Wednesday, February 27, 2008

What the Hell, Mel?

Hi everyone! I'm still in Turkey and working hard, getting ready to start what I hope will be my last day here. The business that I'm in is good and I think we've just about accomplished everything we came here to do - including having a good time of course. I may work for evil Corporate Weiners, but they still haven't made a binding that can keep me from slipping the yoke every so often and kicking up my mildly wicked heels :-)

So I finally get some cool internet time to see how everyone in the World is doing, and my writing instructor, Mel Odom, sends a note saying that his review site has just had its 10,000th visitor. Here's a link. Maximum congrats!

So, I click the link and this message pops up:



Mel's website had been banned in Turkey through a court order obtained a man named Adnan Oktar. Since I can't visit Mel's website, I went over to look at Mr. Oktar's. My Turkish is awful, but I understand that Mr. Oktar is a charismatic leader of an Islamic Creationist movement that is active in political and civil life here. I couldn't find anything that I could read well enough to understand why Mr. Oktar has worked to ban this website. Whatever it was that offended him must have been big enough to merit going to all the extra effort of involving the legal system.

So, what the Hell, Mel? What did you write on this website anyway? Or better yet, why did you wait to write it until I was in a placw where I couldn't read it? Are you punishing me :-) for missing class?

2 comments:

TerriRainer said...

Holy crap! Maybe he's one of those fanatics that likes to burn books, and he bans every stinkin book review site he can....

Or maybe Mel is REALLY a CIA operative....

Bookhound isn't really for book reviews....it has encoded messages....

And he's not even bald....he has a thick head full of hair, he just nair's it to make him look that way....

Teaching and writing are just his cover....

When he goes to writer's conferences, we know what he's REALLY doing, some covert operation, to save democracy, oh yeah, and the written word!

YOU GO MEL!
(wow, now that I think about it, Mel does have that whole Sean Connery look goin....if only he had that accent!)

Terri

Marisa said...

I always knew that Mel was subverting something! No I know it was just the entire country of Turkey. Way to be, Mel! I didn't find the news of his ban that surprising however, because he has been banned in various places such as the Mama Lou's on I-35 and Grand Blvd. for outlining novels in record time, writing sans revisions, and making silly puns.

Also, this news of a present makes me excited! Class isn't the same without you. You missed the story of the time Ron spent nearly a week in jail. Priceless!