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Ho Ho How I Am Glad!

Because it means the heavy lifting of being creative is out of the way for another Intro, as we explore '68 Philosophical Sci-Fi Books To Melt Your Mind' from the channel 'Sci Fi Odyssey',  One hopes they don't actually cause melting of brain as I've read a lot of them and put the memory problems down to old age or gin.    Art!

     Hmmmm.  The prompt was "bright young thing female brass brassiere manly man green skinned alien" which is the inspiration for 90% of pulp sci-fi magazines for a good 30 years and which brought up a lot of - ahem - interesting artwork as of yesteryon.  AI Art Generator seems to have lost focus after the first 6 words.  O well it might bait a few more visitors.  

     ANYWAY enough of bronze lingerie, back to the list of books.

No. 59: Blood Music by Greg Bear (1985).  Another one I've read, probably not long after it was published.  As I recall, it begins with a researcher who creates a batch of self-aware sentient cells which his employer, worrying about potential Frankenstein's Monster scenarios, orders him to destroy.  Instead - in one of the most SPECTACULARLY unwise decisions in the whole of this list - he injects himself with the cells, intending to thus smuggle them out of the workplace.  Spoiler: this leads to the destruction of North America.  Mighty oaks and little acorns and so on.  Art!

     I recall the basic plot, so it has rather stuck with me, but I wouldn't be inclined to read it again.

No. 58: Permutation City by Greg Egan (1994).  Nope, know nothing about it, although Conrad is pretty sure he's read other stuff by Egan.  It seems to be an early exploration of the digital experience for people who can download themselves into computers and thus become effectively immortal.  

No. 57: Anathem by Neal Stephenson (2008).  I need to check on this one as I've read several of his works and cannot remember their titles.  Old age and gin, I'm afraid, and possibly a bit of brain-melting.  Wait one.  Nope, definitely not read.  Art!

     Sounds interesting.

No. 56: Voyage From Yesteryear by James Hogan (1982).  Nothing to do with time travel, as I guessed.  Instead it's about the clash of two cultures, one authoritarian and one anarchic, on one of the habitable exoplanets of the Alpha Centauri system.  This one sounds interesting, I may have to check out Abebooks <wallet squeaks in anguish>.  Art!

No. 55: The Mote In God's Eye by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle (1974).  Ha!  Yes, another that Your Humble Scribe has read, waaay back when, and which I remember not being that impressed with.  The blurb calls it a 'classic' when what they mean is 'old'.  Another first contact novel, if you must know.  It was written when the Sinister Union was still around and was incorporated into the plot, which instantly dates it.  Art!

     Pretty sure that's the cover of the copy I had.  

No. 54: Out Of The Silent Planet by C. S. Lewis (1938).  I have indeed heard of it, just not read it.  Whilst his mate Tolky was working on 'The Hobbit', Lewis was writing this first volume of a trilogy.  It is set on an idyllic Mars that we now know never existed, burgeoning with flora and fauna and intelligent life.  About the only things liable to exist on the Red Planet are microbes, and not many of those.

No. 53: The Cyberiad by Stanislav Lem (1965).  Ha again!  I have read this one, and was very impressed by the English translation from the original Polish, absolutely fizzing with ideas and invention.  I believe the title is a pun on 'The Aenid' or 'The illiad' or both at once.  Art!

No. 52: Lilith's Brood by Octavia Butler (1987).  Nope, not read it.  I have been pleasantly entertained by other works of hers so  I may venture upon this one.  More first contact post-apocalypse. Art!

No.51: Rogue Moon by Algis Budrys (1960).  Conrad recalls starting a library copy of this and not getting very far, for no very good reason.  It concerns the discovery of an alien structure on the Moon, which is invariably lethal to anyone who ventures inside to explore.  Rather than sending in robots, they send in volunteers, who die, only to be reanimated via matter transmission.  Art!

     Wowsers, I didn't think doing another 10 novels would take up so many words.  Part 3 tomorrow.  I bet you can hardly wait.

Made Up Of Ewww!

What is the company Colgate renowned for?  Toothpaste.  So it was only natural for them to try branching out into frozen ready meals, because the two go hand in hand - no, actually they don't.  Stop being silly.  Art!

     The answer was 'No!' said loudly and clearly, which is why you don't see drain cleaning services offering tuxedo hire, and why banks do not keep 56 lb sacks of potatoes to hand.  Thank you to the Museum Of Failure for uncovering this benighted idea.

Making Mordorvia Miserable

Perhaps 'More' should be added in there.  You see, some of the most dangerous people in Ruffia are the ones who loathe the state and Putinpot, but were clever enough not to go around protesting and getting arrested.  One of these people living and working in Moscow passed on recruitment data to 'Verstka' and 'United 24' which does not show things in a good light.  Art!

     Moscow city's recruitment numbers fell 25% in 2025, to 24,500; in December only 876 joined, down from 2,000 in the previous December and the lowest monthly total to date.  Other sources in the city administration stated that even the orcs are getting tired of the war and anyone with any degree of patriotism was already sunflower-fodder in Ukraine.  That's not all, as the quality of recruits has also dropped just as their ages have risen.  This is because recruiters have been told to stop being picky about these volunteer's health, they need all the warm bodies they can get.  Putinpot dare not carry out a mobilisation as he did in 2022, because that was hugely unpopular, and it would collapse industry thanks to lack of workers.  You might call this state of affairs a 'crisisynergy' as everything going wrong is multiplied by everything else going wrong.

Clued-Up Chap

You may recall Conrad recounting with a degree of horror, that he'd seen Frankie Muniz being interviewed recently.  Frankie played the titular character in 'Malcolm In The Middle', which ran for 7 seasons and which finished <drum roll cymbal crash> 20 years ago.  TWENTY YEARS!  Frankie is now 40 and a professional stock car racer.  Art!

Courtesy Joe Vulpis Podcast

     He went into some detail about 'residuals', which are a variety of royalty paid to actors when their shows or films are broadcast.  Because he arranged all his own finances, he dealt with these cheques, collecting them every few days and banking them.  Even for sums as small as $0.09 - sent on a cheque that cost $0.15 and in an envelope that costs $0.60.  He would cross reference with the Screen Actors Guild website to find out where the payments were coming from.

     Nowadays, it's all done direct-deposit, cutting out the cheques, which he felt sad about as he constantly got cheques 'it was like Christmas every day', especially residuals from all the countries outside South Canada.

Finally -

I'm quite glad that I've picked up my 'Enlarged Devil's Dictionary', the last word in cynicism and satire, as composed by Ambrose Gwinnet Bierce, as I read definitions around the one which I finally pick.  Today -

"Idolater,n: One who professes a religion which we do not believe, with a symbolism different from our own.  A person who thinks more of an image on a pedestal than of an image on a coin."