A magical creation of Jonathan Barnavelt: “a little man who popped out at you from behind the paint cans in the cellarway and screamed, ‘Dreeb! Dreeb! I am the Fuse Box Dwarf!’ Lewis was not scared by the little man, and he felt that those who scream, ‘Dreeb!’ are more to be pitied than censured [The House With a Clock In Its Walls, 121].”
Lewis later admits that his uncle’s magic sometimes wore off and that the dwarf had one day vanished [The Doom of the Haunted Opera, 40].
Perhaps this was a device during Bellairs' youth created to explain noises in the basement.
Whatever the case it has its name to some interesting tributes. First, there is a computer virus named Fuse Box Dwarf that infects computer’s EXE files. Within the viral code itself appears the message “Dreeb! Dreeb! I am the fuse box dwarf.” It was first reported in 1993 but its origins are unknown.
Then there is the Home Page Virus, a line of text that appears on various web pages: Dreeb! Dreeb! I am a Home Page Virus! Copy me into your home page today!
To try and get the upper hand on the situation we asked some of the people whose sites promote the puzzling passage and answers are nearly all the same. Nick Kaijaks provided us with the most historic accounts of the line of text: "I couldn't tell you where I picked up the reference. I do recall that I've had it on my home page (and its previous incarnations) for many years. The oldest archived copy of my site that I could find offhand was from April 1997 and it was definitely there then! It could well go back to sometime around 1993-94 when I was first building a home page."
Michael Tilstra echoes much of the same sentiments. "I wasn't aware of the origin of the phrase. I just saw it on someone else's web page, and thought it was funny. So I put it on mine as well. It has been a while since I did that, so I'm really not sure where I originally saw it."
"It was something funny," Iain Davidson adds, whose records show he's had the text since June 1997. "I checked the reference, and there's no sign of the original URL (surprise, surprise...). Internet Legend now, I guess."
Kaijaks adds he too happened across the quote when creating his web page and it seemed like an amusing thing to put there. "I suppose it was one of those early Web fads, like the 'hot link of the day,' odometer hit counters and "under construction" gifs." We agree with Kaijaks that "sadly, whilst 'under construction' gifs broadly survive, the Home Page Virus never seemed as virulent."
