Last Weak  |  Index  |  Next Weak

Weak XVII

24 April 2018

No. 2,285 (cartoon)

You’re living in the past.

You’re living in the future.

One of our calendars is broken.

25 April 2018

Billions and Billions ...

When I need to cycle to another part of Sans Frisco, I ask the ’puter to show the most direct route with the smallest changes in elevation. I’m constantly amazed that a corporation has amassed all of the data I need and made it freely available. (I know that the maps aren’t really a public service; I’m being tracked like a rat in a maze to allow the business to sell more advertising.)

Cycling maps of Sans Frisco are one thing, but I’m astonished and utterly speechless to describe how I feel after seeing the atlas the European Space Agency just published. It’s a three-dimensional look of our galaxy. The data contain comprehensive information about nearly two billion stars: location, luminance, color spectrum, and even motion. (Maybe it’s actually four-dimensional since it includes time?)

I was just beginning to start to imagine beginning to barely comprehend when I was completely overwhelmed by one more detail: the project is only about one percent finished. Billions and billions indeed ...

26 April 2018

Clear Advice

Bernie is one of my most generous friends; he never hesitates to selflessly give me bushels of advice. Why, he’s so magnanimous I’ve never had to ask for it, not even once.

“David, your writing sucks in a negative way,” he opined. “It’s worse than that, it’s imprecise, it’s sloppy, and it’s ambiguous.”

“Thank you,” I replied, “I’m glad you noticed.”

I was chuffed that my response annoyed him, as intended. I have received excellent guidance, but never from Bernie. I’m thinking of Niels Bohr, who advised, “Never express yourself more clearly than you think.”

In practice, that means it’s time to stop typing right now.

27 April 2018

All My Dreams Came True

Dahlia was in a frighteningly good mood when she showed up at my studio.

“I’m here to make all of your dreams come true tonight!” she beamed.

“What’s the catch?” I replied as I stifled a yawn.

“Why are you so cynical?” she asked.

“Because Jimi and I are experienced, that’s why. What’s the catch?” I repeated.

“Well, Mr. Pooh-Pooh Ungrateful, I really am going to make all your dreams come true tonight as long as all you’re dreaming of is cheese and cheap wine.”

Why didn’t she just say that in the first place? I tabled all of my other dreams and we did, in fact, have a lovely evening. Better yet, I’ll still have something to dream about tomorrow. Having all of one’s dreams come true is rarely satisfying over time.

28 April 2018

Once Upon a Time

Once upon a time there was no time.

That’s as far as my new story goes; I can’t figure out whether that was the beginning or the end or both or neither. That’s why I stick to the facts and never write fiction.

29 April 2018

Monty Pythonesque Photographer of the Year

Marcio Cabral is no longer Wildlife Photographer of the Year. Enrico no longer works at Terminal Liquors; Abbie fired him for being drunk on the job nineteen times too many. From my perspective, those two recent changes in status are of equal importance, i.e., none.

I can’t believe that anyone would be interested in who is or isn’t Wildlife Photographer of the Year. Bela Bartok would agree; he noted, “Competitions are for horses, not artists.”

A panel of pretentious, er, prestigious judges determined that Cabral used a stuffed anteater in his photograph. If they were smarter and more creative than they apparently were, they would have made him the first Monty Pythonesque Photographer of the Year instead of stripping him of his title.

I have no problem with Cabral’s approach to wildlife photography; I figured out decades ago that it’s much more efficient to photograph animals in captivity.

In the eighties, Greenpeace paid me a thousand dollars for a photograph of a kangaroo to use in a fundraising extortion letter. (“Send us lots of money right now or this critter’s gonna die a horrific death.) I went to the zoo, photographed the hoppity beast with no fences or bars visible, and that was that. Even I’m not too proud to do stupid, unrewarding work for five hundred dollars an hour.

I think the “is it is or is it ain’t a real wildlife photograph” debate will be conclusively settled in my lifetime when the wilds disappear and wildlife becomes a one-word oxymoron.

Last Weak  |  Index  |  Next Weak
©2018 David Glenn Rinehart