It’s Labor Day Weekend and I’m bored so my mind was a bit sluggish when I checked the site mail and found this:

From: Anna Angio
Subject: Desert Rat

Message Body:
I have decided to rat on some of you and I have some pictures to share with law enforcement.

Whoa, what’s this? For those who don’t know Anna is a friend of ours who spent last winter with her husband here at East Jesus doing a monumental load of work. From constructing art to growing plants to just keeping the boys in line. She is a sweet little lady who I would hate to have mad at me but I know this isn’t her e-mail address and I am sure that she wouldn’t rat on us as that isn’t the Chicago way.

So I opened the next e-mail:
On 2012-09-02 19:10, Slab City Organization wrote:
Anna Angio has made it aware that East Jesus is an illegal trash dump site that needs to be cleaned up. Is she part of your organization? We have contacted the proper authorities at BLM in response to her email. Anna has decided the area needs to be cleaned up, and all artwork be removed. Did you authorize this?

Now it becomes clear. This is the work of the webmaster of slabcity.org. I don’t want to draw web traffic to his site but let me just mention that it is in no way associated with our area. In fact it is run by a gentleman in another part of the country who uses it to get donations for his pocket. He’s been the butt of many a joke here but never taken seriously. He’s all about the clean up of the Slabs but never seems to get here or get any work done. He has several rants about his need to ‘baby sit’ us and inspire/provoke us to clean up the land. So I went over to his site to see if I could gather more information. Checked the bulletin board(which you can’t post or reply unless you pay the $5 membership fee) and found these two gems:

Anna Angio – ILLEGAL SLANDER    
Anna Angio (who claims to represent East Jesus) is slandering this organization with false accusations. She is 100% responsible for our  NEW  efforts to formally label the nearby community of East Jesus as an illegal dump site. The EPA has laws that prohibit dumping, and the inhabitants of East Jesus do not own the land. Therefore, since Anna has slandered us, we have no choice but to add pressure to law enforcement to enforce existing laws regarding things such as illegal sewage dumping. Some East Jesus websites also feature videos of drug use and possession on BLM territory. It should be known publicly that Anna Angio has brought negative attention to East Jesus. Her idea of the GOLDEN RULE is to make up slander, so we have no choice but to respond by letting law enforcement know about all the STUFF going on at East Jesus. So if the camp gets raided by drug sniffing dogs, just remember that Anna Angio picked a fight she was unable to finish. It’s OK to disagree with our organization at any level, it’s your right. But making up slander is just plain illegal, and we aren’t going to sit back and do nothing about it

and:

EAST JESUS SCAM!    
Charlie Russell – Still collecting donations over a year after he died? Where is the money going? We have heard rumors that Anna Angio is skimming the donations, but cannot confirm. Just wanted all of you to know.

Slanderous, I say. Well, I felt I needed to reply to his e-mail (plus I’m bored):

ROTFLMAO! thanks I needed that 🙂 now get bent :p

Thought that might be the end of it (though, secretly I like poking trolls). Sure enough it got a response:

Since you don’t own that land, BLM can remove any structures or trash. We don’t need your permission, I am just letting you know. You don’t have any say in the matter what happens on BLM land. It’s not your property to destroy, as you will soon find out.

I’m shaking, with laughter, so the game is on. My polite reply;

Eric, seriously, get a life. You don’t have a clue about Imperial county or Niland or Slab City. If you took the time to do any research you would know that East Jesus is about finding creative ways of re-using trash and recycling or re-purposing garbage. We can show you pictures of the clean-up effort but then you would think we just wanted your money. So call whoever or whatever department you want and keep the jokes rolling.

Of course he couldn’t let this go, even if I betrayed the fact that I had done a search and knew his name.

The problem isn’t you, it’s a person called Anna Angio. And yes we would share donations, but so far not getting any serious takers. Just those who want the money, then turn around and dig septic pits and charge people for the labor. And I spent more time living in California than any of you know. Gossip seems like a plague around there.

Now he went and did it. More fuel for the fire. So I tried to encourage a factual debate:

You are so funny, do you have a comedy background?

You say the problem isn’t us but you want to call BLM to remove structures. Maybe you didn’t know their offices are closed this holiday weekend. You have a problem with Mrs. Angio who lives in Missouri. You think people are digging septic pits when we practice humanure recycling. You seem to think we take you seriously about donations when you have stated that the money you take in is for the upkeep of your website. That you are ‘baby-sitting’ the slabs but haven’t shown your face in these parts in years. Oh yeah, Matt Derrick ‘a dirty hippy’ as you wrote, is a friend of ours too.
Have a good Labor Day, can’t wait to share this with our friends so they can enjoy a laugh.

I thought that last part about Matt would get some response. See Matt has called him out before and if you do a Google search for slabcity.org one of the first results is:

http://squattheplanet.com/threads/slabcity-org-is-a-scam.12856/

I guess I yanked the chain too hard because this is what I got back;

…just a bunch of low-class rats who think they know it all.

Damn, now how am I supposed to pass the time.