Probably that’s what this will be about. I’m as anxious to see how it turns out as you are. Probably moreso.
Anyway, away I go to Seattle again, to visit friendly faces and places and eat tacos. I’m certain there will be tacos.
I made it, to the flight, not the tacos, lobster sliders notwithstanding. To go, those, which is a lesser experience, but still I’m the only one on this plane who is eating giant fucking lobster claws hanging out of buttery, well-toasted buns, with a side of steak fries. We’re all on the same flight, but mine’s the best so far.
(I had to manually enter the apostrophe in the last sentence. (The second one.))
Or was. Eating lobster. ok? I lied up there. I’m writing this from after the fact. From the future. Not in the present despite the tense. I am on a jet after all, which is pretty futuristic. Flying though the air. Not falling. (Spoilers.) Super earthius. Superterran. Above lesser mortals.
Canned.
Centrally located over the wings, where they keep the fuel and engines.
Which is the heavy part, of course. The heaviest kept with the heaviest, clustering the center of mass over the center of lift.
These few rows only are full, of the plebes among the superterran social class. And me. Most of the customers crammed in the “Basic” section.
Is it a caste when it’s not cast? It feels like it, when walking past the squishy seats, but I suppose it’s a choice, to associate with our fellow frugalites. Our temporary social group.
It would be difficult to maintain a social organism solely of those aloft, excepting, of course, pilots who talk to each other on the airwaves we licensed them. And the flight crew who Downton their flying Abbeys, surely. ( which Google tried to incorrectly apostrophize.) Or so I imagine.
…Or it’s Abbies. Or Abbiezes.
Afterward, attend abord another airplane. Serial bottle episodes of suborbital intrigue.
Except most of the dialogue consists of asking people what kind of chips they would like.
I couldn’t decide, so I got both. Cheezits and a granola bar. I’m flying to Seattle, I’m pretty sure it’s a local ordinance to always have a granola bar handy. Preferably in some sort of holster or readily accessible pouch.
I got ice, which is fine, but also increases my risk profile with regard to this trip. Not a lot, but the ice could have mold or something. Probably lower on the list than the tons of fuel jiggling us between itself. On a long flight especially, the heaving fuel tanks are mostly what the engines are carrying through the air, we’re just along for the ride.
Apparently it’s not turbulence. The captain just called it “unexpected rough air.” I wonder if that’s policy now or just his own phrasing.
The cheezits were a mistake. 0% Maksa. Dusty crumbly air, hinting that once, long ago, it had been in the same room as cheese.
It’s unfair to judge them on the cheezeit to buttered lobster scale. Sadly for them, the C2BLS, as it’s known to scientists in the EU, is very punishing to the dry cracker end of the scale. If it were judged among its peers the rectangular orange thing would rise to a fair middle. Or less when the third judge tries putting lobster on them. A Mendoza-line-dwelling cracker among those flights where people eat lobster. Spoiler: I’m the only judge.
The granola is a Kind bar. I don’t know what kind, because it was dark and the font is small and I couldn’t read it more than I could care what kind it is.
I’ll report back later.
This flight is to Minneapolis, which Google remembered how to spell. I’d have gotten close anyway. I’m no Alice Cooper.
For those of you who got that reference, you’re awesome for validating my childhood memories by also remembering them. For those of you who didn’t, a Cooper is someone who makes barrels.
I have a layover (still different from an overlay) there. I don’t have to tell you this because that’s the only reason anyone goes to Minneapolis. (Shout out to my Milwaukee peeps!)
Just kidding; I literally know nothing and no one there that Alice Cooper didn’t introduce me to.
Ok, I know a few things, like there’s an airport, for one. And probably lots of very fine people.
I think
Google assistant on Android needs Gboard. I tried to set a reminder, but it wouldn’t without WiFi. Ok Google, report a bug. I was going to type that into their bug reporting interface. But there isn’t one. Also the keyboard is literally the worst. It would be nice if Google would use the keyboard from this new startup I heard of called Google. It’s on the app store, er, I mean the “Play Store”. Stupid name, Google. (P.s. hire me)
I’ve spent a lot of time making a lot of money for other people, in exchange for not dying. Literally that is where we are as a society. We are letting people die of diabetes and other preventable diseases because they can’t prove to someone they have surplus value. The self sufficient are driven off the land. Where they built the airport. I learned that from Alice Cooper while he was standing on a rock.
Or, they’re driven out of the woods, or their tent on the street, where they need less, but not nothing. Maslow knows why crime grows among those. Your nose knows too, as it turns away from them, so as not to also point your eyes at them. Them that need the most help. Them.
And I too do, unpoint my nose at them. Because, like you, I’m afraid of them.
I’m afraid of you too. In varying degrees from Manson to Mom. (M2M according to NATO treaty and HIPPA regulations.) Because we’re a terrifying, brutal, blood-soaked species of ape. Apex Apes. Angry finger waggling, forehead wrinkling, capillary busting, teeth baring, weapon inventing apes. Dangerous because also afraid.
It’s not just you.
It’s all of you, with your easy to infect social memecosphere. The memosphere. Memes are really what we are. Ideas exchanged. Individuals coopted, reprogrammed to repeat. To consume and produce. From crock pot to crusade.
It’s not a bad thing, it’s just a symptom of our vulnerability to code drift and descent into fragmentation, each neuron slightly differently timed and tuned. A wave of human in electrical form. An orchestral ocean of organic -ones (and -ines and -amines) squozen on either end by neural oozing.
You, know, every day stuff.
And all your stuff has to work right or you’ll die. Even the exoskeleton we’ve built around us, our oxygen pumps, our jet engines, our internet interface, our power. If you can pay for it, of course. If you have enough working stuff to extract more stuff. And you have to have enough stuff that you don’t get arrested for being stuffless while the government decides whether or not your kids get sick because you can’t afford to get out of Flynt.
Let them drink Coke?
Taking care of each other is what makes us human. Sharing our ideas to reprogram each other a little. The problem is when the program hurts the host. When the meme is malignant. A twisted-off piece of the overall organism, a ball of bile and bad things, an infection of intellection. A handful of hate.
Handed at arm’s length, but still taken,
if often involuntarily,
imaged in arc-bright advertising light
Neurons following the program.
Program.
Interrupting introspection.
…
Landing, will try to post during my layover.
Share the best bits of yourself with each other, please?
H