191 lines
9.4 KiB
Plaintext
191 lines
9.4 KiB
Plaintext
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==========================================================================
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== ==
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== If you enjoy these please feel free to contact me and say hello. I ==
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== can be reached at Sun via the Arpanet or the USENET. My email addr- ==
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== esses are: ==
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== ==
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== {ucbvax, decwrl, allegro}!sun!dbercel!toto ==
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== ==
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== or ==
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== ==
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== dbercel@sun.com or dbercel@sun.arpa ==
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==========================================================================
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Hitch Hikers Guide To The Net
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Episode 6
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(Flarg Brittashik is leading the crew of the Infinity down the contorted
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stairway toward the interior of Netrothea.)
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Martin: What an awful place, why do we bother to go on?
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Xaphod: Quiet!
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Flarg: Actually, he's right. One of the things we Netrotheans
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proved was that the Net does not actually exist. It
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therefore follows that nothing we do really matters at all.
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Arnold Lint:What?
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Flarg: Is that all you can say you mindless, facial emation!
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Rod: What do you mean "we don't exist"?
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Flarg: Well, first we approached the problem assuming that we were
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a unique Net. There is none other like us in the entire
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domain of space, right?
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Rod: Right . . .
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Flarg: Well, if we are alone, how do we know we are? Without
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another Net to tell us we are, we may not be. We could just
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be the figments of our imaginations. How do you KNOW that
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that cat over there does in fact have 5 legs? You see it,
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but what's to say that it is actually there. Do you follow?
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[********************************************************************
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What Flarg Brittashik was pointing out was the famed five-legged cat of
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Felix Major. The "The Hitch Hikers Guide To The Net" indicates that the
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myth of the five-legged cat was actually the result of the heavy
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drinking done on Felix Major. You see, the female of the species on
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Felix Major is covered with a blue slime which eventually dissolves her
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mate if contact is maintained for too long. Because of this, the men on
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Felix Major spend a lot of time in bars discussing the differences
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between being Kosher and being a Cannibal. They tend to drink an awful
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lot while discussing this topic. In their usually intoxicated state, it
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is not difficult to mistake a cat for having a fifth leg if viewed side
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ways (or as having one eye if viewed from the rear). The "The Hitch
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Hikers Guide To The Net" also points out that the favorite drink on
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Felix Major is called the 'Intesto-rout'. It is mixed as follows: Mix
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equal parts of gin, whiskey, rye, vodka, rum, bourbon, and brandy. Add a
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cup of beer that has been left in a gym locker for 3 days. To this add 5
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Ex-Lax pills, 1 Valium, 2 No-Doz, and half a lid of grass. Mix it well
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in a Hamilton Blech mixer. Now add a rotten egg, a decaying guppy, the
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spleen of 10 freshly killed frogs, and about a fist full of goat brains.
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Again mix it all up. To add a bit of zip to the mixture, add some
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Drain-O. Now put the whole mixture under a dead horse for 37 hours.
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After it has aged, filter it through the right kidney of a rabid llama
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and serve it in a slightly soiled bed pan with an olive. Felix Major,
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quite obviously developed quite a drunk driving problem. The solution
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arrived at was simple and logical. They simply ground up offenders and
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added them to 'Intest-rout's. Rumor has it that this extra ingredient
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gave the drink the full bodied taste it had always been lacking.
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*********************************************************************
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Arnold Lint:It's the old "Does a falling tree make a sound if there's no
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one there to hear" story, right?
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Flarg: Ooo! 'The falling tree makes no noise!' Aren't we the
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smart-behinded little cretins!
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Xaphod: No, you idiot! It means . . . uh . . .
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Flarg: Actually, he's quite correct. We were not happy with finding
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out that we may be alone, so we then assumed that there was
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the possibility for an infinite number of varied Nets.
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Gillian: How nice.
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Flarg: Yes, well, it now became apparent that our one little Net
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was entirely insignificant in the scope of things in
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general. Mathematically, our percentage of existence
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amounted to 1 over infinity, which is too small to even
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consider. Worse yet, since no other Net has ever contacted
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us, we may REALLY not exist after all. We could REALLY be
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mirages of the cosmic mind.
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Xaphod: Wow, that's heavy!
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Flarg: Quiet, you drugged out excuse to evacuate my stomach on the
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table!
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Rod: Go on already!
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Flarg: Well, after taking many heavy drugs, we finally arrived at a
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solid decision.
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Gillian: What was it?
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Flarg: We agreed that our existence was so insignificant that
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anything we did really wouldn't matter. Hence our national
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slogan changed to "Who Cares". After all, in light of
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everything I've revealed to you, it must be perfectly
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obvious that it just doesn't matter what you do or say on
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the Net.
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Arnold Lint:Boy, I hope the rest of the Net doesn't hear that.
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Flarg: Oh, they did. That's why they attacked us and wiped out most
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of Netrothea. They just couldn't accept that all the fuss
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they were making really didn't amount to a damn thing.
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[********************************************************************
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"The Hitch Hikers Guide To The Net" points out that the Netrotheans were
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somewhat renowned for exploding the faiths of others. Prior to their
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non-existence fetish, they published a series of treatises titled: "Who
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is this guy God anyway?", "Everything you always wanted to know about
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the benevolent Lord, but were afraid to ask.", and "Well, that's it for
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God." The Netrotheans had no fears of being wiped out for their bizarre
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views. They believed that since what we call 'death' is theoretically
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infinite, and what we call 'life' is so finite and miserable (what with
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everybody wearing digital watches and coveting thy neighbor's bits of
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green-dyed, processed plant matter), we must surely have gotten things
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backwards. They therefore had no problems dealing with the after-life.
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*********************************************************************]
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Xaphod: Wow, that's wild!
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Flarg: Now if you really want to blow your mind, consider this: If
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the Net doesn't really exist, do we exist? If we exist, what
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is the point of our existence? What is the medium of our
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communication if there really is no Net? What does it all
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mean?
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Arnold Lint:I don't know?
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Rod: That's obvious.
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Martin: I'm kind of relieved that nothing really exists. It's sort
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of reassuring to know that all the misery I've endured on
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the Net really doesn't affect anything anyway.
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Gillian: Quiet Martin. Don't you know what this all means! It means
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that the constant day to day struggle to keep up with the
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Net is all pointless. Posting news is futile, reading news
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is futile, thinking about news is futile - because where
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ever the news came from or goes to, what ever thought up the
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news - none of it exists - and neither do we!
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Rod: Yah, just think. We may have been posting news to a void!
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Xaphod: Wait a minute! We get replies to our news!
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Flarg: We thought of that too. But consider the odds against our
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actual existence. They could be considered random at best.
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The odds of other beings also existing comes down to the
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same random probability. It follows that any communication
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would have to be a random coincidence. Now, consider that
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the only communication we see is simply processed electrical
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impulses. Consider the quantity and speed of the impulses.
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The odds against them coming together in a logical
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combination are astronomically bad. It follows, then, that
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what we mistake for communication with other beings (which
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don't exist either) are simply galactic burps in our faces,
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if we existed.
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Xaphod: Wow!
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Flarg: Well, you wastes of space, I've got to go and kick my dog
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through a hedge.
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(With that Flarg disappears in a burst of purple smoke. When the smoke
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clears, only a can of "Putrina Rat Chow" remains.)
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******************** End Of Part 6 ********************
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What other fantastic things (which don't exist) will be revealed on
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Netrothea (which also doesn't exist). To find out . . . Tune in next
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time (a bizarre concept, time) . . . same Net-time . . . same
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Net-channel.
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danielle
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