From c2eeb37ac10ef346e128e3d3457700c8693b574e Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: dtb Date: Mon, 26 Dec 2022 17:33:50 -0500 Subject: [PATCH] 2022-12-27 --- homepage/blah/index.html | 136 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 136 insertions(+) diff --git a/homepage/blah/index.html b/homepage/blah/index.html index 2ba4325..e17d440 100644 --- a/homepage/blah/index.html +++ b/homepage/blah/index.html @@ -16,6 +16,142 @@ ideas' witlessness; ideas' witnesses; ideas- +2022-12-27 + + 20XX refers to the past, not the future, in one fifth of cases. But the +past was pretty futuristic! Dream big, I need my space. + +2022-09-13 + +Slipstream +DTB + Published here under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial- +NoDerivatives 4.0 International Public License. + They found Amber as some DNA encased in fossilized tree sap when I was +twenty years old. A small networked community speculated that society's problems +were due to our genetic distance from our ancestors. + This was my twenty-second year, for the third or fourth time. I meet +my wife Cassidy for the first time for the fourth time next week. + I go to work. I work at a laboratory, at this time JCN, "where dreams +are made", before it's taken and turned into the National Defense Center, NDC. +I can prevent this by submitting a false, smaller figure for our proposal for +governmental funding – a clerical oversight, no more than an off-by-ten, +changes an official's perception of how "innovative" JCN can be, influences +their and eventually their leader's choice. Yang Electric becomes NDC instead; +another aboriginal creation forced to assimilate. + Someone asks me how my day is going. My day is fine. How is yours? Not +so good, Ada. Carl gets a divorce next January and dies six months after that. +Officially of grief, technically of a gunshot wound. + I leave. Today I worked on a paper I publish next month on hyper +-realistic simulation of reality, simulation into which someone could +(inexpensively) be dropped unaware. Even my first time working on this I was so +horrified at what I had created I for the first time and uncomfortably faked +numbers on my paper so nobody would be interested. One could end up perceiving +decades in seconds; trapped in hell or suffocated in heaven. Immersion is only +useful to a certain extent. + I get into my car. 667 River Road. I drive past the animal shelter at +which I worked as a teenager. Unit 5. I knock on the door. + Cassidy's uncle answers. He still has hair, I didn't know he still had +hair now. We're both on the ground in his apartment. I brought a scalpel +thinking it would be enough but I forgot this is only a couple years after Ron +got out of the Navy. He calls me a fucking psychopath and I grunt but say +nothing. JCN still sharpens the scalpels between each use – this changes +because it's overkill, we only really use them for opening boxes even by now. +He's on top of me. All I need is one straight cut but I manage to plunge the +blade into his windpipe. He chokes and coughs blood onto me. It burns like acid. +I stand up and close the door. He's living alone, working at a warehouse, on the +top floor so I don't need to worry about unexpected guests. + I have no prior connection with this corpse. He has dozens of enemies +including the children of the families he separated in the middle-East. I wipe +off the doorknob and my face, put my bandanna back into my pocket, and leave. In +this part of town I'm not worried about anyone describing my car to the police, +not worried about the surveillance because there isn't any yet, at least to the +extent with which I'm familiar. I'm back in my car. I'm staring blankly at the +road. I'm in my driveway. I'm staring blankly at the television. I'm laying in +bed staring at the ceiling. + I'm at work. I'm at home. I'm in bed. I work. I go home. I go to bed. I +meet my wife Cassidy for the first time for the fourth time. Cassidy Malcolm, my +name is Ada Karina. Last night you played the lottery; you always play the date +and truncate off the extra digits. You've never told anybody about how your +childhood hamster ate its babies and you didn't know why. Please have coffee +with me. + When I met her for the first time for the second time she eventually +confessed that she drank coffee, not tea, and that's why she was so hesitant to +meet me that second first time. She switched to tea later. That hesitation made +her meet me after she had already taken the job at the wristwatch company. + She would see her uncle next week and tell him about us if he was still +alive. I think of this as I order us two of her favorite potion, cold brewed +coffee with a pinch of cinnamon. She hasn't had this in months, she tells me for +the fourth time. I apologize for my detachment. I've seen my world crumble again +and again. I'm too far gone, and I’m sorry, and I have to move on. She's talking +to me for the first time for the fourth time and the last time and I'm not +listening. I'm sipping the cold brew and trying to taste the cinnamon, for the +last time. + The NDC euthanized Cassidy via baton. I watched from behind a window +grate in handcuffs as two children in police uniforms beat her until she stopped +moving, and then until she stopped bleeding and then until they were tired. She +slowly splintered into pieces, bending at more and more seams rolling back and +forth on the tile. Her brain chemistry was a single link too far from Amber. + I go home. I sleep. My day is fine. How is yours? To be honest, Ada, +things aren't so great at home. I'm sorry to hear that, Carl. What's wrong? My +wife won't talk to me. I don't know why. She's just slowly gone silent. Maybe +it's me? Have you talked to those close to her? + Typing, clicking. I'm staring at a light bulb, hammering phosphors off +in new familiar patterns. + They found me when they dragged Cassidy's corpse into the acid bath. +They shoved me along a steel hallway and took me to a holding cell with a dozen +other loved of the dead. + During her second final week on Earth Cassidy was rarely awake and less +often lucid. When she wasn't as well Cassidy said she felt like she was being +dissolved. She coughed up blood, lots of it. The doctors asked me if she could +have been exposed to anything that would cause lung cancer. + Ron was a loving uncle, caring brother, and courageous veteran who will +be dearly missed. Service will be held at Lisbon St. Baptist, 8-12, 5pm. +Cassidy's uncle's obituary was brief to stay within the minimum cost from the +paper. My third thirty-fifth year, he shot her in the side of her head. I +tackled him to the ground and beat him until he stopped moving, and then until +he stopped bleeding, and then until I was tired, when I collapsed next to him. +The police came for the noise complaint. + I set up tests for my project. One of the tests checks for whether a +program that only ever returns a zero value returns a true value, which it +doesn't. I pretend to not know what's wrong. My day is fine. How's yours? I- I +don't know, Ada. I'm sorry. + I entered my password into the locking panel on the door. It still +worked. I read digests of all active projects in the laboratory and took note +of one of the room numbers. I loaded both an old program I wrote and a current +program being developed at NDC onto my wristwatch, opened the door, and ran. The +other captives ran too, to a different wing of the building in a greater number. + Cassidy and I found her dog dead in her apartment two weeks afteer we +met for the first time in my third twenty-second year. Brick was shot with a +rifle. The police came but didn't find the round and the killer left no other +trace. I asked the neighbor across the hall and he said he didn't hear Brick +bark at whomever shot him. + I go home. I go to sleep. I wake up. I go to work. Dials spinning. +Buttons clicking. There's an issue with my database access. I call the +technology information desk. My user was deleted by accident; they adjust my +permissions so my account can't be deleted as part of an automatic process. + I ran into a steel room and threw the lab technician out of his chair +before kicking him in his chin, knocking him out. I entered my old emergency +authorization code into the computer and watched the cathode in the center of +the room start to glow a deep blue. + I publish my paper to no applause as expected. The concept was obviously +impossible with modern technology but its aspiration was noble. + I was in my forty-fifth year on the second floor of JCN. My legs shook +but I managed to walk out and into the outside air, which I didn't think I would +breathe again. I ran to my apartment and waited until I, in my twenty-second +year, the first time, was asleep. I set a code and plugged myself into the +simulation. + I didn't know how long I'd be stranded away from my time so I went to a +park to sleep, but on my way I dissolved back into the NDC, in front of a +glowing cathode. The laboratory technician stared at me. The experiment wasn't +ready! What have I done? + I answered and upon its receipt of the password the universe dissolved. +I watched the technician scream and turn to sand and I woke up in my bed, +twenty-two years old, two blueprints and a handful of vestiges and some +asbestos left in the fire-proof wristwatch next to me, unplugged from my +simulation, my consciousness slipstreamed into the past present day. + + 2022-12-26 HELL MONTH; the Devil's date of AUGUST when the sun is ceasing its