Confidential Information

It was a cloudy, breezy day.  I needed comfort food.  For days, the thought of Chinese cuisine had been bubbling up from my unconscious.  But where, in the white-bread world of San Diego, could I find superior, authentic Mandarin?  I finally gave up the impossible dream and headed off to Panda Express.

While picking the remnants of Chow Mein out of my teeth with my right hand, I dutifully popped open the cellophane wrapped fortune cookie with my left.  As I crunched away on the, well, I’m not sure just what fortune cookies are made of; I stripped the slender paper purporting to offer insight into my future out of the remaining half of the cookie.  I read it.  I read it again.

 

Keep your plan secret for now!

Hmmm, I pondered, “Keep your plan secret for now!”  Immediately, I was awash in a sea of confusion.  Well, that maybe an overstatement.  Perhaps it was just a lagoon of confusion as my plans are generally rather inconsequential. I pushed thoughts of magnitude aside.  The more important consideration was, “What plan?”  I retraced the steps of my day so far.  I had arisen comparatively late today, but I had no plan for sleeping in. It just happened.  I toasted an English muffin, applied peanut butter and jelly (Knott’s Berry Farm Boysenberry Preserves, with seeds… mmm) and ate it.  I hadn't really given breakfast much forethought so I was pretty confident I had not violated the intent of the fortune there.  Then I finished a borrowed book I was reading.  I realized there was some planning involved here because I wanted to make sure I could return the book the next day.  But upon review, I hadn't really shared the plan with anyone so on the outside chance I was the victim of some time warp anomaly where I received the warning after the critical event occurred, I was sure I was safe where the book was concerned.

Keep your plan secret for now!

Satisfied I was not retroactively guilty of challenging fate; I cleaned off my table and made for Starbuck’s.  When I reached the front of the cue and it was my turn to order, I was struck by the conundrum, “Is ordering coffee, which is part of my planned activity for the afternoon (I’m retired folks, and reading at Starbuck’s in the afternoon while all of the saps are still working away is one of my greatest joys… not the greatest, but right up there in the top ten percent), a violation of the oriental admonishment?”

With the quick mental reflexes of a predatory cat, I chicaned.  “I’ll have a grande coffee and, a chocolate chunk cookie!” The chocolate chunk cookie was not part of the original plan.  So inserting spontaneity into the plan at the last second should mollify the fates.  I ate my cookie, drank my coffee, read my book without event.  I’m confident the bullet had been dodged so far.

Keep your plan secret for now!

While I was gratified to escape Starbuck’s without spilling on my shirt or being goaded into conversation by a complete stranger (By the way, have you ever considered how gruesome it would be to encounter an incomplete stranger?  Ick!) whom I am sure would have attempted to pries my plan from my lips by wile and craft, I was not confident that I had accurately identified the plan of concern.  My mind reeled.  Did I have any other plans?  My life is lived in a rather haphazard manner; on a wing and a prayer as it were.

Keep your plan secret for now!

Having successfully found my way home without resorting to the use of a plan, I parked myself upon the couch to cogitate on this dilemma.  Was I supposed to have a plan?  It had been a few weeks since my most recent trip to Panda Express.  Perhaps I missed a visit as the result of some cosmic misstep.  Was there some hapless schmoe out there racking his brains to formulate a plan as instructed by a fortune targeted at me but intercepted by accident?  And if so, when constructed, how would this play toy of the fates know to keep it secret as I had successfully intercepted the step two instruction?

Keep your plan secret for now!

But let’s assume that I do stumble upon a plan and am able to decipher it correctly.  I must keep it secret for now.  How will I know when the time is right to reveal my plan?  Am I committed then to eating lunch every day at Panda Express until I am given a cookie that contains the fortune, “You should share your preciously secret plan”?  If I do lunch at Panda Express, will fate assure that I am in the correct ordered place in line to get the appropriate cookie?  If I arrive at the door coincidentally with an aged dowager do I follow conventional decorum and hold the door for her, allowing her to take what should have been my place in line?  Or do I risk offending the gods by slamming her to the floor in an attempt to ensure I find the instructions I am seeking?  What if I then get a cookie whose fortune reads, “Courtesy is the true path to achieving your goals.”?

 Keep your plan secret for now!

As I retrace the critical path that has led me to this indecision, there are two things of which I am certain: one, I am not going to share my solution with you; two, from now on, it’s Mexican food.

The Irrational, Rationalized

As do all writers, I occasionally draw a blank when it comes to digestible subject matter.  The ideal of course is to lay responsibility for topic selection at someone else’s feet and then run like the wind across the keyboard without sense of responsibility. But when you write a regular column (or blog, if you will), that external source of inspiration is sometimes nowhere to be found.  If I were to break my promise to avoid political commentary I would have nearly infinite opportunity, but I am not yet that desperate.  There is nothing going on in my life this week worth reporting on; at least that I would be foolish enough to commit to print. And after last week’s debacle with the corrupted hard drive, you know there is not much I would be too embarrassed to share.

So at times like these, I can’t speak for other writers; I find a peek inside the room where the typewriter qualified chimpanzees reside offers an opportunity to pick some interesting tidbits off of the floor. If you do not understand this reference, please refer to the infinite monkey theorem. As we enter the room, I admonish you to speak softly, move slowly and avoid eye contact as the chimpanzees are rather surly when their concentration is broken.

A Journey Out of Reality

The joy, and danger, of peeking behind this curtain is the joy of infinite possibilities.  Here, probability is moot.  One need not consider the likeliness of stumbling across a pile that mixes absolute absurdity with incontrovertible logic.  In here, it’s all the same.  Our motto is, “If it can happen, it will happen… eventually… and you’ll be blamed.  Of course, with an infinite number of possibilities, there must be an infinite number of corners in which to look.  There is no logical place to start as any one corner is as likely to inform, entertain, delight or disgust as any other.

My Gray Matter Is Better than Yours

Ah, here is an interesting notion; brane theory.  No, this is not a misspelling (try to convince Word of that) but jargon short hand for Membrane Theory.  This hypothesis is an alternative to the Big Bang Theory (the wildly popular explanation for the Universe and everything in it, not the wildly popular sitcom airing Thursday nights at eight o’clock on CBS) attempting to address some of its scientific short comings (for more on this, see my blog The Big Pffft! posted 5/9/13).  The most glaring hole in the Big Bang Theory is the lack of explanation as to what caused the bang in the first place; brane theory proponents  pooh-poohing the notion that something can spontaneously appear from nothing.  Their alternative being the existence of multiple membranes (each a universe unto itself) that are mutually attracted by a force similar to gravity.  When brane to brane contact is made, an explosion occurs which produces the initial energy that eventually cools into what we observe as our universe.  The problem with their offering of course is lack of explanation for the presence of the membranes, or parallel universes, in the first place.

Obamacare Explained!

Yes, it’s obvious there are words printed on these sheets of paper.  But there doesn’t seem to be any punctuation.  No matter how you group the words into phrases, the outcome just doesn’t seem to make sense.  I guess they missed the period in Obama’s speech, silly monkeys (…er, bureaucrats?).

Enemies, Foreign and Domestic

“...support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic;” Those of you who have served in the military will recognize this as an excerpt of the U.S. Armed Forces Oath of Enlistment.  And while the rhetoric seems patriotic and noble, just what does it mean?  How does one defend the principles of a document which is subject to amendment and open to interpretation?  We will assume here that intent is the defense of the principles and not the physical document itself, although one can never be absolutely sure about government intent.  Does the provision for defense against domestic enemies violate the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878? (You’ll have to look that one up yourself, the monkeys are due a break as per their union contract).

Now you legal beagles out there needn’t write comments as to the history of the act, the exceptions as provided by statute or the exemptions for National Guard, U.S. Coast Guard or natural disasters.  Our goal is not accuracy, but to have fun at the monkeys’ expense.

Einstein on Beauty

In his 1916 general theory of relativity, Albert Einstein defined gravity as the curvature of the fabric of space-time by the presence of matter.  If you don’t understand that, not to worry; the monkeys have an explanation.

On a superficial level, it translates to this: The universe has dimples.  Now Einstein is reputed to have been quite the hound so we should meet this with no great surprise.  As certainly as “…God doesn’t play dice with the world”, we can infer that the universe is female, comely and a bit coquettish.

Almost the Bard

Look over here!  It’s a complete, typewritten copy of Hamnet?  Ooh, missed it by that much.

 

The Truth is Out There!

Today's Special Edition is prompted by evidence of a government cover up!

While perusing the interweb for salacious stories about East Coast politicians, I uncovered this appetizing tidbit buried deep on the front page of my Yahoo! news feed.

http://news.yahoo.com/bizarre-asteroid-six-tails-spotted-hubble-telescope-photos-214743038.html


While government toadies are claiming the pictured space phenomenon is a meteor with multiple tails, in the same article they state that there have been no historical occurrences of multi-tailed, or any-tailed meteors recorded.  Just like mind-control conspiratorial astronomers (I'll bet you didn't even no such a cadre of nefarious scientists existed) to shove an unidentifiable object into a category where it doesn't belong.

Clearly, the pictures have captured a controlled space vessel with multi-dimensional, parallel-universe transversing engines.  Six jetted asteroid... Please!

Get ready to learn the language of the new masters.

Stand by for future news as I can conjure it up from the deep recesses of my paranoid mind!

What I Like About You

There is a time honored adage that suggests we never really appreciate something (someone?) until it is gone. The truth of this postulate, unfortunately, is not likely to be tested until that fateful occurrence by which we lose what we then realize was so cherished.

What I like about you

You hold me tight

Tell me I’m the only one

Wanna come over tonight

 

Last week I came dangerously close to losing a very dear friend, my computer. On Sunday afternoon, I was apparently looking where I should not have been and acquired a rather nasty virus.  This particular malware hijacked my Fujitsu, claimed I had committed some amorphous federal crime and was holding me hostage for a $300 fee in exchange for relinquishing control of my dear, dear friend.

You’re whispering in my ear

Tell me all the things that I wanna hear

‘Cause that’s true

That’s what I like about you

 I, of course, did not panic.  Your humble reporter had been through this before. I resigned myself to the fact that I would have to have my hard drive wiped (no, that is not a double entendre) to bring it back to life.  So, without hesitation, I wrapped up my poor, wounded baby and sped, Mercury like, to Fry’s.

What I like about you

You really know how to dance

When you go up, down, jump around

Think about true romance

 To my everlasting shame, I am not diligent in backing up my data in anticipation of catastrophic computer calamities.  So, as I drove the comatose patient to the aid station, I tallied up the important information I would either lose or have to recreate from source documents.  A pall fell over my heretofore optimistic outlook.

You’re whispering in my ear

Tell me all the things that I wanna hear

‘Cause that’s true

That’s what I like about you

That’s what I like about you

That’s what I like about you

Luckily, Fry’s technical service and repair department, unlike most hospital emergency rooms, is not inundated by a swarm of desperate, drunken bar-b-cue incident victims.  We did not have to wait long for assistance. I presented Fuji (I don’t really call my computer Fuji, but I figured this gesture would serve to heighten the sense of pathos.  Writers, can’t live with ‘em, can’t make them live in the real world!).  The technician dutifully listened to my tale of woe.  He turned on the computer and examined the offending screen image.  He restarted it and began furiously mashing keys.  He repeated this procedure several times and, with each iteration, delayed the hijacking of the boot-up just a bit longer.  “I think we can extract and rebuild your data, then remove the virus from your hard disk,” he said, offhandedly, “We have to charge a fee for that. Is that what you want to do?”

What I like about you

You keep me warm at night

Never wanna let you go

Know you make me feel alright

 My heart was filled with joy.  The birds were singing.  I’m sure my eyes moistened.  I gathered my composure and replied, “Yeah, that’ll be okay.”  So the dance began.  The technician guessed it would take two days to get it done.  So dutifully, I waited until Monday afternoon to call and inquire of the status.  Whomever it was that took my call, read the status report as updated by the technician servicing my Fujitsu, “Remove and restore data on hard drive… wha, wha, wha…”

“When will that be done?” I queried, hopefully.

“Should be done tomorrow, we’ll call when it’s ready.”

 My patience evaporated on Thursday and I dropped in to Fry’s to check the progress of the victim.  I spoke to a technician previously unknown to me who read from a computer screen, “Backed up hard drive, removed virus.”  He turned his attention to me and said that the next step would be to reinstall the recaptured data and test it. He could not tell me where the responsible technician was at that moment, but assured me the process would take no more than two hours.  The machine should be ready by tomorrow (Friday).

I called Friday.  I called Saturday.  Sunday, I decided to drop in again.  My original technician was there, but he had passed the machine off to another to do the reinstall.  The case notes stated he had begun the reinstall but did not indicate successful conclusion.  He wandered off to find the patient.  He brought it to the counter, the hard drive not installed. “I don’t know what the status is.  I can drop the hard drive in and see if it starts.”

“Please do!”  With bated breath, I waited.  Then, Daffy Duck (my desktop wallpaper) popped into view.  One by one, the icons settled into their regimented positions.  He launched Internet Explorer and, voila, there was connectivity. The angels sang.



 

You’re whispering in my ear

Tell me all things that I wanna hear

‘Cause that’s true

That’s what I like about you

That’s what I like about you

That’s what I like about you 

What was it like to live for a week without the internet?  It was horrendous.  Now those of you who really know me well will not be surprised to read that I consider myself something of a loner.  I have few people I really consider friends.  And being isolated from them (e-mail is my main communications medium) really brought home how important they are.

That’s what I like about you

That’s what I like about you

That’s what I like about you