SILICON SOAPWARE wafting your way along the slipstreams of the Info Highway from Bubbles = Tom Digby = bubbles@well.com http://www.well.com/~bubbles/ Issue #155 New Moon of August 12, 2007 Contents copyright 2007 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. Details of how to sign up are at the end. ********************* As I write this we're a few days past the anniversary of the Hiroshima A-Bomb. It got some mention in the news, but not all that much. That's probably to be expected, since it wasn't a round number of years ago this year. At the Open Mike event I went to in the evening several performers mentioned it. Some even chose material they felt was especially appropriate to that theme. That reminded me of my theory that we were lucky nuclear weapons were developed just in time to end a war. Had they been available earlier, they would have been used more extensively. The heat of battle would have overridden any second thoughts. On the other hand, had they not been available until after the war was over, there would have been no real gut-level reason not to use them in the next conflict. Scientists might have still calculated the expected destruction, but the neat columns of statistics would not have been accompanied by pictures of dying children. The Cold War would have been much more likely to turn hot, whereupon the "heat of battle" mindset would have taken over. As it was, nuclear weapons got used just enough to demonstrate the havoc they could wreak, after which people on all sides had time to think before the next temptation to use them arose. That leads to concern for the future. More and more countries are developing nuclear weapons, while at the same time the horror of their actual use is fading from living memory. Sooner or later someone somewhere is going to yield to the temptation. Then what? If each generation must learn the lesson anew, let us hope and pray that it can be relearned at minimal cost. ********************* Whenever I check the news and it looks like the world is still pretty much in one piece I feel relieved. The sky has not fallen. But now as I think about that expression, part of me wonders what it would look like if the sky were to fall. I know that's just a cliche expression, and that the sky is not the kind of object that could actually fall. But even so it could happen in a cartoon or some such. So how would they draw it? It might start with vague rumbling and crackling noises overhead, accompanied by a rain of small bits of debris. You look up and see a network of rapidly growing cracks. Then larger and larger pieces would come crashing to the ground everywhere. If it were to happen at night, many of the fallen pieces might still contain twinkly little pinpoints of stars, while anyone looking up sees only blackness where the sky had been. If it happens during the day I would expect the fallen pieces to be blue and/or gray, depending on how clear or cloudy the weather had been just before the collapse. What's harder to imagine is what we would see above where the sky had been. Blackness? An expanse of blank white space? Gears and machinery and such? Heaven, with angels flying hither and yon? Or maybe it's something indescribable. Whatever it is is so wondrous that you're speechless. And then when you look away and the power of speech gradually returns, you can't recall what you saw. So you look up to refresh your memory and are once again speechless. It's beyond the power of the human mind to grasp. The only way to depict that in a cartoon or comic strip might be to never actually show it on camera. Thus it would join such things as how to start sawing a hole in the floor, or what someone on the other side sees when you slap a portable hole onto a wall. Yes, that would be kind of frustrating to the audience, but I suspect that any attempt to actually show it would disappoint those with anything resembling good imaginations. ********************* There are at least two sides to every story, unless it's written on Mobius-strip paper. ********************* Something I got to wondering about recently is how various mythical creatures would sleep. For example, how do centaurs sleep? Do they sleep standing up like horses, or do they lie down? The horse part might be OK with sleeping standing up, but what of the human part? And if the human part preferred to lie down to sleep, would there be any really good position? A centaur might be able to sleep on its side, but turning over would be a major operation. Has anyone really thought this through? And then what of the various winged humanoids, such as fairies and angels? It may depend on the type of wings. For example, I have a picture of a fairy with what look like butterfly wings. That kind of wing looks good in the picture, but could get awkward in bed. If he holds them together like many butterflies do, he could sleep on his stomach or side, but would have problems if he tried to use blankets and sheets and such. If he spreads them wide he could lie on his back, but wouldn't be able to turn over easily. And trying to sleep with another person could be a problem. Bee-type wings and angel wings might not be quite as bad for sleeping, but could still be kind of awkward. Or do magical beings need to sleep at all? That would be one way out of the problem. Among humans, sleep seems to serve a number of functions, not all of which are understood. Might magical beings have some other way of dealing with those needs, and thus not need sleep as we know it at all? There's a lot of stuff here that we don't know, and may never really be certain of. So the story-teller's guess is as good as any. ********************* I read somewhere that some police department in Thailand will make officers who break the rules wear Hello Kitty armbands as punishment. The logic is that police officers are generally macho men, so the childlike cuteness of the Hello Kitty images will seem degrading to them. According to the article the officers won't be wearing the armbands in public, but will have to wear them as long as they are in the station. And they're also taken off outside duty, so they'll be in the station most of the time. ********************* This happened at one of those big hardware stores. I was walking fairly briskly down an aisle, on my way to something I knew to be in a part of the store some distance away. Someone else was walking in the opposite direction up the same aisle. Just as we passed I heard him softly say "You look ridiculous." Then, before I could come up with a reply, he was gone. That may have been just as well, because that's the kind of subjective value judgment that you can't really say much in reply to. I felt more amused than offended, if I even felt offended at all. Some Spock-like part of me agrees that he's sort of right, in the sense that there's seldom any rational reason for anybody to go around with long hair and glitter and a nose ring. But then the primary reason not to go around with long hair and glitter and a nose ring (assuming one wants to) is that this society has sort of tacitly agreed that "normal" men don't go around with long hair and glitter and nose rings. If you are willing to not be "normal" then you might as well go for it. Yes, there are some situations where long hair and nose rings and such can be a physical impediment or even a safety hazard, but then the same can be said of neckties. In any event, I hardly ever find myself in those types of situations so that argument doesn't apply. Besides, not everyone agrees with that anonymous person in the hardware store. For every comment of that sort I've gotten several compliments. And be the rational considerations as they may, when I look at myself in the mirror and see the long hair and glitter and nose ring it just sort of feels right. So I'll probably keep the long hair and glitter and nose ring for the foreseeable future. ********************* I've been dealing with a cold the last few days, which sort of reminded me of this: Incident Along Fantasy Way Hospital Parking Only On a street near where I live was a parking lot. Then they fenced it off And dug a big hole Like they were going to build something. But the sign remained: "PARKING FOR HOSPITAL ONLY". A month went by and nothing else happened And I eventually stopped thinking about it. Then one day instead of the hole There was a magnificent building With all kinds of people And cars and delivery trucks And ambulances Coming and going And over the door a sign: "MERCY HOSPITAL". It stood there a week Then one day was gone Leaving only the hole And the parking sign. A month or two later came another -- Sirens all hours of the night And the sign said "CENTRAL EMERGENCY". It stayed about ten days. Then one evening as I strolled by I saw that where the hospitals had been Was now a bank, And taped to the front door was a slip of paper: A parking ticket. Thomas G. Digby written 0035 hr 10/20/74 entered 1635 hr 2/27/92 ********************* HOW TO GET SILICON SOAPWARE EMAILED TO YOU If you're getting it via email and the Reply-to in the headers is ss_talk@bubbles.best.vwh.net you're getting the list version, and anything you send to that address will be posted. That's the one you want if you like conversation. There's usually a burst of activity after each issue, often dying down to almost nothing in between. Any post can spark a new flurry at any time. If there's no mention of "bubbles.best.vwh.net" in the headers, you're getting the BCC version. That's the one for those who want just Silicon Soapware with no banter. The zine content is the same for both. 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