Ode to the -sters

I have never had the honor of entering a post that deserves such prestige and reverence as the post of which you are about to partake, because never have there been 2 people as highly excellent, witty, intelligent and dashingly good-looking as the two, the only

ELLENSTER AND MATTSTER



While these two unique individuals do indeed have normal names that don't include the oh-so-fashionable suffix, they both quite prefer to be referred in the -ster form. Likewise, they express a generosity unmatched in its far-reaching equality by not only reserving this delightful suffix for just their own names, but rather they spread the term of endearment thickly, like thick rich peanut butter, over the plethora of people and things that are so privileged to be a part of the existence that is ELLEN and MATT. I, myself, was once fortunate enough to be referred to as "the Mamester" and wore the name with beaming pride. Because Ellen and Matt are such fine individuals, you may begin to see a lot of them in my posts from here on out. The only reason they haven't made specific appearances before now was that I was fighting it out with their agents getting permission to post their pictures online because they are in such high demand ... so please, don't go stealing their pictures and telling people you know them if you don't. I know they're just that cool and everyone wants to meet them, but please, respect their rights as individuals to a little privacy.

Who ARE these people? What defines them?

Ellen (n.) - The only person I know who can say "shitballs" and "fartknockers" in the same sentence and still ooooze with a southun chaaam that runs smooth and easy as honey. Growing up with someone you don't take the time to realize all the things that make them who they are, you just know those people innately, the way you know how to speak or think. You just know the person inside and out without knowing specificly how you know them so well. I tried to figure out how it is that Ellen can be so downright crude and still make every mother in town call her first to babysit, but I never have gotten it. Just as I will never be able to explain emotion, I will never be able to explain Ellen. But that doesn't make me know her less, just in a way that is abstract and undescribeable. So ask me to define Ellen and I can tell you that she makes me laugh in a way that is unashamed of the sound that comes out and allows me to be the worst and best of me in a way that makes me walk away from my worst and only compare my best to her. But I can't define her. She is above definition.

Matt (n.) - I tried three times to write a good definition of Matt. They all came out sounding fake and contrived so I erased them all because I don't find Matt to be fake or contrived so that just wouldn't be appropriate. But I can tell this. We walked in to Matt's new house from seeing Pirates of the Carribbean 2 (fun movie ... johnny depp ... good times). It was my choice and I think Matt agreed to take Ellen and me, not against his will, but maybe against his good judgement on the second night in theaters. A good man indeed, being taken along to drool over sun-toasted pirates and buying $9 bottles of water. Ellen went upstairs probably to use the bathroom and I curled myself into a corner of the over-sized suede-ish couch in the immaculately spotless den. Glancing across the room, my gag reflex kicked in and I pulled my knees close in fear of getting closer to a hugh spider ready to pounce on the far red square of the rug.
"Uh Matt I'm trying not to freak out but there is a huge spider right there on the rug." I of course knew that the spider had come to fulfill the mission that all spiders have set out before them: to violently attack and kill me. Matt obviously had missed that fine point when studying spiders because he did NOT proceed to violently fight back with a thick rubber shoe tread, but rather calmly crossed to the kitchen to retrieve the glass I had been drinking out of at dinner.
"What are you doing? You have to kill him. I can't sleep here unless he's dead -" mid sentence Matt slammed the glass down, causing the spider to lurch in my direction. I, naturally, screamed repeatedly, flapped my hands to ward of spider progression and perched every inch of me on a one square foot portion of the back of the couch. Amazingly, the glass trapped the spider.
To make a long story short, Ellen and Matt spent the next half hour or so examining the spider through the glass, looking up spider pictures on the internet, then examining again for comparison purposes while I remained perched on the top of the couch gagging and staring in fear at my enemy. And you know what, in the end Matt did NOT violently destroy the spider as I would have liked. No. He put him in a tupperware container and froze him, politely offering me a popsicle as he put the container in the freezer.
"To show my exterminator." He said, shrugging matter-of-factly as if people just froze spider everyday right next to their pizzas and popsicles.
Laid-back and thorough. You don't get more laid-back than nonchalantly strolling across the room to grab a glass while a deathly, vicious spider lurks near the hyperventilating little sister of your girlfriend. And you definitely don't get more thorough than trapping, investigating and freezing a monstrously large spider "just to show the exterminator."