SILICON SOAPWARE wafting your way along the slipstreams of the Info Highway from Bubbles = Tom Digby = bubbles@well.sf.ca.us http://www.well.com/user/bubbles/ Issue #54 New Moon of June 13, 1999 Contents copyright 1999 by Thomas G. Digby, with a liberal definition of "fair use". In other words, feel free to quote excerpts elsewhere (with proper attribution), post the entire zine (verbatim, including this notice) on other boards that don't charge specifically for reading the zine, link my Web page, and so on, but if something from here forms a substantial part of something you make money from, it's only fair that I get a cut of the profits. Silicon Soapware is available via email with or without reader feedback. If you don't want to read about the mechanics of this, skip down to the row of asterisks (****). 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I do that one manually. ********************* It's getting towards summer, and for many of us that means open windows. I'm reminded of a short I might want to do if I ever get into animation: Bedroom (cabin, stateroom, whatever you call it) on some kind of spaceship or space station. It has a double bunk, and a closed window (like a house window, not a porthole) with a view of stars and planets and such. There are people sleeping in both bunks. One of them gets up, floating in free-fall, works his(?) way over to the window, and opens it. Air immediately starts roaring out into the vacuum of space, taking assorted loose small objects with it. The person works his way back into bed, struggling against the wind, using whatever hand- holds are available. The other person soon wakes up, works his(?) way over to the window, and closes it. As the air calms down he gets back into bed with little effort. This wakes up the first person, who opens the window again. Repeat the cycle once or twice more, then fade to the title: "Why Windows on Spaceships Don't Open". ********************* Someone I went to dinner with at Baycon (science fiction convention) ordered White Zinfandel. I noticed that "White Zinfandel" sounds enough like "White Infidel" to bring up thoughts of Arab cannibals in some alternate world or something. ********************* Some of the Baycon parties were hosted by people from that Star Trek fandom where various local clubs are "ships". Someone at the gay party mentioned being sort of pushed out of one particular chapter because the leadership was into traditional Family Values or something. This leads to thoughts of what if different Starfleet ships were somehow given conflicting versions of the Prime Directive. In any reasonable organization communications should be good enough that the discrepancy would quickly come to light, but what if it didn't? One ship might be working toward liberty and enlightenment for all intelligent beings, while another might see its mission as promoting 1950's American gender roles galaxy-wide. If either of these ships ever needs help from the other, or some crew member gets transferred from one to the other, it could be Interesting. ********************* Remember Grape Jokes: What's purple and carries a light-saber? Obi-Wine Kenobi. ********************* In the Star Wars universe, there's a Republic that is supplanted by an Empire, with the Empire eventually being overthrown in its turn. And I think there's eventually a restored Republic. And in the most recent movie, first in the timeline, there's a child who is destined to grow up to be a major Bad Guy. But one of the Jedi, who presumably all have psychic ways of knowing such things, says "He will bring balance to the Force". But how can that be, if he goes over to the Dark Side? In the Christian view, the Dark Side is just something to be suppressed or avoided, like the Devil. No "balance" there. But in the Pagan view the Dark Side is a necessary part of the whole. Rather than being on the side of the Christian Devil, think of those on the Dark Side as doing the work of Kali the Destroyer, who clears away the old to make way for the new, in an eternal cycle. We get some hints that the Republic had gone into what amounts to senility, bogged down in bureaucracy and corruption. If that's correct, then maybe the Republic needed to die and be reborn. Darth Vader and the Empire are the instruments by which the Republic is rejuvenated. The Empire rises, does its thing, then is overthrown in its turn. And a new Republic rises, Phoenix-like, from the ashes. That's the true restoration of balance. This does not mean we should all rush out and embrace the Dark Side. There's a lot of icky stuff there. But it does have its place in the grand scheme of things, just as the icky microbes and crawling things that recycle dead bodies have their place in the Circle of Life. ********************* Sometimes an area will get a spell of weather where the forecasts are less accurate than usual. There was one such here a few weeks ago, where over the course of about a day the prediction for the next day went from "a slight chance of showers in the extreme northern portions" to pretty much definite rain over the whole area. That gave me a mental image of blondes (or whatever not-too-smart group you prefer to use) returning newly-bought radios and TVs because the weather reports coming out of them were wrong. ********************* Something reminded me of the science-fiction idea of "igniting" Jupiter, analogous to lighting a wood fire. A pile of firewood is metastable: It will just sit there until you light it, and then it will burn until it is consumed unless you put it out. Does the same sort of meta-stability hold for stars or almost-stars? Could you (given the technology) pile up a mass of hydrogen and such that would just sit there quietly without fusion starting up until you "lit" it with something like an H-bomb, and then would continue to "burn" like a star? Or would mass of hydrogen big enough to sustain fusion always ignite, even if you piled it up in such a way as to not get hot from compression? And even if such a metastable mass of star-stuff is possible, is it likely to accumulate naturally without igniting? ********************* In other news, I was wondering when the concept of national flags came in. Did Rome have one? In movies I've seen they had standard-bearers parading around carrying the letters SPQR on top of a pole, but I don't think they had a flag as we know it. Did Athens and Sparta have flags? Did China and Japan and various other nations in Asia have them before contact with Europeans? Festive banners were around, but that's not the same thing as "The Flag". And is there some present-day requirement that every country have a national flag? What if somebody starts a country somewhere (perhaps on Earth, perhaps on the Moon or in the asteroid belt) and says they're not going to have a flag? Will the UN refuse to admit them to membership until they have something they can put in that line of flags out front? ********************* Telemarketers have been in the news lately, along with reports some lawmakers are getting fed up with them. That reminds me of this ... SORRY, RIGHT NUMBER In the dead of night The phone rings... And rings... And rings... "Hello?" Bright cheery voice: "Good morning! This is your three a.m. wake-up call." Not quite awake, I still manage to say That I didn't order any Three a.m. wake-up call. "We know that, but for only ten dollars a month You can cancel it." I thought I'd sent my money in for that already, But no, That had been to cancel Their two a.m. wake-up call. The three a.m. call was a new item Just added to their list Of "services". And they were planning others for the future At other hours of the night Along with don't-stay-in-the-shower-too-long calls Plus physical-fitness calls To keep you jogging Between the dinner table And the phone. I mumble something About answering machines And the voice grows angry: "That's...that's...restraint of trade! Listen, buster, you try that And we'll get an injunction so fast It'll make your head swim. And don't try anything funny Like letting it ring, either!" My mention of the bit In the Eighth Amendment about Cruel and unusual punishment Brings only scornful laughter: "We're exempt from all that stuff." My patience nears its end: "Law or no law, if this phone rings one more time I'm gonna rip it out by the roots And mail it to Timbuktu." SLAM!!! Ten minutes later Some delivery service calls With a special deal On mailing phones to Timbuktu In the middle of the night. So, the next time they call They'll get a recording: "The number you have reached Has been ripped out by the roots And mailed to Timbuktu. All of our overseas circuits are busy And calling Timbuktu is too expensive anyway But if you insist You may hold the line Until something becomes available." Only my friends will know That it's really An answering machine. Thomas G. Digby Entered 2345hr 2/22/84 -- END --