( Week IX , Week XI )
Monday
Good grief, we are safe nowhere! Mrs Wilberforce just dropped in with three boxes of feather boas. She found us in an entirely dimension in space! The Quergs are at a loss in understanding it. She just flounced in, dropped off these gigantic packages and flounced out again, utterly oblivious to the change in locale. Now we have feather boas, and our supervisor recommended we just wash them and then they'll drop them off in an undercover operation. How bizarre it is! Celia actually giggled for a whole hour, off and on. At least they're not hats!
Tuesday
I've just realised, my diary, that I never followed up on the singed hats. There they were on our return from the Ring of Querg. We found out the next day, after explaining that being singed is not the same as being dirty, that there had been a small expedition to a volcano planet in the Iocane system, with some damage being taken as a result. It sounds like a very interesting planet, even if it is part of a very unlikely story. Incidentally, the Blots are just sitting there, outside the laundry. I'm somehow tempted to drape the feather boas on them, but Celia just looked at me disgustedly when I suggested it.
Wednesday
A mystery has been revealed! Egbert is actually a time-space continuum correction to the Blots problem. Yesterday, he visited us here at the laundry, traversing the road from our new communal house, and tripped over one of the interlopers, who promptly vanished! Astonished, the Quergs took some readings and discovered that some agent had put him there for that purpose. He trumpeted with glee and began running about and wildly tripping over them at every opportunity! There are now no Blots left, although our maintenance/therapist Querg thinks they must begin accumulating again soon. He seems to think that we weren't as unimportant to the natural timeline as they had thought, or that something else is badly wrong.
Thursday
The boas have been shipped back to our home time, finally! We managed to get a note put in as well, with the Quergs' agreement, asking for some necessary supplies to come back the squad. We really need some new sensor wipes and Celia misses her robo-bear! What madness! I gave up my robo-raccoon years ago, and she still has a bear!
Egbert has begun meditating in the middle of the night. I wonder if he has been told something about going home, as he seems rather melancholy recently. Barely an 'Egg!' has been heard for days.
There is a Blot outside the laundry. Celia is looking worried.
Friday
A brief note for today: The Grand High Querg has summoned us, including Egbert, to the Dome. We had never even heard of a Grand High Querg or a Dome! I wonder what we've done! Tomorrow, we will go. Celia's robo-bear growls at me when I sing in the wash facility.
There will be more...
Tuesday, 13 September 2016
Sunday, 11 September 2016
Just One More Turn
It was (and still is) a dangerous era. There were whole tribes of computer games (usually devised by the arch villain Sid Meier) which devoured your time in both real-time and in turns. Unsatisfied with merely having one success, Meier devised 'Railroad Tycoon', 'Civilization', 'Colonization' and even 'Pirates'. He used up decades of people's lives, not even including 'Silent Service' and 'Gunship'. His real success was in the 'one more turn' temptation of 'Colonization' and 'Civilization', though, which haunts me even now, decades later, in the form of 'Colonization', published in 1994. It's fiendish. It should be nothing compared to later offspring 'Alpha Centauri' and 'Civilization IV', but it's definitely better in its simplicity. Curses!
'End of turn' is an addictive phrase. With one click you could be off exploring the consequences of all your actions, moving cargo and military units, preparing for the inevitable end game. It is a strange and compulsive process, and one that taunts this writer even now. At this moment I could be selecting 'Declare independence' and rushing off to see if I can ward off the evil empire and liberate everyone, but instead discipline is holding and a blog post is being wrung from the keyboard of fate, which complains at not having to just provide an 'enter' key from time to time. 'One more turn' is a phenomenon wherein the game player repeatedly puts off finishing a session by thinking to themselves that they will play 'just one more turn' over and over again. Hours later, the player looks up and out of the window and sees darkness. A whole day has vanished, their eyes are bleary, and they haven't even build that fort in Baltimore yet...
You can guess what kind of weekend it has been now, can't you? Swimming, cycling and lots of turn taking! In other news, 'Strangeness In Space' (look it up) is going to Kickstart a two-episode season finale (featuring Sylvester McCoy?), 'Quincy, M.E.' is proving far better than I remembered or even predicted during the confused first run of episodes, the Labour leadership elections grumble on interminably, and 'Star Trek's fiftieth anniversary rolled by. 'Star Trek' is fifty, and I spent the weekend playing 'Colonization'. What kind of weird world is this? What else happened? Oh, the movie 'Hellzapoppin' arrived via DVD rental, and I'm not entirely certain how to react. It was... indescribable.
More 'Star Trek' thoughts will follow in the week to come. My students will certainly get bored with it, if nothing else! Maybe I should 'Deep Space Nine' on DVD after all. Maybe.
O.
'End of turn' is an addictive phrase. With one click you could be off exploring the consequences of all your actions, moving cargo and military units, preparing for the inevitable end game. It is a strange and compulsive process, and one that taunts this writer even now. At this moment I could be selecting 'Declare independence' and rushing off to see if I can ward off the evil empire and liberate everyone, but instead discipline is holding and a blog post is being wrung from the keyboard of fate, which complains at not having to just provide an 'enter' key from time to time. 'One more turn' is a phenomenon wherein the game player repeatedly puts off finishing a session by thinking to themselves that they will play 'just one more turn' over and over again. Hours later, the player looks up and out of the window and sees darkness. A whole day has vanished, their eyes are bleary, and they haven't even build that fort in Baltimore yet...
You can guess what kind of weekend it has been now, can't you? Swimming, cycling and lots of turn taking! In other news, 'Strangeness In Space' (look it up) is going to Kickstart a two-episode season finale (featuring Sylvester McCoy?), 'Quincy, M.E.' is proving far better than I remembered or even predicted during the confused first run of episodes, the Labour leadership elections grumble on interminably, and 'Star Trek's fiftieth anniversary rolled by. 'Star Trek' is fifty, and I spent the weekend playing 'Colonization'. What kind of weird world is this? What else happened? Oh, the movie 'Hellzapoppin' arrived via DVD rental, and I'm not entirely certain how to react. It was... indescribable.
More 'Star Trek' thoughts will follow in the week to come. My students will certainly get bored with it, if nothing else! Maybe I should 'Deep Space Nine' on DVD after all. Maybe.
O.
Friday, 9 September 2016
Story: The Glove, XV
( Part XIV , XVI ABORTED )
Megan's Story
"There are things we weren't told when we were growing up. Nor were our parents, or probably our grandparents too. It's not easy to understand, or it wasn't for me, but this world is... crooked. We were one colony once, and then supposedly we split up into two cities to forestall some crucial disaster, which never happened.
Suppose for a moment, that we were wrong, and that crisis did happen, and that it was covered up over time.
There's a town up North called Baleine, where some researchers discovered a buried ship which we assumed to be similar to those that the founders of Ganymede used to get here, but they were baffled by the lack of anything like an engine. Where did the motive power come from? One day, they turned up at the site and discovered that the ship had vanished. Completely. It was nowhere to be seen, with only a smooth indentation in the ground, as if it had been scooped out with a giant ladle. All the records were lost. Even the piper records were wiped.
Six months ago, I encountered a strange man, claiming to be lost and confused. He had wandered in from the countryside, wearing some pipes and traditional Burgh costume. I led him to an inn, and explained the situation to the landlaird, who took him in. When I went in for a drink the next day, the man had departed after spinning tails of space flights on the back of a comet, and being shot around the moon from a giant cannon. They couldn't make head nor tail out of any of it! The landlaird surrepetitiously passed me a book. It was called 'Off On A Comet'.
Later, in the privacy of my own chambers, I looked up 'Off On A Comet' on the colony database. There was no trace of it. It was a ghost form another world, a story by some man called Jules Verne, about a soldier and some companions whose bit of land was knocked off their world into space on a fantastical journey as part of a comet. The book simply didn't exist!
The man was never seen again, but I kept the novel in a secure place. The spaceship was never found, but the people still remembered. Things were being kept from us. Maybe they were small things, and maybe they were large. A few people banded together, or conspired to collect all of these incidents.
This calendar year, to date, we have catalogued one thousand two hundred and seventy incidents of interference and unusual events. Seven hundred were attributed to the Pipers themselves. The shooting here will in all likelihood be one of them. We're accumulating a small library of texts left behind by strange vagabonds which are for all intents and purposes apocryphal.
Something is going on here. Something secret. Are you interested?"
Megan's Story
"There are things we weren't told when we were growing up. Nor were our parents, or probably our grandparents too. It's not easy to understand, or it wasn't for me, but this world is... crooked. We were one colony once, and then supposedly we split up into two cities to forestall some crucial disaster, which never happened.
Suppose for a moment, that we were wrong, and that crisis did happen, and that it was covered up over time.
There's a town up North called Baleine, where some researchers discovered a buried ship which we assumed to be similar to those that the founders of Ganymede used to get here, but they were baffled by the lack of anything like an engine. Where did the motive power come from? One day, they turned up at the site and discovered that the ship had vanished. Completely. It was nowhere to be seen, with only a smooth indentation in the ground, as if it had been scooped out with a giant ladle. All the records were lost. Even the piper records were wiped.
Six months ago, I encountered a strange man, claiming to be lost and confused. He had wandered in from the countryside, wearing some pipes and traditional Burgh costume. I led him to an inn, and explained the situation to the landlaird, who took him in. When I went in for a drink the next day, the man had departed after spinning tails of space flights on the back of a comet, and being shot around the moon from a giant cannon. They couldn't make head nor tail out of any of it! The landlaird surrepetitiously passed me a book. It was called 'Off On A Comet'.
Later, in the privacy of my own chambers, I looked up 'Off On A Comet' on the colony database. There was no trace of it. It was a ghost form another world, a story by some man called Jules Verne, about a soldier and some companions whose bit of land was knocked off their world into space on a fantastical journey as part of a comet. The book simply didn't exist!
The man was never seen again, but I kept the novel in a secure place. The spaceship was never found, but the people still remembered. Things were being kept from us. Maybe they were small things, and maybe they were large. A few people banded together, or conspired to collect all of these incidents.
This calendar year, to date, we have catalogued one thousand two hundred and seventy incidents of interference and unusual events. Seven hundred were attributed to the Pipers themselves. The shooting here will in all likelihood be one of them. We're accumulating a small library of texts left behind by strange vagabonds which are for all intents and purposes apocryphal.
Something is going on here. Something secret. Are you interested?"
Wednesday, 7 September 2016
Zoot Zoot
The nights draw in, and the Autumn is truly upon us after the rigours of an almost entirely non-existent Summer. Oh, that's not true, for there were some sunny weeks, but the murk and rain predominated in the most welcome of ways. There's nothing quite so nice as a damp Summer, and the consequential ignoring of sunscreen and hats. Now, Winter is looking us dead in the eye, and what will we do? Wander around, taking sanity preserving long midday walks in the pale sunshine? It's not the worst idea in the world. Visit castles in solitude, free from the crowds wandering around in the other seasons? Brilliant!
Looking back at the Phrontistery, the great repository of rare or archaic words, I'm reminded of the word 'nihilism', which I've seen a thousand times before, but never fully understood except from the context. It's actually a far more shocking word than you might think:
nihilism - denial of all reality; extreme scepticism.
Yes, a nihilist is someone who completely disbelieves in any of the reality all around us. All of it. Completely. Even I, as someone who routinely assumes all of life to be utterly ludicrous and supremely mockable, still believe it is somehow real. There are things and people to care about. No, a true nihilist is at the very minimum extremely sceptical of everything. Everything. Shoes. Busses. Themselves. The world. Then, if you're not convinced that anything is real, you also believe that none of it matters, and then the most dangerous conclusion is that you can destroy what you like because it's not real to begin with. Nihilism in its truest definition, is a very dangerous thing. You're only ever one definition away from new ideas and insight into both the wonders and the fears of the world.
Now, in one of the more pleasant parts of being a tutor, it's time to write a reply to a letter from a former student, and encourage her English on every level that I can! It doesn't end with the lessons, especially when people are nice.
O.
Looking back at the Phrontistery, the great repository of rare or archaic words, I'm reminded of the word 'nihilism', which I've seen a thousand times before, but never fully understood except from the context. It's actually a far more shocking word than you might think:
nihilism - denial of all reality; extreme scepticism.
Yes, a nihilist is someone who completely disbelieves in any of the reality all around us. All of it. Completely. Even I, as someone who routinely assumes all of life to be utterly ludicrous and supremely mockable, still believe it is somehow real. There are things and people to care about. No, a true nihilist is at the very minimum extremely sceptical of everything. Everything. Shoes. Busses. Themselves. The world. Then, if you're not convinced that anything is real, you also believe that none of it matters, and then the most dangerous conclusion is that you can destroy what you like because it's not real to begin with. Nihilism in its truest definition, is a very dangerous thing. You're only ever one definition away from new ideas and insight into both the wonders and the fears of the world.
Now, in one of the more pleasant parts of being a tutor, it's time to write a reply to a letter from a former student, and encourage her English on every level that I can! It doesn't end with the lessons, especially when people are nice.
O.
Monday, 5 September 2016
Story: 'Wordspace' Phase II, Part V
( Part IV , VI )
"There is hope." A voice said from somewhere. It wasn't Cloud, because her voice was softer, and it wasn't Sorpresa as he spoke some other language. Yes, the words speak in their own language, which may or may not have been composed of... words. Where did those words in turn live? Is there a bottom to a recursive chain, and is it possible we're all just words that live in someone else's language? These are questions for another day. Preferably a day with icecream.
Cloud repeated what their mighty friend Earth had done some days before, and crashed into the giant at near to ground level, but with much less bulk. The result was a whole load of nothing, as the giant merely wobbled and Cloud glanced away.
"Cloud?" Mystery enquired tentatively.
"Yes?"
"Was that entirely pointless?"
Cloud sighed. "Yes, it appears so."
"What are we supposed to do now?"
It was a good question.
"There is hope."
"Cloud, did you just hear something?" Mystery asked while looking behind at the behemoth. It was crashing along behind them. Sorpresa was still holding on, but with a thrilled look on his face.
"No, only the collision. Must... fly... faster..."
"¡Rapido! ¡Rapido! ¡No te rindas!" Sorpresa was getting in on the action. The invader was definitely getting closer.
"We have definitely got to find Translation, wherever he may be." Muttered the enigmatic word as Cloud accelerated onward. "Hey, are we headed where I think?"
"Not yet. Hold on to something." Cloud warned them tersely. She had already talked to him more in this chase than in previous decades combined. He had hardly grabbed on to something when Cloud executed a high speed u-turn and swooped around the alien's leg syllables. Sorpresa threw something from a small bag as they went by, which Mystery couldn't identify in the rush. It seemed as if they were heading back towards War and her troop, but what could they do against such a giant? It made War look like a youngling!
A sudden conjuration of light erupted behind them, and Mystery almost looked back out of habit. Almost. He hoped War had a plan.
To be continued...
"There is hope." A voice said from somewhere. It wasn't Cloud, because her voice was softer, and it wasn't Sorpresa as he spoke some other language. Yes, the words speak in their own language, which may or may not have been composed of... words. Where did those words in turn live? Is there a bottom to a recursive chain, and is it possible we're all just words that live in someone else's language? These are questions for another day. Preferably a day with icecream.
Cloud repeated what their mighty friend Earth had done some days before, and crashed into the giant at near to ground level, but with much less bulk. The result was a whole load of nothing, as the giant merely wobbled and Cloud glanced away.
"Cloud?" Mystery enquired tentatively.
"Yes?"
"Was that entirely pointless?"
Cloud sighed. "Yes, it appears so."
"What are we supposed to do now?"
It was a good question.
"There is hope."
"Cloud, did you just hear something?" Mystery asked while looking behind at the behemoth. It was crashing along behind them. Sorpresa was still holding on, but with a thrilled look on his face.
"No, only the collision. Must... fly... faster..."
"¡Rapido! ¡Rapido! ¡No te rindas!" Sorpresa was getting in on the action. The invader was definitely getting closer.
"We have definitely got to find Translation, wherever he may be." Muttered the enigmatic word as Cloud accelerated onward. "Hey, are we headed where I think?"
"Not yet. Hold on to something." Cloud warned them tersely. She had already talked to him more in this chase than in previous decades combined. He had hardly grabbed on to something when Cloud executed a high speed u-turn and swooped around the alien's leg syllables. Sorpresa threw something from a small bag as they went by, which Mystery couldn't identify in the rush. It seemed as if they were heading back towards War and her troop, but what could they do against such a giant? It made War look like a youngling!
A sudden conjuration of light erupted behind them, and Mystery almost looked back out of habit. Almost. He hoped War had a plan.
To be continued...
Saturday, 3 September 2016
A Free Weekend
Why is a free weekend different to the curse of a bank holiday? Why does one feel so much better than the other? It's a curious thing. Perhaps Bank Holidays are permanently soaked with that legacy of times gone by, those family day trips of stress supreme... --- No. There's no need to think about past bank holidays any more. This is a Saturday at the beginning of September, drowned under a day of perpetual rain, and enlivened by the return of a classic old game: 'Colonization'. No, not the remakes but the original game. It's still amazing, and has sucked up what would have been a whole day of writing, rather appallingly. Yes, 'Colonization' still has it, and is available once again. Ahhhhhh... 'Click herer to end turn.' Yes, I will, thank you.
It feels as if a weight has lifted after horrific Summer of news, a silly season so filled with venom that the upcoming US presidential elections are actually a light-hearted relief, despite the equally loathed candidates carrying the flags for the two main parties. Oh, how wonderful it would be for a third party to sweep the board and save (or would they?) us from the Trump or the Clinton. Ah, what a dream! It has to happen one day, when people realise they're allowed to vote for any of the listed candidates.
A free weekend is quite a luxury. The remaining part could be spent in any number of ways... More 'Colonization', in a complete surrender to the sleep deprived lack of creativity, Spanish practice, the podcast recording happening in a scant couple of hours, or even eating tea! Oh, what luxury it is to be free! Next weekend might be fiendishly more complicated and next month the inundation of degree work will begin, but now there is freedom. Freedom to play a game, write a blog post without pressure, and to read the book version of 'The Beiderbecke Trilogy'. What a strange feeling it is...
There shall be reading, and writing. Writing has come upon me all of a sudden, and very unfortunately since I left my idea pad at a student's house, and the impulse must be quenched by something other than yogurt and a small migraine. There shall be writing...
O.
It feels as if a weight has lifted after horrific Summer of news, a silly season so filled with venom that the upcoming US presidential elections are actually a light-hearted relief, despite the equally loathed candidates carrying the flags for the two main parties. Oh, how wonderful it would be for a third party to sweep the board and save (or would they?) us from the Trump or the Clinton. Ah, what a dream! It has to happen one day, when people realise they're allowed to vote for any of the listed candidates.
A free weekend is quite a luxury. The remaining part could be spent in any number of ways... More 'Colonization', in a complete surrender to the sleep deprived lack of creativity, Spanish practice, the podcast recording happening in a scant couple of hours, or even eating tea! Oh, what luxury it is to be free! Next weekend might be fiendishly more complicated and next month the inundation of degree work will begin, but now there is freedom. Freedom to play a game, write a blog post without pressure, and to read the book version of 'The Beiderbecke Trilogy'. What a strange feeling it is...
There shall be reading, and writing. Writing has come upon me all of a sudden, and very unfortunately since I left my idea pad at a student's house, and the impulse must be quenched by something other than yogurt and a small migraine. There shall be writing...
O.
Thursday, 1 September 2016
Story: The Ninja of Health, XIII
( Part XII , XIV )
The picture in the rearranged tablecloth was a little abstract. Well, very abstract, when you consider the means used to create it. Originally it had been multicoloured, striped, and studded with polka dots. Now, the weave had been altered onto a pattern of the karmic substrate of the universe. The Oracle could have explained it less opaquely, but he was asleep after his mind bending exertions.
"Is that a lighthouse?" Asked the Man.
"Maybe. Or a rocket. Or a lightbulb." Responded his lady companion. "Over there, is that a cliff?"
"I think so. What do you think it means? Including the rocks at the bottom?"
"Those are cookie remnants, you dope!" The Woman swept off the tablecloth. "What would a lighthouse be doing in the middle of a great big crater?"
"I don't know. Perhaps this is where that space marble came from? Or where it's going to?" After a moment, the Man continued, "This image might not even be connected to that entity. We'll have to wait for him to wake up. I wonder who's minding the shop?" He traced the edge of a large swirl, that might have been a baseball, as he mused, before moving aside so the Woman could document the vision with her camera.
The two went downstairs to the shop. There was a woman behind the counter that they didn't know. They wandered over to the wheel and stood on either side, facing each while holding the spokes.
"We should be doing something. Not just staring into each other's eyes while a mysterious entity is roaming the country and our tame soothsayer sleeps off a small prognostication that manifested as a rewoven tablecloth." The Man didn't shift his gaze.
"Love is a curious thing. Sometimes we just need to be together, gentle man."
"That's true, milady." The Man cocked his head sideways. "Do you sense something?"
"Yes, and it's not the pizza."
CRASH. The two looked over to see the woman behind the counter collapse to the floor, striking her head on a corner in the process. The Woman looked at her companion, and then rushed over. "Suddenly, I wonder if our friend upstairs is really sleeping off a vision. Go."
The Man went.
To be continued...
The picture in the rearranged tablecloth was a little abstract. Well, very abstract, when you consider the means used to create it. Originally it had been multicoloured, striped, and studded with polka dots. Now, the weave had been altered onto a pattern of the karmic substrate of the universe. The Oracle could have explained it less opaquely, but he was asleep after his mind bending exertions.
"Is that a lighthouse?" Asked the Man.
"Maybe. Or a rocket. Or a lightbulb." Responded his lady companion. "Over there, is that a cliff?"
"I think so. What do you think it means? Including the rocks at the bottom?"
"Those are cookie remnants, you dope!" The Woman swept off the tablecloth. "What would a lighthouse be doing in the middle of a great big crater?"
"I don't know. Perhaps this is where that space marble came from? Or where it's going to?" After a moment, the Man continued, "This image might not even be connected to that entity. We'll have to wait for him to wake up. I wonder who's minding the shop?" He traced the edge of a large swirl, that might have been a baseball, as he mused, before moving aside so the Woman could document the vision with her camera.
The two went downstairs to the shop. There was a woman behind the counter that they didn't know. They wandered over to the wheel and stood on either side, facing each while holding the spokes.
"We should be doing something. Not just staring into each other's eyes while a mysterious entity is roaming the country and our tame soothsayer sleeps off a small prognostication that manifested as a rewoven tablecloth." The Man didn't shift his gaze.
"Love is a curious thing. Sometimes we just need to be together, gentle man."
"That's true, milady." The Man cocked his head sideways. "Do you sense something?"
"Yes, and it's not the pizza."
CRASH. The two looked over to see the woman behind the counter collapse to the floor, striking her head on a corner in the process. The Woman looked at her companion, and then rushed over. "Suddenly, I wonder if our friend upstairs is really sleeping off a vision. Go."
The Man went.
To be continued...
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