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Weak XLVII

20 November 2018

No. 1,886 (cartoon)

Suicide isn’t the answer.

Wouldn’t that depend on the question?

21 November 2018

Cheap Irony

Rain washed away the particulates of a hundred dead people and the possessions of thousands of others who lost all of their material belongings in the recent wildfires. That means we Sans Friscans no longer need filtered masks to breathe.

I was going to make a snide remark about some people looking much better wearing a mask, but thought the better of it since they’re probably saying the same or much worse about me.

Instead, I decided to mark the end of polluted air with cheap irony: I burned my breathing mask.

22 November 2018

Time Shifts

I continue to be flummoxed by modern technology. That’s hardly worth mentioning in 2018; no one can make all of their electronic doodads work all of the time.

Cordelia didn’t know how adjust the digital clock in her car, who does? (That’s one of the reasons I have a bicycle instead of an automobile.) She came up with a novel solution: she drove to Why, Arizona. As soon as she crossed the border into a new time zone, her clock displayed the correct time.

In practice, that means she can’t return to California until 10 March, but she finds that preferable to trying to program her car.

23 November 2018

Curses!

The Internet Archive’s catchphrase is, “Universal access to all knowledge.” Aretta Williams took that impossibly lofty ideal as a literal description of services available and mailed a most challenging query.

I am 100% certain someone has put a curse on me or something. I am experiencing some very strange things such as: mind out of body experience as if someone has made a doll of me and doing things to it, and a voice that sounds dark and eerie. Also, the feeling there is an evil presence near by. Could you help me get this curse off or do you know someone who can?

This question was anything but unusual, and one of the librarians fired off a stock reply to her inquiry.

Dear Ms. Williams,

Thank you for writing. Our researchers are assiduously investigating the matters you raised. I lieu of an immediate definitive answer, you might consider using aluminum foil to fashion some sort of protective headgear.

Exchanges like these are why I learned not to deal with the public when I was a teenager.

24 November 2018

Three Flavors of Twilight!

I was planning on going on a late bike ride, so I asked the Internet what time the sun would set. I got a verbose reply to my simple question.

Actual Time 16:55
Civil Twilight 17:23
Nautical Twilight: 17:55
Astronomical Twilight: 18:27

Tomorrow will see 86 fewer seconds of daylight.

I had no idea there were three different flavors of twilight!

25 November 2018

Reefer Magic

Rosaline is one of the most relentlessly optimistic people I know. I showed up at her studio with a couple of bottles of wine, and she insisted on getting snacks even though I protested that I wasn’t hungry.

She looked in her refrigerator and announced that there was nothing in there except a carrot and an empty jar of mayonnaise. After the first couple of glasses, she checked the reefer again and still found nothing but the empty mayonnaise container and the lonely carrot. After I opened another bottle she had yet another look with the same results.

I laughed at her fruitless search, but I laughed alone. She informed me with the seriousest seriousness that sometimes it takes many trips to the refrigerator or pantry before food materializes. I didn’t argue with her. That would have been pointless; squabbling usually is.

I was saved by the doorbell when Emilia arrived with four burritos. Four? Rosaline forgot to tell her that Duncan canceled, so she put the extra burrito in the refrigerator.

I wonder if Rosaline might have been right all along about eats materializing in the reefer? Nah ...

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©2018 David Glenn Rinehart