The Name

Someone asked me about the name of the blog recently and I was torn as to what I should say.

Part of me wanted to say it was an answer to a question I’m posed in various forms: Why do you study war/what do you think about war/how do you feel picking a subject so connected to death, pain and suffering?

And my answer is invariably, that my personal opinion of war is meaningless. That I think that war is bad, but not inherently evil. That war is unfortunate but sometimes necessary. That fighting is something worthy of study, not something to be ignored. And that warfare and military subjects have never had the financial support that they do today, making them an inviting career opportunity for a prospective civilian instructor.

So, about war, I’ve “Never Felt Better”.

But that’s not where the name came from.

I could say that the name is a reflection of my current state of growth. I’m nearly done with college, breaking free of the last ties of adolescence, preparing to make my way in the real world in a life and subject that I am comfortable with. I’ve “Never Felt Better” about everything in general.

But that’s not where the name came from.

I could say that aspects of my chosen topic have depressed and warped my mind. Things like the Holocaust shattered my carefree innocence, but I found the subject to so intriguing, so worthy of study, that I continued it. But, since I began that fateful study, I’ve yet to get over the slump in mood. I’ve “Never Felt Better” since that day.

But that’s not where the name came from.

I could say that my original purpose in life was to set up a clothes manufacturing place and that I came up with a witty pun name: Never Felt Better. But my dream ended when I failed basic cloth class in secondary and I picked military history instead. But my dream stayed with me and lives on in my blog title.

But that’s not where the name came from.

The truth is far, far more retarded.

‘Never Felt Better’ gets its source from an in-joke among my friends that I will now attempt to explain without sounding like a mentally deficient malcontent.

It’s all about BSG of course.

The first episode of Battlestar Galactica’s fourth season, ‘He that believeth in me’ has a dream/hallucination sequence right at its start. A certain character, much beloved by fandom, has just discovered that he/she is a Cylon agent. And in the midst of battle, they have a sudden vision of freezing up in the command room, and looking across the table at Admiral Adama. Adama asks them “What the hell is the matter with you?”

And the character replies: “Nothing. Never Felt Better in my life” as they raise a pistol and shoot the Admiral through the eye. Then they snap back to reality, revealing it to be a short dream sequence.

A friend and I (I’ll call him Maynard) were discussing the episode later in the week, when another friend, (We’ll call him, Crafter) joined us. He hadn’t seen the episode and didn’t want us spoiling anything.

So rather than pick a new topic of conversation, we did the mature thing, and attempted to continue our conversation without spoilers. This proved difficult.

I really liked the above scene and I wanted to know what Maynard thought of it. So I asked him “What about that bit…” and proceeded to mime holding a gun to his head, put on a really stupid imitation of the character’s voice and said “Never Felt Better…bang”.

Crafter’s reaction was along the line of  “What the hell are you going on about?” which caused us to laugh. Good times.

And then it all got out of control. 

We happened to be waiting to go to a social occasion with numerous friends, a University awards ceremony. So a whole bunch of the gamer crowd was there. And the second me and Maynard recounted what had just happened to one person, it started to spread.

For the whole rest of the night, the activity not helped by the alcohol we imbibed, we were miming the gun, and “Never Felt Bettering” each other. And it just got worse.

I’m not sure how it happened but within a couple of days everyone was doing it. Myself and Maynard created a monster. We greeted each other with the words. If we were asked “How Are You?” the imaginary guns were coming out of their holsters before the question was finished. On our forums, every third post was along the lines of deliberately asking someone how they felt to set it up. We got into groups to try and trick people into asking us how we felt, so we could do it in unison to freak them out.

It became a signature for users on our forums. On AGM power points, it was a slogan under the society banner. Anytime any violence was threatened, in a joking manner of course, it was usually with a “I’ll make sure you never feel better!”

When accounts got hijacked, it became the title of coming out of the closet threads. Very soon it spread to other societies and non-soc people.

In future, when anyone did anything remotely treacherous, whether it was real life or an RPG, out came the words. We couldn’t control it. It was out our hands.

But eventually, like all in-jokes, it died down. People still used those three magic words but less and less frequently.

When I decided to make create this blog, three years after the birth of NFB, I considered many names.

‘Commence Bombardment’ was my first choice, but I thought it was too long, too many syllables. ‘Whirlwind’ was briefly on the table as was ‘Huckleberries, Huckleberries!’ and ‘As Racist As They Are’.

Those are all in-jokes from my circle of friends by the way. One day I may explain them to you.

Other, non-injokey candidates included ‘I Will Kill You’, a quotation from one of my course teachers (nothing sinister I promise), ‘Strategic Bombing Doesn’t Work’, a maxim hammered into us by the course coordinators or ‘Two By Two’, a Firefly reference.

But ‘Never Felt Better’ got the nod. It was simple, easy to remember, and original (for a blog title anyway). And it was a nod to past glories.

I admit, as co-creator of the in-joke, Maynard really should have equal rights. But I’ll be nice and let him have ‘Whirlwind!’, another collaboration.

So that’s where the name came from. But do me a favour. Pretend its one of the other explanations.