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Weak XLIV

30 October 2018

No. 8,146 (cartoon)

Your life is an inspiration.

Thank you.

I’ll never be that pathetic and miserable.

31 October 2018

A Scary Halloween Lesson

When I was eight my mother made me a witch costume for Halloween: a black cape, a wig made from a dyed mop, the obligatory broom, and abracadabra! The mayor of our small town pulled me out a parade of second-graders and awarded me the prize for best costume: a silver dollar.

The politician told me I could get anything I wanted with it. I was of course pleased to own such a powerful coin, and announced I was going to trade it for a huge model train set. He immediately contradicted himself and told me that wasn’t an option.

He lied to me! In doing so, he gave me an even bigger gift: he taught me to distrust authority, and that was indeed priceless.

1 November 2018

Rainbows Forming Off Madagascar?

I called Nico tonight; the chat lasted less than ten seconds. She said she was too busy to bloviate; she was enjoying a live broadcast of the sound of rainbows forming off the coast of Madagascar after a tropical storm. I apologized for my bad timing then immediately ended the conversation.

It took me an hour or so to realize Nico was lying to me and/or pranking me; rainbows in gestation are never audible over seven hertz, a frequency too low for radio transmission. No need to continue with a scientific explanation; Nico doesn’t even have a radio. No one except a grandparent owns such an antiquated contraption in 2018.

2 November 2018

The Museum of Uncontroversial Food

I was initially excited when I read about the Disgusting Food Museum. Visitors to Malmö, Sweden, can find bull’s penis, fermented shark, fruit bats, and of course casu marzu, the Italian cheese viscous with live maggots, under one roof. I liked the concept until I thought about it.

Everyone finds someone’s favorite food disgusting; vegans who are repulsed by the very idea of eating meat have their menu deemed unpalatable by carnivores. The Disgusting Food Museum will never have a definitive collection until its curators have a sample of every possible dish.

That’s what gave me the idea for my latest project, the Museum of Uncontroversial Food. I completed it less than an hour after concluding that there’s not a single thing one can eat that someone else won’t find contentious.

And with that, I’m off to find a matchbox to house the Museum of Uncontroversial Food’s comprehensive and nonexistent conceptual collection.

“Give me a museum and I’ll fill it,” Pablo Picasso bragged. No one ever gave him a museum, but I’m going to fill mine before I have lunch!

3 November 2018

Sex and Babies

Josephine has a good calendar, so she knows this is 2018. Thus she wasn’t surprised to hear that her daughter Jana just had her first sex education class in fourth grade. Childhood isn’t what it used to be; it never was.

She was worried that school officials might convey the wrong message, a reasonable concern given that no one can agree on what the right information is. Her fears were confirmed when Jana returned from school and cheerfully informed her that sex could be very dangerous.

Oh dear. Warnings about sexually transmitted diseases to a ten-year-old girl? A discussion of birth control options? Incurring the wrath of one or more deities? Nope; Jana told her that sex can make you have a baby you’re stuck with forever. Yuck!

Josephine congratulated her daughter on learning an important lesson, and resisted the temptation to say that she wished that someone had reminded her of such dire consequences eleven years ago.

4 November 2018

Au Revoir, Le Grand K

A kilogram weighs as much as a liter of water. That is an accurate definition, but not a very precise one. If you want the most definitive measurement available today, head for the Bureau International des Poids et Mesures in Sèvres, France. If you can make it through three locked vault doors, you’ll discover the only true kilogram in the universe, colloquially known as Le Grand K.

The weight of the unique platinum and iridium cylinder, formally known as the International Prototype Kilogram, literally defines the weight of a kilogram, but not for long. Le Grand K will be retiring in a few months after almost a hundred and thirty years of tireless service to science and commerce. In a small way, the change is about protecting our intergalactic reputation.

“If we want to talk about physics we have to agree on a set of units,” explained Stephan Schlamminger, a physicist at the US National Institute of Standards and Technology, “but if we say our unit of mass is based on a lump of metal we keep in Paris, we’ll be the laughing stock of the universe.”

Soon, the kilogram’s definitive weight will be based on Planck’s constant. I have no idea how that works; the shoddy report I read described it as, “a number that is woven into the fabric of the universe.” As if anyone has the dimmest understanding of said fabric, or, more probably, fabrics.

As for me, I’m going to borrow Le Grand K and go shopping. I suspect the nefarious Mongolian at the local market has been overcharging me for ginger, and this will be my chance to make a citizen’s arrest if I can prove I’m right.

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©2018 David Glenn Rinehart