This World Has Lost Its Glory
Nosehair and I have started building a space elevator out behind the apartment. The trees give us pretty good cover, from the sun and park visitors and vandals and such, and we’ve really made some good progress.
A space elevator is a device consisting in part of a cable, or tether, anchored to the earth, that extends into space. Devices called climbers go up and down the tether to deliver payloads, at significantly lower cost than using rockets.
The important thing about a space elevator is making sure it won’t break, so you need super-strong material. Luckily, I’ve made significant strides toward affordable production of a workable material. I’ve developed a process to convert ordinary carbon-containing materials into ultra-strong carbon nanotubes.
A little scientific background is in order.
It started with my CRISPR kit that Nosehair bought me for Christmas last year. (“Merry CRISPR!” he guffawed.) I was having a great old time, creating new species and whatnot. Then, completely by accident, one day I dropped a genetic sample into a cold fusion vortex that I had left running for another experiment. (Recall my work with bathtub fusion: Hester, K. “Electrochemically Induced Nuclear Fusion of Deuterium in Domestic Bathroom Fixtures.” kenhester.com Science Journal, 22 December 2012, http://science.kenhester.com/?articleRef=2012122201.) The results were that the fusion vortex rearranged the carbon structure of the sample into a biologically unviable but super-light and strong material.
I call the process “carbon-fusion nanoblastoplasty.”
I’ll publish my carbon findings in the by-and-by, but suffice it to say, we can make the nanotubes from a wide variety of carbon-containing materials, including, for instance, Nosehair’s prodigious waste product. And yours and mine.
We had several meters of tether constructed a few months ago, but to make it to space, we needed help. I’d have to walk Nosehair around the park for about 50 more years to get enough material.
So I started lobbying world leaders, financiers, entrepreneurs, etc. to join in. Celebrities, of course. The stars were very excited to help fund my shit-fueled enterprise. I love those guys. They’ve got emotional intelligence.
Part of the allure for them is the opportunity to repurpose this supposed waste product that otherwise just goes out to stink up the waterways and oceans. Work is underway to develop more efficient containers that can be cheaply built and distributed worldwide. There’s a lot of money to be made, of course. A company called ColoDefender is already helping me in a beta of a large-scale collection effort.
Now, I’m all into sustainability, you know. I did a PSA on my YouTube channel, holding up some nanotube fore-product in one hand, end product in the other, and saying, “NH One cares about the environment. We’re putting natural waste material to work building the world’s first sustainable space elevator…” etc. That’s when the celebrities started taking notice and the money started pouring in. Words are powerful. Images, of course, more so.
Celebrities and entrepreneurs are great, but the real money is governments, because they can simply tax their millions of citizens.
Or, say, introduce a revolutionary new health care program… that starts in schools. One of the wellness paths in this program makes use of ColoDefender collection.
Anyway, I digress. To tell the truth, the whole business side of this thing does not interest me much. I didn’t even like opening up the apartment to all these people. It’s kind of my refuge. Nobody can see inside my apartment. The trees are too thick.
But, hey, this stuff isn’t cheap. I couldn’t build the world’s first space elevator by staying in my room all day. Sometimes I see Nosehair sitting in his room or out on the balcony, his eyes going up and down. I think he’s daydreaming about the elevator. But, hey, you don’t make it happen by just dreaming about it.
Maybe I should hire a business manager. Someone who sees the elevator going up and down not as an elevator going up and down, but as cash piling up.
* * *
I buy large quantities of peanuts to feed Nosehair. People look at me like… you shouldn’t feed your kids so many peanuts, man. I tell them, hah, I don’t have kids, I have a pet elephant. Ha… hm. I didn’t really like admitting that I didn’t have kids. I’m part of that declining American birth rate trend. But probably not for the usual reasons.
Anyway, the people in the peanut store understand, I think. It doesn’t really matter if they do. I think to myself: I control them with my words. If I were a politician, I could tax them. It’s easy.
* * *
The celebrities, financiers, world leaders come and go, move about the room, have a drink or two. I’m watching the video. I’m waving my hand above them, moving them around. Sometimes you see villains in movies doing that kind of thing—spying on people and secretly manipulating them. Why do you think they do that? You know what the successful business people and politicians do: they manipulate you right out in the open. They twist your arm.
I cart my peanuts to the checkout line. Mom and Dad and the kids are in front of me. I don’t have children, but I’ve got my little pal. And we’ve got our dreams. We’re going to build this thing, buddy.
* * *
Words Are All I Have
But, now, here’s the thing: A space elevator needs a counterweight, up at the end of it, in space. This is to produce enough centrifugal force to counteract gravity and keep the elevator taut.
Nosehair told me wants to be the counterweight. At least, part of it.
I said, what? Are you kidding? He just looked at me.
All this work to build this thing and make a fortune, and he just wants to sit out there on the end of it? Maybe he thinks it will be fun, flying around and around in space. I guess it would be possible… spacesuit… feeding tubes… could be solar powered…
But why… do you want to be all alone, Nosehair? Why… why do you want to leave me? Eventually, I got him to open up a little. He said he was sick of all the babble, all the noise. People coming by the apartment… chemical equations… business plans… Well, that’s kind of what I feel, too, sometimes, but I keep working, you know. You have to.
He looked at me. He said, “You know, there’s a world beyond words. We’ve all been there. I want to go back.”
Huh? I felt kind of punched in the mouth. I’ve gotten a lot done with, you know, words. And speaking of words, Nosehair, what are you going to do up there all the time? Who are you going to talk to?
He said, it’s beautiful up there. You don’t need to do or say anything.
We’re just little containers, for little bits of life, he explained. The real life is out there.
But… I don’t want to lose you, buddy. I’ll give you a radio in your helmet, of course… we can talk. I’ll call you! You can tell me about the constellations… solar flares… describe the UFOs…
Oh, wait, he wants to get away from the noise. Maybe I can just visit him sometimes. Yeah! I’ll just ride up the elevator and we’ll hang out.
What will we see when we get up there, buddy? I can’t wait.
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