2001-09-01 - 11:48 p.m.

Planetarion: Phoenix and Ricardo

As it turns out, yesterday's little experiment was an exercise in futility. The decision has effectively been taken out of my hands.

Ricardo and his allies launched a full-scale attack on Phoenix last night, involving several million ships. Phoenix got an impressive array of defense, including us, some of her future galaxy mates.

However, a couple of hours into it I noticed, to my horror, that Terror and Johnny, two of my current galaxy mates, were on the attacking side. I suspect Ricardo called them in on purpose, just to have someone from my galaxy opposing me.

We've had problems with people from my galaxy being on both sides of attacks. Since we are so close to the end of the round, I see no point in getting our galaxy torn apart over what essentially is a lovers' quarrel. I sent an email to both Johnny and Terror, informing them that I was on the defending side of the planet they were attacking. I asked them nicely to withdraw their attack, and indicated that I was going to withdraw myself.

To my surprise, they actually complied. Usually politeness doesn't work with them.

However, the fact that Ricardo is palling around with Johnny, Terror and Sharon means that he is utterly unsuitable for our galaxy. The reason we are forming this galaxy is to get away from these guys.

It's kind of a pity, because I was beginning to understand what his problems with Phoenix were.

Phoenix has made a big point of telling us what a vicious, abusive, stalkerly asshole her former husband was. What she neglected to mention is that she is STILL MARRIED to him. If I was looking at her as potential girlfriend material, that would turn me right off. I also get the impression that there is still some sort of complicated attraction between Phoenix and her former-jailbird husband. Again, exactly the sort of situation I would try to stay far away from.

Add to this the fact that Phoenix is kind of sticky-sweet clingy, and you could see why Ricardo might reasonably want to break up with her. That being said, there is no reason for him to act like a total rat bastard asshole. By being such a schmuck he is effectively forcing everyone that knows the two of them to choose her over him. Well, he's 21 and stupid.

Because Ricardo has proven to be so treacherous and vicious, just about everyone is convinced that picking Phoenix was the right choice. That, and the fact that Phoenix was able, single-handedly, to get massive defense for herself, while at the same time calling down a huge counterattack on Ricardo. Not too shabby.

Phoenix seems cloyingly sweet, but I still wouldn't want to piss her off. You know what they say about a woman scorned.