Interview with bojangles

They said you had the envelope with the details of the person we’re interviewing.

Can we continue this conversation over some breakfast?

Well, the tables have turned (even though I've only interviewed with you twice)! I guess the best place to start is that I'm pretty much a "normal Pokémaster."

I'm a 17-year old freshman in college in the wonderful city of New York. So other hobbies include Magic and strategy games. Getting away from nerdy things, I fence recreationally and love hanging out with all my great friends and doing all the crazy stuff that goes along with that.

A common misconception is that my name, "bojangles," is a spin-off of the fried chicken place in the southern areas of America. I never have and never will live in the south, and I've definitely never been to Bojangles the restaurant. It was just a goofy name my friends and I made up back years ago.

Funny you should ask. When I took my leave of absence, it was right around the time BW was coming out. Therefore I never established much of a foothold in the new metagame. I've just picked up BW Ubers again and I'm testing random teams and styles, so don't laugh at me if you see me and crush me on the ladders.

However, I've always fancied myself very good at analyzing the metagames rather than necessarily playing them, and this was definitely true during my prime in 4th Gen Ubers. I'm making a comeback though!

Well, I would divide my jobs into twofold: Ubers and Grammar.

My first moderator position was in Stark Ubers, because the newly established subforum was in danger of being washed out by all the mediocre posters that had descended upon the scene. Theorymon, Jibaku, and I were pretty running the tier from #ubers on IRC before that subforum opened up anyway, so I was sort of the natural choice as those two already modded there.

Concurrently, I was establishing myself as one of the more prolific grammar checkers in C&C at the time, and Jimbo offered me a position here at The Smog as head grammar checker. I was flattered and jumped aboard the team. The C&C moderator position was sort of a culmination of the two. Because I like analyzing the metagame and have what I consider to be an excellent grasp of the English language, being a moderator seemed to fit. Later, along with whistle, I established the Grammar-Prose group, so I was technically the king of all grammar on the site at one point.

I like to think of myself as pretty intelligent, and while that definitely helps, a fair amount can be traced back to this one class I took called Techniques of Writing. It really helped me with the more subtle nuances of grammar. I sort of make it my business to use this to appear educated and bright. People also take my suggestions so that's cool too.

Haha, actually this class was in the early days of High School.

I'm currently just a lowly first-year at Columbia University, but my sights are set on neuroscience and maybe medical school, but who knows. I also like theoretical physics and economics, but unfortunately with the job market the way it is, I might be pushed in a certain direction. I do take a course cryptically named "University Writing," though, so I guess my skills are being put to use.

I've always been fascinated by science and math, so my interests have always been in those areas. Moving past the time in my life whenever every kid wanted to be a firefighter or some variation on that, I actually thought my calling would be architecture. Granted this was when I was like 10, so take that with a grain of salt.

As I took more biology courses, it seemed most interesting to me, so that's where I'm at now.

I was actually the fencing captain for my High School team, but don't let that confuse you; I was pretty average and appointed mainly because a lot of people liked me. I picked up Magic again recently and have gotten to be quite good at it, but not in a very competitive sense. I'm not going to tournaments or anything, but I think some of the Magic players on Smogon are coming to fear some of my decks.

Hmm. I'll give a two part answer on this one. Competitively, my favorite Pokémon was either Rayquaza or Kyogre. Rayquaza can just do so many fun things that he's a serious consideration for any team. Kyogre is great too because he's so powerful that there's a serious "oh Jesus" moment whenever he switches in on full health.

Otherwise though, Cyndaquil is clearly the best Pokémon. I mean seriously, he's just so adorable!

No problem! Happy to be on the list of Smogoners worthy to be interviewed.