I am a survivalist... sort of

I have a persistent fear that civilization as we know it is going to collapse and I will have to make my way through its crumbling architecture and try, somehow, to survive.

This is not an entertaining theoretical but a fairly constant and concrete fear.  I think about and plan for various kinds of specific disaster all the time.  Sort of.

See I don't actually test or implement my plans for survival.

When I lived in northern Canada as a college freshman, for instance, (yes this has been going on for a while) I never actually tried to get through a frigid Edmonton night by sleeping over the exhaust vents of the university library.  I just noted every building I passed that had large warm grates, places where the snow wouldn't stick, and I'd think, "oh yeah, I could sleep there."  And it would temporarily ease my mind.  I could survive one night as a homeless person in The Coldest City on Earth (my TM). 

I do not even have the fairly sensible three-day kit - enough food and water assembled to get through a temporary but widespread loss of services to Seattle thanks to earthquake/air strike/tsunami/civil unrest/major power grid failure.

As a scientist this disaster mindset has both helped and hindered me.  I can see, as I begin every experiment, about fifty ways it will most likely fail.

This is, of course, unlike my fear that I will suddenly be destitute and abandoned by all friends and family, actually pretty rational.   Science is unkind to those of us with a dopamine addiction, and daily my fears are proven grounded in such brutally real ways that I could bar graph them and give you the error bars and chi squared on failure, accompanied by a linear regression showing the correlation between my direst predictions and actual outcomes.

And also, unlike my never-fully-realized plan to have a meeting spot where my friends and I could rebuild society and fight off the hordes of profiteers and militia, when it comes to research, being a negative future nancy leads me to plan my experiments very, very carefully - though not, unfortunately, well enough to consistently achieve success.  I would say that my planning maybe shifts the failure rate from 75% down to 65%.  60% on a good day.

It's hard to know if this is worth the extra time and stress that it costs me.   But I always have the most beautiful controls.

Lately I have been thinking that I maybe would feel better and even be more productive if I tried to balance my science-worry with my world-worry.

Maybe I could let go of my neurotic planning for every possible experimental outcome, and control for only the top five most likely contingencies.  And maybe I could devote a little bit of time to emergency planning - for the top five most likely scenarios.

Maybe I'll put that 3 day kit together finally.

Meanwhile... I don't know that it makes much sense to ponder this one solo.  I am now officially taking suggestions from you, the people, about where we should huddle together when the revolution/nuclear winter/zombie apocalypse comes. 

Serial killer Hawaian edition

I dreamt that I went to visit a friend in Hawaii.  She had moved there over a year ago with a backpack and now had a job, friends, an apartment.

When I arrived, her new friends told me she worked for a filmographer who, it was rumored, did snuff films.  My friend would not comment on this.

She gave me the grand tour of her adopted town.  Now we were in Hanoi, and it was very tidy.  We stood chatting in the lobby of her boss' studio while porn stars paraded on and off of the various sets.

Half a hot dog bun away from being obese

I was touring Australia to collect census data on fitness for a huge graph on the home page of the National Health website.

I asked every person I met to ride a kanagaroo for five minutes after eating half a hot dog bun.  If the person did very well - stayed on the kangaroo, got the kangaroo up to its top speed, and seemed relaxed rather than exhausted at the end - then I would playfully refer to their high fitness level as being "half a hot dog bun away from being obese".  If someone was average or poor, I simply thanked them for participating.

The last such instance before I woke took place in an abandoned parking lot with a group of eight women on a "hen tour"  - soccer mom besties taking a fortnight off from their husbands and kids. 

I sat at the back of the converted school bus they were using to travel across country and handed out the hot dog bun pieces.  Somehow I miscounted and there weren't enough hot dog bun halves to go round.  I gave the last woman a Dorito chip and a soft corn tortilla instead, hoping it was an equivalent amount of calories. 

Then the kangaroo arrived.

Go big or go home

You ever dream big, wide, momentous dreams, dreams that fill the night with epic movie style images... and wake up with muzzy shadows chased from your head by the first crack of your eyelids?
Yeah.  Well that's the night I had.  I have dream amnesia, and it sucks.

Wear a hardhat at all times in this area

*WARNING* This post contains content not suitable for all audiences.  While it does not use particularly graphic language, it mentions sex, as well as prophylactics, the morning after pill, and abortion, with occasional details that could be upsetting for some people.

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I was driving across the country in my old family van.  I visited my parents and had an emotional talk with my dad about money, our shared history, and sandwiches.  We agreed on bacon but disagreed on tomatoes.  It was a good visit but left me feeling lonely.

 I met Adam in a diner after a brief correspondence through a Craigslist ad.  We chatted over soup long enough to establish there was decent chemistry, and then got into my van.

I drove to an empty parking lot, next to an abandoned movie theater decorated with scaffolding.  Signs across the side of the building read, "Wear a hard hat at all times in this area."

We didn't bother getting naked.  We began seated, me facing him, straddling his lap, and then decided we needed more leverage.  The van turned into the roof of the movie theater.  The air was warm with a nice breeze, and the ground was covered with Astroturf.

I got on my hands and knees.  He was behind me.  After only second he leaned forward, breath in my ear and murmured, "Too soon."

"What?"  I turned.  He pulled away, looking smug.  I realized for the first time that he had not been using a condom.  I felt instantly sick.  Why, oh why, hadn't I checked for that in the beginning? 

Even if I could recall verbatim the ensuing thirty second monologue, it would be laced with too many expletives to share.  The safe for work words included stupid, irresponsible, and selfish.  "I am fertile.  Did this not occur to you at all?" I yelled.

Adam shrugged, I stopped, took a breath and said, quietly, "You don't seem concerned."

"You're making a big deal out of this," he replied.

"OK," I kept my voice low, so that I wouldn't scream.  "What, in your opinion, should I be doing?"

He reached out and gently squeezed my upper arm.  "I think... you could be a better sport about it."

I felt my brain melt with rage. I knew what he was about to say before the words left his mouth.

He went on, "There are ways to fix it.  You know.  If anything happens."

"Right," I said.  "I'll tell you what.  Why don't we take you to the clinic right now and have someone scrape out your insides with a metal instrument?" For the first time I saw his eyes widen.  "Don't you dare act like this is nothing.  Or that it's the same for me as it is for you."  I punched him, hard, in the bicep, then got into my van and drove away.  I wondered if this town had an all night clinic.  A pharmacy might do.  I needed Plan B right away.

I circled the parking lot.  There were no exits so I ended up passing him again, leaning against his car.  I rolled down the window, pulled up the ancient button lock and said, "HEY."  When he looked up, I motioned for him to get into the passenger seat.

He was on the roof again.  My van was lifted and so tall that I still looked down on him.  I operated the axle crank so that I could bring my vehicle level with the theater roof, then used the newly installed robotic arm to swing myself gracefully out on the roof ledge.

I sat, patting the concrete beside me.

He sat next to me, avoiding eye contact.

"Sorry," he said, after an enormous silence.

"I am going to find a drugstore," I said.  "Want to come?"

Riding the bus should be a euphemism for something...

My car broke down.  The bus I caught took forever to arrive and when it did, there were twin female drivers, and two fare boxes.  "It's a tandem!" the two attractive redheads exclaimed in synchrony, to answer the question on my face. 

I didn't recognize the route number but the front driver said yes she was going to Shoreline; in fact, the main artery in my neighbourhood was under construction.  The detour would pass directly in front of my house.

The passengers inside were rowdy.  They had been riding for hours, they said.  The bus was experiencing intermittent mechanical problems and the relief bus had been too small to fit everyone so it had gone ahead with their luggage.  Meanwhile it was getting dark and groups of passengers had formed alliances and staked out different territories so they could sleep in safety. 

At the front left I recognized the distinctive blonde dreadlocks of my sister.  She had her back to me and was putting up strands of white Christmas lights.  The front bench seat was Tetris'ed together with a few yanked-out side seats to form a nice double bed over which she had spread a fluffy white faux fur comforter. 

Her boyfriend, seated and facing forward, saw me first and yelled "sister!!!" in a british accent; he was clearly drunk.  After joyful greetings all round I learned they had smuggled rum on the bus and so were not concerned about the longer-than-normal journey.

We approached a red light and my sister's boyfriend asked her to grab some ibuprofen from the corner store.  She was out the door before I could explain that we had just hit the suburbs and the bus stops would now be half a mile apart.  Just as she exited the store, purchase in hand, the light changed.  The bus accelerated to commuter train speed, leaving no opportunity for my sister to re-board. 

We called her cell and it dutifully buzzed beside us; in her haste to run the errand she'd left it on the seat.   I was in a panic; my sister was lost in a strange city at night. How would we ever find her?  Now I was eager to get home so I could drop all her stuff and borrow a car to retrace the route.

At an intersection about six miles down the road, the bus shuddered to a stop.  The mechanic was called again.  I went forward to ask the bus driver if he could patch in over the radio to be on the lookout for my sister in case she boarded the next bus. 

The driver - now a man, thanks to a company-mandated shift change - was initially reluctant to help.  "Thousands of people board buses every day," he said.  I insisted, mentioning her distinctive hair.  "Blonde dreadlocks?" he looked thoughtful then nodded, reached for his radio.  "I can work with that."

I had hoped for a long stop but only minutes after the mechanic arrived, the bus was rolling again.  I considered calling the non-emergency police line to see if they had an officer in the area who could look for my sister but then realized she would probably avoid any roving patrol car.  As a rasta-looking taxi driver, most of my sister's law enforcement experiences had left her bitter and wary. 

I was near tears and pacing at the back of the bus when someone came up behind me and wrapped my waist with gold-bangled arms.  "Surprise!" My sister kissed my cheek.  Besides her many bracelets, she was now wearing an ankle-length gold satin sheath under a crocheted shawl.  Not only had she managed to locate a bus route map, cash and a taxi, there had been time for shopping.

To celebrate we turned the bus into a Buick and deleted the other passengers.  I race-carred down the freeway toward the airport so as not to miss their flight.  It was dawn, the sun coming up fast.  Abruptly I realized that I was speeding behind a highway patrol car.  The lights and siren came on, and the car slowed.  I swore; he was going to get behind me.  A minute later his true target, a small blue Honda, pulled over and I maneuvered around both cars with a sigh of relief... only to see a whole carvan of emergency vehicles angled across four out of five lanes on the highway.  Two officers directed traffic as it squeezed through in the far left lane. 

As we got closer, I recognized the officers as the two perky redhead drivers from the bus ride.  They began doing a Broadway style tap dance, using their nightsticks as canes.  As we passed, they shimmied in unison, sent air kisses in through our window and yelled, "See? Police don't have to be scary!" 

Really??!??

I worked till 4am, got home at 430, and

DREAMT I WENT TO WORK.

Double you tee eff.

That is all.

Hotel meets Human rights

I was attending a conference in a huge hotel complex, consisting of 14 hexagonal wings connected by corridors at 35 degree angles; in aerial view it resembled a geometrical warren, like a distended beehive.

One morning, on my way to a seminar, I tried to use the bathroom.  A large hispanic woman wearing a medical mask blocked my way.  I backed out, confused, and went down the hall to the atrium of my wing, where the restrooms for men and women were side by side, each containing four stalls. 

Eight lines about six people deep waited for the bathroom, like outdoor concert goers queueing for the porta-potties.  Both the mens and womens' entrances were blocked by unsmiling workers, in hazard suits and disposable masks.  I was feeling rather desperate at this point and decided to just return to my room and use the toilet there. 

I passed the far end of the mob and a line that had only a single occupant.  Velvet movie  ropes demarcated the VIP line, and the silver haired woman with a clipboard manning it smiled at me.  "Hilary," she motioned me over, "you're faculty; you can get in this line."

I smiled back, pleased to be recognized, but it felt awkward to have some privelege the mob lacked.  "What's going on?" I asked. 

Earlier that morning there had been apparently some confrontation between the local army and a guerrilla leader in the Dominican Republic, and this man, widely considered a hero by residents, and a notorious criminal by the US government, had been shot and killed while trying to set explosives at an undisclosed location.

I puzzled over the news, trying to make the connection to the toilet stand-in.  I could see mourning an important figure, or staging a protest to achieve one of his aims but the goal of this action was unclear.  Was it simply to raise awareness?  Had he been setting explosives on a latrine?

The women barring the ladies room chatted and shifted but the men stood shoulder to shoulder, arms crossed in the doorway to the mens' restroom, so still and silent, even their facial muscles didn't move.  They exuded a kind of cold outrage and determination; it was impossible to be unmoved.

I turned to go and a little boy broke rank and ran after me.  He tapped my hand and whispered,"take me with you?"  We turned the corner, out of sight of the mob and the bathroom protestors. 

"Hi," I said, "Who are you?"

"I'm Gomez," he said, "and I'm eight.  I can tell you what happened, and why my family and everyone is standing in the toilet."

I realized this could be the start of a great story.  I nodded, taking the hand he offered.  "I have to make a quick stop in my hotel to get my tape recorder," I said.  The truth was it was already in my pocket; but I still needed to use the restroom very urgently.

At my hotel room I made a big deal of propping open the door so it wouldn't be inappropriate to have a little boy in my room without his parents' knowledge or consent.  I had a small worry that one of the maids might be standing in my hotel room toilet but I had the room to myself.

"I'll be right back," I told the boy.  "Watch TV if you like."

Then I woke.

The real world - if it were a video game

My world was a video game in which at any given time, 8 people I knew would be randomly assigned players.  Every time they performed some significant act, it would go into this virtual data box that hovered just over their right shoulder.

Visually the box was about 3 inches cubed, and it held 8 Mb of data.  When full, a threshold would be activated and a mystery would open, which had to be solved by the person and their immediate friends - which  might include other players - within a given time limit.

Success meant the burden of Playing would pass, at least temporarily, to some other member of the world.  Failure led, as is the case in all video games, to sudden death.  In this game, as is the case in real life, players had only a single timed attempt to get it right.