ work (and his twitter pic) that evoked the word “whimsical” in a way that, refreshingly enough, did not make me want to punch him in the face.

Seriously. How can you hate a man who makes Shadow of the Colossus-inspired collage art?

So I asked him if I could pick his brain a bit whilst he was sitting in his apartment (or magical tree or wherever the hell he lives), adjusting the chain length of my newly purchased toy.

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