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Many of our top users seem to have avatars with a picture of themselves in a car with what appears to me to be Paddington Bear:
enter image description here enter image description here

So what is the story behind this?

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    The Paddington Bear was also childhood friend of mine. One day I removed his boots only to find that his left leg was significantly shorter than the right. This caused my young mind a significant amount of grief, as I tried to imagine how this could have happened. From then on, I could never play with Paddington freely. I was constantly drawn to removing his boots and examining his deformity. Many years on, I became a Sysadmin. Coincidence? I think not.
    – jscott
    Commented Aug 3, 2011 at 12:34
  • Corrected tags for clarity
    – Nixphoe
    Commented Aug 5, 2011 at 13:16
  • 5
    Oh, crap... I've been out of town for a few days and not checking meta. I missed this whole thing!
    – Evan Anderson
    Commented Aug 5, 2011 at 17:18

8 Answers 8

Reset to default
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Erm...my fault.

There's a theme park near where I live called 'Adventure Wonderland', I was forced to go about 5 years ago with another local family. Well it was beyond crappy - I was SO bored, then out of the corner of my eye I saw the Paddington 'Kiddy Ride' (that's the official term for those things apparently). As a kid I'd loved the books and even went on 'Junior Mastermind' on the BBC answering questions about them (came first on specialist subject but came second overall by one point after the general knowledge round - not that I'm bitter or overly competitive about it). I'd always been fond of Paddington so I cheered myself up by having that photo taken.

I get lots of photos taken for work stuff with me all 'suited-up' but the avatar I like for this site (and a couple of others) is that one of me with Paddington - as I feel it conveys something about me that many others don't.

Anyway cut to last week or so when EvanA pops up, he'd seen an almost identical ride near him and thought it would be funny to sit in it and get a photo. Well it worked and I was simply delighted by it, since then others have very nicely made their own. I am in the process of finding and buying a ride such as that which I hope to ship (and possibly abandon) at a future SF-related event.

So there you go.

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    Plus you were having a bad day the other day so I changed mine to help cheer you up with becoming a gravatar-meme :-)
    – Bart Silverstrim
    Commented Aug 3, 2011 at 12:21
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    Well, that, and I owed him for a little bit of advice @Chopper3 gave regarding what kind of hat to wear in Boston...not funny! I know nothing about sports...
    – Bart Silverstrim
    Commented Aug 3, 2011 at 12:30
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    I told another friend that Yankee caps are made in South Boston and that he should wear one, smiling and pointing at it wherever he went went there - he was physically thrown out of a bar :)
    – Chopper3 Mod
    Commented Aug 3, 2011 at 12:32
  • Okay, that's kind of funny, I suppose.
    – Bart Silverstrim
    Commented Aug 3, 2011 at 12:33
  • The idea of shipping a Paddington ride to a SF event was actually my idea.. :P
    – Tom O'Connor
    Commented Aug 4, 2011 at 19:30
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I did't buy Chopper3's story ("five years ago, bla bla" ...). So I went to his company's car park and discovered this little secret: IT'S HIS REGULAR CAR!!!

I took this picture (exhibit 'A'):

Paddington Bear car

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    haha - that'd give me better mileage than my real car for certain
    – Chopper3 Mod
    Commented Aug 3, 2011 at 12:58
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Rogues gallery

Chopper3Bart SilverstrimChrisSEvan AndersonIainITHedgeHogJacobKyle BrandtMichael LomanScott PackTom O'ConnorWesley DavidZoredacheevoretaq7 samSmall ClangerNixphowfaulkHolocryptic MikeyBBen PilbrowjscottInceptiontombull89

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    "Have you seen these users? Wanted for impersonating an officer of the highest order. Please dial 999 if you encounter them. They are considered unarmed and extremely contagious."
    – Wesley
    Commented Aug 4, 2011 at 20:55
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    Ahh, crap... I got the steering wheel turned the wrong way... (and I couldn't find a red car, either... >grumble<)
    – Evan Anderson
    Commented Aug 5, 2011 at 17:24
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Separated at birth

Sir.

I could not help but be struck by the similarity between Chopper3 and Evan Anserson. I wonder if they are related.

Yours etc,

Iain

With apologies to Private Eye's lookalikes

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  • They must be similar. I think the labels are reversed...?
    – Bart Silverstrim
    Commented Aug 3, 2011 at 14:10
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    @BartSilverstrim: It's deliberate, I guess you have to have read Private Eve to get it.
    – user9517
    Commented Aug 3, 2011 at 14:22
  • Ah, I get it now...
    – Bart Silverstrim
    Commented Aug 3, 2011 at 14:35
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    I think I'm much fatter :)
    – Chopper3 Mod
    Commented Aug 4, 2011 at 19:52
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Revenge of the choptar meme.

enter image description here Photo by: https://serverfault.com/users/16732/tom-oconnor
Original Question: Two servers using same name servers?

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    I just noticed that my self. Getting crazy out there!
    – Nixphoe
    Commented Aug 4, 2011 at 20:55
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    @Nixphoe - Getting? GETTING?? insane cackle
    – voretaq7
    Commented Aug 5, 2011 at 15:10
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We can't answer that question until you have a Paddington Bear choppertar...

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    -1 for peer pressure and general tomfoolery.
    – Kyle Brandt
    Commented Aug 3, 2011 at 12:18
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    Jokes on you. My name's not Tom. :-p
    – Bart Silverstrim
    Commented Aug 3, 2011 at 12:19
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For posterity. I couldn't zoom out enough, but Bart's juuuuuust offscreen at the top.

enter image description here

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  • Even worse, it doesn't appear that SE links out to a full-res image. :(
    – jscott
    Commented Aug 5, 2011 at 0:32
  • Right click -> View Image
    – Chris S
    Commented Aug 5, 2011 at 3:33
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There is only one appropriate response to all of this tomfoolery: Additional tomfoolery in Unicode.

đŸ»

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    Nice... square.
    – Nathan Osman
    Commented Dec 13, 2011 at 2:16
  • @GeorgeEdison Well, SOMEONE doesn't have full Unicode support on his workstation! marathon-studios.com/unicode/U1F43B/Bear_Face
    – voretaq7
    Commented Dec 13, 2011 at 18:39
  • Weird. It doesn't show up in any of the fonts I tried.
    – Nathan Osman
    Commented Dec 13, 2011 at 18:42
  • also at some point my OS X unicode font got upgraded: It's a cartoon bearface now, not line-art...
    – voretaq7
    Commented Dec 13, 2011 at 19:00

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