textfiles/magazines/LWS/six.lws

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"The Adventures of Lone Wolf Scientific"
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An electronically syndicated series that
follows the exploits of two madcap
mavens of high-technology. Copyright 1991
Michy Peshota. May not be distributed
without accompanying WELCOME.LWS and
EPISOD.LWS files.
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EPISODE #6
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         A Day in the Life of Two Defense Workers

>>S-max and Andrew.BAS struggle to adjust to their new lives
as defense contractor workers.  When the computer builder
tires of his responsibilities keeping track of "super-string
defense links", he convinces his officemate that they should
design a closet-sized replica of NASA's Mission Control.<<

                      By M. Peshota

     Andrew.BAS was glueing a plastic model of the space-
shuttle together when his officemate burst in.  "Gus and I
just had a man-to-man talk," S-max bragged, referring to
their boss, Gus Farwick.  "Or should I say--"  He smirked
pompously.  "--technological-innovator-to-technological-
innovator?"  The self-proclaimed 'genius computer builder'
plopped a tin can full of kite string on his desk.  "Gus has
assigned me to a most urgent task.  The very fate of
technological civilization may hinge upon its successful
completion."

     "Yeah?"  the programmer looked up, impressed.

     S-max smirked again.  He tossed his large, bushy head
for effect.  "I am to keep track of the super-string links
between key components of our multi-billion dollar defense
network.  I am to ensure that expensive weapons do not fall
prey to big hairy knots on the battlefield."  He continued
on breathlessly, "Gus no doubt chose me for this important
task, not only because of my much legended electronic
genius, but also for my extensive knowledge of cosmological
string theory."  He grunted with self-importance.  "I will
no doubt be working on the project for days.  You probably
won't be hearing a lot from me."

     Andrew.BAS nodded agreeably, looking back to the half-
built plastic shuttle model propped on the floor by his
knees.  He liked the idea of not hearing from the loquacious
computer builder for a while.  For the past four days, all
S-max had been doing was shuffling around the office,
ranting about how computer programmers like Andrew.BAS were
intellectually inferior to genius computer hardware
designers such as himself.  He called them "brains-in-a-
wristwatch programmers."  It would be good not to have to
listen to that for a while.

     S-max blurted, "I bet it is a good feeling to know that
you have an officemate who is already getting in good with
the boss."

     "I suppose," Andrew.BAS said politely.  Inwardly, he
couldn't help feel envious that the computer builder now had
work to do while he did not.

     "Employers love me," S-max continued brightly. "They
are continually showering me with goodies."  He pointed in
illustration to the can of kite string on his desk.

     Andrew.BAS smiled wanly.  "I'm very happy for you."

     S-max stuffed his big hands in his army jacket pockets.
He swaggered across the room.  Arriving at his half-
completed "champagne-filled Jacuzzi" sitting in the corner
on the floor, he gazed fondly at its tangle of jet
propellers, lawn sprinklers, and half-drained bottles of
bubble bath.  "It was no doubt my vision for twenty-first
century technology--of which this is a prime example--that
excited Gus the most."  He idly disentangled the cockpit "No
Smoking" sign from the three-legged bathtub.

     "I wouldn't be surprised," Andrew.BAS mused, pouring
over the shuttle model assembly blueprints.

     S-max spotted the plastic cargo shuttle bay with its
miniature satellite that Andrew.BAS's clenched.  "Please,
take that vile thing away, out of my sight," he commanded,
motioning to it. "I don't want to be reminded of our space
program's gross ineptitude in refusing to avail itself of
the free advise of a computer genuis such as myself."  He
shuddered at the memory of his ejection, months prior, from
the employment office at NASA.  One moment he had been
advising the space program on how to secure its forty-ton
satellites in the space shuttle during transport ("Use duct
tape--lots of it."), and the next they were escorting him
and all his broken screwdrivers to the door.  He shuddered
again.  And to think, if they'd played their cards right,
they could have also have had him for a commander on the
space shuttle.

     Andrew.BAS compliantly tucked the miniature cargo bay
out of sight in a nearby cardboard box.

     From the other side of the office, they heard strains
of "Chariots of Fire."  It sounded ghostly.  It was their
officemate, burnt out assembly language savant Austin
Jellowack, humming the company song, "Onward Dingready
Soldiers, As Sung to Chariots of Fire."  With each passing
day, Austin seemed to sink lower and lower behind his
computer terminal, his arthritic knuckles rattling over the
worn, dirty keys faster and faster, as if the more he saw of
his new officemates, the more frightened he became.

     Ignoring him, S-max shuffled back to his desk.  He
pulled from his jacket's inside pocket a wide roll of paper.
With loud, self-important rustles, he smoothed it out on the
desk.  He traced a finger over the blueish paper, back and
forth several times, emitted a "Hmmph!" of thought, then
stared at it intently, rubbing his stubbled chin.  Finally
he said to Andrew.BAS, "These are blueprints for a multi-
billion dollar weapon sytem.  I sweet-talked them out of the
receptionist at the front desk."

     The programmer looked up skeptically. "The receptionist
had blueprints for a multi-billion dollar weapon system?"

     "They were entrusted to her in case of an attack by
barbarians.  The last place barbarians would look for secret
multi-billion dollar weapon plans would be in the top drawer
of a receptionist's desk.  Clever, don't you think?"

     Andrew.BAS lifted his small, blond head to get a look
at the alleged multi-billion dollar blueprints.  "Isn't that
one of the posters that Dingready & Derringdo mails to
college job placement offices to help recruit employees?"

     S-max eyed the paper skeptically.

     Andrew.BAS walked over and pointed out a small drawing
at the bottom.  It depicted a gaggle of recent engineering
school graduates holding their moon helmets.  "And look at
this plane," he added, pointing to a graceless craft with a
missing propeller and which looked like it had been shot
down over Cleveland.  Passengers, adorned in hombergs and
1954 suits and dresses, slid down a big orange inflated
slide propped against its side.  They were sliding into the
ocean, or else jumping out the door in parachutes.
Andrew.BAS explained, "It's a poster that shows how to exit
a Dingready & Derringdo plane in an emergency.  Don't you
see the company motto on the bottom?"  He pointed to it.  It
said "Courtesy of Dingready & Derringdo Aerospace.  We're
there on the ground when you need us."

     The computer builder scrutinized it further.  He knit
his thick brows in disbelief.  Finally he gasped, "Why
you're right, Andrew.BAS!  I should have spotted it
immediately!  As I'm sure you're aware, these college
recruitment posters are often indistinguishable from plans
for multi-billion dollar weapon systems.  Defense
contractors like Dingready & Derringdo often print up plans
for multi-billion dollar weapon systems at the same time
that they print up college recruitment posters--so as to
save on the cost of silk-screening."  He grunted.
"Consequently, the two frequently become confused.  It was
an easy mistake to make.  I am glad you caught it in the
nick of time, though, before I spent <<endless hours>>
pencilling in a radar navigation system or a computer
telemetry system.  Think of it!  I could have frittered away
enormous amounts of my high-paid electronic genius designing
a telemetry system for a plane that specializes in
transporting floppy hatted nudniks to Miami Beach."  With a
cluck of childlike admiration, he added, "My, you are
perceptive for a computer programmer, aren't you?  I
wouldn't have guessed that a programmer such as yourself
could unriddle such an intellectual subtlety without the
profligate singing of Sesame Street songs."  He grunted
again.  "Usually, computer programmers are not very bright."

     Andrew.BAS ignored the offensive S-max and returned to
his model space shuttle on the floor.

     S-max jammed the so-called "blue prints" into a desk
drawer.   Arising from his desk with the hautiness of a
lion, he sauntered over to Andrew.BAS's model space shuttle
and eyed it critically.  He circled it several times.
Finally, he exclaimed, "No, no, Andrew.BAS, you are doing it
all wrong!"  He wagged a finger in reprimand.  "Before you
glue on the plastic landing wheels you need to mark off your
launch ground.  Migod, don't they teach you people
<<anything>> at programmers' school?!  I can hardly believe
what I am seeing."  From a screwdriver-stuffed pocket, he
extracted a gnarled hunk of red chalk.  It looked like the
kind of red chalk usually responsible for indecipherable
writing on the walls of circuit closets.  With a loud sigh
of exasperation, he leaned over and began chalking on the
concrete floor--circles, stars, arrows, lines, ellipses,
x's, triangles, Mickey Mouse ears, two stick figures, dollar
signs, a heart with an arrow through it, something that
looked like the coast of Africa, and a maze-like runway in
the shape of an Aztec lizard.  All the while, he clucked in
artistic self-fulfillment.

     Andrew.BAS watched him in astonishment.

     Finally, the computer builder stood up, brushed the
chalk from his baboonish hands, and surveyed the now
bruised-looking floor in pride.  "That will do it, now
you're set," he proclaimed, shuffling back to his desk.

     In relief, Andrew.BAS resumed glueing plastic wheels on
his shuttle model.

     S-max, meanwhile, once again took a seat behind his
desk, extracted the crumpled "weapon system blue prints"
from the drawer, and began sketching a telemetry system onto
the plane.

     For several moments, the only sound was the screech-
screech of S-max's green laundry marker and the off-key
humming of the assembly language savant in the corner.

     Soon, Andrew.BAS spotted the computer builder once
again eyeing his plastic space shuttle dolefully.

     "Now what's wrong?"

     "You need a Mission Control."

     "A Mission Control?"

     "Yes, a Mission Control.  One with a lot of expensive
computer consoles."

     "I see."

     "It is absolutely imperative that we have one,
Andrew.BAS!  The authenticity of the project depends upon
it!"

     "But we already have a launch ground," Andrew.BAS
protested, nodding toward the ravished floor.

     S-max ignored him and pointed to the closet directly
behind him.  "It would fit perfectly in the coat closet."

     "The Mission Control?"

     "I am not talking about that collection of Cracker Jack
prizes you refer to as programming tools!" he burst out.
"Yes, the Mission Control."

     Andrew.BAS stared at the coat closet in apprehension.
He could see it now: the deranged computer builder stuffing
it full of lawn sprinklers and radio-antenna festooned
bathtubs, just like his champagne-filled Jacuzzi.  He would
probably scheme a way to install an electrical outlet which
he would proceed to dangerously overload.  All that
Andrew.BAS could think of saying, though, was, "Where are we
going to store our snowboots in the winter?"

     S-max rumbled, "Migod, you programmers are such old
maids!  <<Where are we going to store our snowboots?>>" he
whined in mimicry of the programmer's soft-voiced protest.
"This is not the time for trifles!  This is not the time to
worry about where we're going to store our rubber boots!
Now is the time for action!"

     "I see," Andrew.BAS reflected calmly.  It really wasn't
such a bad idea, he mused, building a miniature Mission
Control to go with his miniature space shuttle.  It could
serve as a monument to all the computer programmers who work
so hard in Mission Control coding the computer software that
speeds man across the galaxy.  Whenever he looked at it he
could think of his life-long dream--to be one of the
programmers in Mission Control.  Finally, he asked, "What
should we build it out of?"






     As the waifish Andrew.BAS struggled to push the
shopping cart loaded with toy robots down the aisle, S-max
bustled ahead of him through the hobby store.  "Let's
see..." he mused, plucking a plastic rocketship off the
shelf, "we still need a moon rover, an all-terrain planetary
recreational vehicle, and something with extra-large
tailpipes in which to roll over the plains of Saturn in
style."

     "I thought we were only building a Mission Control."

     "Migod, Andrew.BAS!" the blowsy S-max despaired.
"Don't you realize that when you bring an unvarnished
computer genius like me into a project, one visionary
concept is going to just naturally flow into another?"

     "I'm sorry, I didn't realize that."

     "Well it is something you're going to have to become
accustomed to."  The computer builder snorted.  He snatched
from a shelf several handfuls of rubber snakes and lizards
and heaved them into the cart.  Ever since they had arrived
at Loose-Toothed Lonzo's Crazy Crafts and War Games, S-max
had been animated with the glee of a newly installed diety
about to jerry-build a brandnew Creation out of craft paste
and 25 cent felt pieces.  He paraded down the aisles,
tossing into their shopping cart every plastic gewgaw that
caught his eye.

     "What are those for?" Andrew.BAS asked of the snakes.

     "For the model of the Mojave Desert rocket test grounds
that we will erect in the wasteland that is the second floor
marketing department."

     The programmer groaned.  Not only did S-max plan to
build a model of Mission Control in their office coat
closet, but now he also wanted to transform second floor
marketing into a rocket test grounds, as well as make the
the janitor's closet down the hall into a space-ship airlock
by hanging rubber octopus from the ceiling--to simulate
space creatures trying to sneak into the ship.  How did he
ever let himself get mixed up in this? Andrew.BAS wondered.

     The computer builder's restless eyes fell on a plaster
bust of John F. Kennedy.  It was wedged between two ready-
to-paint birdhouses on a shelf.  He seized it with
satisfaction. "This will make an ideal prop for the TV
announcer's room that we can build in the vault down the
hall from our office."

     "You mean the vault where they lock the engineering
blueprints?"

     "Yes, that is the one.  It is perfectly insulated to
keep the raucous of ill-behaved TV people from disturbing
the men and women of technological vision in Mission
Control.  It also has a pretty good lock."  He nestled the
bust of the technologically far-seeing president beneath the
shopping cart beside the case of silver spray-paint.

     Pushing the overloaded cart further down the aisle,
Andrew.BAS repeated one of the questions that had troubled
his sensible mind all through their shopping spree. "How are
we going to pay for all this junk?"

     "I wouldn't worry about it, Andrew.BAS," came the hasty
response.  "I'm sure our employee has a credit line here."

     "Why would an aerospace company have a credit line at
Loose-Toothed Lonzo's Crazy Crafts & War Games?"

     "Trust me, Andrew.BAS, I have worked for defense
contractors before.  Where else but the local hobby shop are
they going to procure their instant paper mache'?"

     All through the drive home (they discovered that
Dingready & Derringdo Aerospace did indeed have a credit
line at Lonzo's), S-max chattered away about how they could
expand their depictions of NASA operations beyond the coat
closet, beyond the marketing department, beyond the
blueprint vault, beyond even the janitor's closet.  "We can
hot-glue plastic diplodocuses around Gus Farwick's office to
similate the halls of Congress pitifully frozen in the
technological Stone Age.  We can affix broken hand-mirrors
to that model of the <<Hindenburg>> in the employee
cafeteria to make it look like a dysfunctional space
telescope...."

     When they finally arrived back at work, Andrew.BAS
stumbling beneath a heavy load of shopping bags, S-max
sauntering ahead of him as nonchallantly as a man with no
burdens in the world, the computer builder proceeded to
spent the rest of the day lying on his stomach on the floor,
modeling from clay misbegotten little figures that were
supposed to be NASA employees, but looked more like
casualties of an atomic blast.  Andrew.BAS, meanwhile,
spray-painted his and S-max's tennis shoes silver to make
them look like moon boots.

     All the while, their officemate, Austin Jellowack,
watched them fearfully from behind his computer terminal, as
he hummed broken bars of the company song, assumedly for
comfort.  When S-max finally tired of this dirge-like
crooning, he seized the startled Austin by the t-shirt
collar, shoved a shopping bag full of mirrors and glue gun
in his withered hands, then dragged the frail, monkish
programmer out the door and down the hall to the employee
cafeteria.  There he deposited him in front of the model of
the <<Hindenburg>> with vague instructions to transform it
into "something we can all enjoy."

     The model-builders worked late into the night.  Whoever
passed by their office and spotted the dim, yellow light
burning solemnly through the mottled glass window of the
door, marvelled at the employees' zest for work and how they
were applying themselves so diligently to the problems of
our nation's high-tech defense.  Some no doubt commented to
themselves that the government was for once getting its
money's worth from Dingready & Derringdo Aerospace and, as
far as the military contractor was concerned, they were
probably correct.

>>>>In the next episode, "The House Guest with 172 Soldering
Irons," Andrew.BAS naively offers the homeless S-max a place
to sleep.  The two reluctant confreres are not even out of
the employee parking garage when he begins to regret it.<<<<


                          <Finis>