Dates in Dugan History

1974 – Born in St. Paul, Neb.
1978 — Pooped my pants at mother’s wedding; first in a long line of memorable shattings
1979 — Wrote and performed first piece: “Monday Night Football with Howard Cosell”; won second place (Hershey bar) at school talent show
1980 — Repeated Cosell act, although updated like today’s video games, and won talent show; awarded stupid triangle-and-golf-tee thinking game; stopped writing for a couple years
1984 — Tornado destroyed house
1985 — Won first prize at town parade for throwing a bunch of sticks on my bike and calling it the “G.I. Joe Mobile”
1986 — Bike stolen; no suspects were arrested; award-winning bike never reclaimed; taken out of public school and spent a year studying at a place called “Happy Church”
1987 – Re-entered public school as that kid that went to “Happy Church” school
1988 – Moved to Grand Island, Neb., and attended Northwest High School, known as Cow Pie High; started driving to school daily until I ditched the car
1989 – Became editor of school newspaper and began performing in theatre; worked at Dairy Queen and drove my car around the city illegally, only being busted once
1990 – Wrote lame student profiles for local paper; continued as editor and theatre guy; won award for playing evil preacher; left Dairy Queen for a video store; became cool and began smoking
1991 — Won award for playing evil innkeeper; failed creative writing class
1992 — Won Henry Fonda Memorial Scholarship, presented by Jane and Peter Fonda and Ted Turner; had first paid writing gig penning children’s scripts for The Groundwater Foundation (then Nebraska Groundwater Foundation) festival
1993 — Wasted scholarship on knucklehead year at University of Nebraska; went back to working at video store
1994 — Attended Peru State College, pursuing degree in English
1995 — Became editor of the school paper; began writing short stories
1996 — Wrote first book, still untitled; wrote what is today “Tis Better to Be Vile Than Vile Esteem’d“; created “controversial” “Life and Times of Diesel Dog” comic with Scott Krichau
1997 — Began writing haiku series to glorify Bill Ranford; graduated with a B.S. in English
1998 — Attended graduate school at Northwest Missouri State University; left school; became reporter for small-town newspaper; wrote column “Antisocial, Common Terry” (get it? neither did they)
1999 — Wrote “Trudy & Colin: The Relationship Guide“; took position editing obituaries at Sioux City Journal; spent my life savings ($50) on duct tape
2000 — Wrote column for Journal’s entertainment magazine “XL” geared toward young people, of which there were none in Sioux City
2001 — Became content editor at Smart Computing magazine in Lincoln; saw Mike Watt in concert in Minneapolis, had revelation to start own music magazine
2002 — Moved to Des Moines and started Red Rag Magazine
2003 — Received message that I wanted to save forever from Mike Watt on answering machine; lightning strike resets machine; Red Rag R.I.P. (unrelated to Watt incident); started writing CCG articles for Wizards of the Coast online; moved to Seattle
2004 — Found a job at Nintendo of America; started writing “The Hick Arrives“; won MLB Showdown national championship
2005 — Created NOA Rufus character; wrote Nintendogs and Mario Slam Basketball web sites
2006 — Wrote first Wii website for E3 2006; wasted year exercising
2007 — Transferred to Nintendo of Europe in Frankfurt; began writing “The Fog People”
2008 — Wrote “The Closest Distance“; Attended Road Bowling World Championships in Cork, Ireland; Moved to Prague
2009 — Wrote “How to Write Email That GETS RESULTS and Other CEObservations,” “The Dilettantes” and “Jsem Robot” ; hit by a car at Birkenau concentration camp making me, technically, a survivor; fined 50 euro for being hit by car at concentration camp
2010 — Wrote “Mary Courage and Her Children,” “The Hick Arrives at the Tea Party”
2011 — Went to Japan on business and found myself in the middle of a 9.0 earthquake; wrote “Dies,” “Feng Shui for Cubists,” “My Future is a Thing of the Past”
2012 — Coming soon: “A Day in the Life of Prague” and “Father”