By Marc Heiden, since 1997.
See also: a novel about a monkey.

I think if there is one thing I am going to have to explain to my grandchildren, it is why I did not start or at least invest in an interplanetary mining concern. The descendants of the iPhone and other devices will be made with metals that are rare or non-existent on Earth; they will be omnipresent, and they will run very well, and a few people will become extraordinarily rich from supplying them, but I will not be among those people, and my grandchildren will ask why.

(I will not have to explain why we allowed the climate on Earth to get all fucked up; that will be a topic for our children, mainly, the generation for whom there is not yet a sufficient body of cartoons in which this weather and its consequences are commonplace. Our grandchildren will find talk of old weather patterns odd and mildly interesting, like our own grandparents and milkmen and ice deliveries and nickelodeons, as long as we do not go on too long about it.)

No, it is my grandchildren to whom I will have to justify our family's failure to own any portion of an interplanetary mining concern. (Possibly some portion of what remains of my 401(k) will be invested in one, several layers of involvement away from my awareness, just as today.) My grandchildren will wonder how this boundless source of wealth could not have been obvious to me. They'll know that the first space mining flight was followed by others almost immediately, and from there it never stopped — the oil and gold rushes will provide some basis of comparison, in the sense that nobody will remember how many people struck out or died in accidents, only that it resulted in the likes of John D. Rockefeller.

(But it will be a rush without violence; we will be too fragile in outer space to attack each other, and by the time we have grown secure enough for that sort of thing, we will have learned to be civilized about it.)

My grandchildren will say that we could have been rich; they will not be angry about it (they will be, after all, good kids and fond of me, as I am well-suited to grandfatherhood), just puzzled that I had what will appear to them a clear and simple choice when I was a young man: to mine in outer space and become rich, or to not mine in outer space and keep fucking around in offices — and my decision was apparently to keep fucking around in offices.

I will sigh and tell my grandchildren that someone had to stay behind and fight off all the polar bears; those things were mean.

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I really want to do something to cause problems and sadness for the online job sites. I don't expect to be able to do it any time soon, but I need to develop a strategy for this, because it sets a bad precedent to allow anything to fuck with the good faith of fine people who just need a job. The only plans I have come up with so far are heavily dependent upon me having unlimited money. For example, in one scenario, everyone who works for Monster.com gets signed to lifetime contracts, making them excited, and then the focus of the company is shifted to making sculptures out of raw sewage. The company intranet is filled with ads for cushy jobs in other divisions, and employees can set up search agents that email them ads that match their criteria, allowing the employees to send their resumes with just a click of a button to a fictional email address that will never, ever reply to them.

I don't have unlimited money, though. You'd think I would, given that I've had this weblog for like eight years now, but somehow I've managed to miss it. No worries. All things considered, it's worked out pretty well for me.

The results of the Terri Schiavo autopsy are in, and although it offers categorical evidence that she was brain-dead and beyond all hope of recovery, her parents have not changed their minds and neither has President Bush. Because I have recently decided that I am a goddam mercenary as long as I don't have to work very hard and get paid holidays, let me offer the following ideas for them to bolster their case against what might otherwise appear to be overwhelming reality:

1. Doctors say that the vision centers of her brain were dead, and she could not see anything. Was that because of the lack of oxygen to her brain...or did her husband viciously put sunglasses on her while she was in a dark room, and then have the scans taken?
2. Doctors say that her brain was about half the size of a normal brain for a woman of her age. Was that because of the brain damage...or was it because the liberal media stole half of her brain while nobody was looking and implanted it in the reanimated corpse of Pol Pot?
3. Doctors say that, contrary to the allegations of right-wing media pundits, there was no evidence whatsoever that her husband, Michael Schiavo, had abused her. Was that because he did not, in fact, abuse her...or was it because he was taught ninja stealth torture techniques by agents of Pol Pot in exchange for half of her brain?

It would suck to have to apologize for having been completely wrong, so I expect that everyone is going to kick in for my consulting fee and hit the airwaves as soon as possible. You read it here today; you'll hear it from Bill Frist tomorrow.

I'd be remiss if I didn't link to the Martian sunset photo, if for no reason other than so I can find it again later. I'm rendered speechless and sincere by that sort of thing. It's a real photograph! Enough with the computer-corrected ultra-bright images, that's what a sunset really looks like on Mars and there's how I want my tax dollars spent. The Mars Rovers are great. When Opportunity finally got its wheel un-stuck, I went ape-shit. Why do we even care about sending people to planets? It's just empty symbolism. We'll get around to that eventually, but how much better would it be to have rovers on six moons of Saturn than two guys kicking around where rovers have already gone? We need to learn what secret, arcane practices are taking place on Venus, and rovers can tell us. (I am convinced there are some. I can lead a team to program the rover with ten thousand ways to convince aliens it's down.) There are volcanoes on Io, for fuck's sake. That is serious business. And Kurt Vonnegut has been right about everything else so far, so we need to send a rover to Titan as soon as possible.

(I will amend this entire line of argument to its incontrovertible opposite if I can be one of the two guys who gets to go to Mars. I've never completely recovered from the betrayal I felt when I learned there was no real way to get involved in astronomy without extensive use of math.)

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There was a light dusting of snow outside when I left for work this morning. I think there is time and occasion left for a good old avalanche, a bring the city to a halt storm, but it doesn't seem to be in the offing. Well, there was Christmas Eve, and that was nice.

The library has not responded to any of my entreaties. Retaliatory gestures are in preparatory stages.

The Chinese made headlines again recently by reiterating their plans to launch manned space flights. They used the occasion to also announce their plans to send men to the moon and to Mars. I have long believed that government expenditures on anything other than sending men to Mars are bullshit, so I must give due respect to the Chinese for the announcement, although anonymous foreign sources, despite worldwide consensus in the rap world, choose to hate on the players and the game:

(news) "There are even more outlandish plans, like manned moon bases. They think they can put a man on the surface of Mars. Some of these are too ambitious but a lunar program could be the next step," the diplomat said.

Do you think that the Chinese space program is unprepared?! Check your head, sir:

Would-be spacefarers typically went through three to five years of training, including courses in rocket design, astronomy and communications, state media said. There was also a flight manual on board the spacecraft for emergencies, the Sichuan Daily quoted Qi Faren, Shenzhou's chief engineer, as saying. "In case there is a problem when people are on board, the astronauts can quickly flip through the book to find the reason," Qi said.

They have an instruction manual, so what's the problem? NASA is jealous they didn't think of that with Apollo 13.

The Chinese space program, which does not disclose the name of its astronauts, prefers to shroud its space program in a veil of secrecy. I worry, therefore, that I may come into conflict with the Chinese government over this web page. Such a showdown would be unfortunate for everyone involved. Perhaps an arrangement could be reached whereby I would receive a trip to Beijing, where I would play 'Clumsy American Astronaut' in a propaganda film about the superiority of the Chinese space program. Then, NASA could make a sequel propaganda film, also starring me, wherein 'Clumsy American Astronaut' overcomes his confusion and winds up being the best astronaut ever. Several rebuttal films later, the world is captivated by my portrayal of 'Clumsy American Astronaut' and resolves to set aside its differences, leading to a new era of peace for humanity. Alternately, I make off with the monkeys from both space programs, inherit an olive farm in the south of France, attempt to train the monkeys to pick olives, and come into hilarious conflict with the villagers. Either way, I think this is a good plan, and I recommend we get started as soon as possible.

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I had a splendid run-around in the snow on Christmas Eve. For some reason, no one else thought to go down to the lakefront after midnight during the blizzard, so I was alone in the newly-fallen snow. I had my Lomo with me and attempted to document the strange sights, but I discovered later that the aperture was set wrong, so I am not sure if any of the pictures will come out. (Lomo is tricky. I am still getting used to its ways, having previously owned only disposable cameras.) The emotional high point of the trip was walking past the empty lot where a guy in a trailer sets up to sell Christmas trees every year. Evidently assuming that there were no more sales to be made at this late point in the season, he took off, leaving seven or eight forlorn trees behind. A cartoon reindeer head overlooked them from a lightpole. The physical high point of the trip was when I stepped out on the beach and was teleported by unknown motherfuckers to the goddam moon all of a sudden. Shit! There are those who will suspect that I was hallucinating from being out in the sub-zero cold for an hour, but I have pictures, if Lomo is true.

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In a free moment, I decided to check up on the Chinese Space Program. I have been keeping an eye on those guys for a while, but every time I look away, there are new developments:

(news) Space authorities in China point to a Shenzhou 4 flying before year's end, perhaps indicative of a launch planned for sometime this month, said Phillip Clark, head of the Molniya Space Consultancy in the United Kingdom. "With just about everything tested for the manned program, I would think that Shenzhou 4 will be pretty-much a duplicate of what is planned for the first manned mission. That is, test everything out…but the men," Clark told SPACE.com. In March, Zhang Qingwei, president of the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC), was quoted by state-run media outlets as saying that new, more powerful launchers will boost a 20-ton permanently manned space station into orbit. "By Western and even former-Soviet standards, the Chinese manned space program is progressing at a painfully slow rate," Clark notes. "But then again, historically, the Chinese have always taken their time with programs and have taken little notice of the expectations of those observers outside China!"

Phillip Clark can talk all the space-trash he likes, but the Chinese themselves appear, by and large, to be content remaining enigmatic about their plans. They have been quite busy reserving intense domain names, and, judging by the design of the sites, some intense shit has been going down, but it has been going down in Chinese, which I do not understand, so I had to be content with raising one eyebrow at the laser-beacon CASC logo, a white-hot version of which Phillip Clark can probably expect to suddenly materialize above his bed in the near future in response to his mockery.

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I want to clarify my position on the firing of pandas into outer space, as I worry that it may have been misinterpreted. Please allow me to explain:

I. I do not want to see all pandas fired into outer space, just one, and perhaps a second, to keep the first one company. I would like to keep a majority of pandas here on earth;
II. I do not mean to imply that the Chinese have vast stores of pandas, hidden and secret from the world, and they can afford to lose a few in the interest of astrophysics;
III. I think the panda(s) should be brought back alive;
IV. I think the panda(s) should be given a great deal of bamboo for the trip;
V. I realize that "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" was not a very good motion picture, and therefore I am not suggesting that a recreation of said motion picture be staged with an omnipotent space panda standing in for the omnipotent bald space woman;
VI. I realize that "2001: A Space Odyssey" was a very good space odyssey, and though it is not central to my position, I would like to suggest that replacing all of the astronauts in said space odyssey with pandas might be kind of funny;
VII. "What the fuck? All he ever talks about are animals, outer space and homeless guys."
VIII. Pandas have a lot of fur, and therefore the rocket should be fired away from the sun, not toward it, lest the panda get too warm;
IX. Have any experiments been done involving penguins in zero gravity, and the whole thing where they watch airplanes overhead and fall over? If not, why not? It's not as though there is a fucking penguin shortage;
X. Penguin, penguin, penguin, penguin, moose. Penguin;
XI. Certain motherfucking motherfuckers have motherfuckingly been fucking mothers, such as fathers;
XII. "Yes, but what ba-a-ands do you listen to?"
XIII. Pandas are big and strong, and though they are genial, if an alien should decide to fuck with the panda, I think the panda will be able to handle it;
XIV. Steps should be taken to ensure that no one from "Ranma" is sent up by mistake;
XV. Pandas can play basketball, I seen it on the teevee;
XVI. (news) A Beijing film director has asked Jenna Bush, daughter of US President George W. Bush, to star in an anti-terrorism movie, a Hong Kong newspaper reported. Director Long Zanxu has sent Jenna a letter offering her the part of heroine Nancy Lee in a 100-million-yuan (12.06-million-dollar) production called "Hero Defending Country", the South China Morning Post reported. Jenna, who is a university student in the US, has not yet replied. In the movie, Lee battles with terrorists on planes and trains in a bid to beat the bad guys and improve Sino-US relations. Long said the small budget restricted him from hiring Hollywood stars like action movie hero Harrison Ford. However, he believed the political nature of the film would suit Jenna Bush and hoped that she would accept a low-paid contract as she was not a movie star. "I intend to console the victims of this terrorist accident with my film," the Post quoted the letter to Bush as reading in English. "And if you, Jenna, the daughter of the USA President, could play the role in this film developed by China and America, how much would it set the hearts of the people aflame. "In the near future, billions of film fans will praise you for your excellent playing in our film after they speak highly of your father's heroic struggle," the letter added. Filming was due to begin in the spring of 2002 and would be done mainly in China, the report said. This is Long's second invitation for Jenna to star in one of his productions. Last year, he invited her to take part in a love drama;
XVII. My computer is pretty old. I need a new one. I was thinking I might get a desktop, because they are cheaper, and hang on to the laptop, which I'd just use for writing. But is it obscene to own and employ two computers? I don't mean to be obscene;
XVIII. What I am saying is, there could be some fantastic slapstick involving Jenna Bush getting the panda drunk. That wouldn't fly in Hollywood, but the Hong Kong film industry is much better at that sort of thing, e.g. "Drunken Master 2";
XIX. I don't have any money, anyway;
XX. Bears 46, Patriots 10;
XXI. My New Year's resolution this year, now drawing to a close, was to earn power-ups and dodge spinning blades. I am not sure that I succeeded;
XXII. One of my friends in New York recognized me on "Judge Mathis"! Great;
XXIII. Is it sexy that I know Roman numerals so well? Love me;
XXIV. Wednesday nights are pretty good for bowling. Let me know if you want to come. I'm not positive if we're going this week, though, because a bunch of people are going to "Lord of the Rings";
XXV. Quoth the Burger King announcer: "Arrrrwen, the elf!"
XXVI. (news) Gordon Watson, a 50-year-old library employee in Vancouver, British Columbia, is among those fans who feel that Peter Jackson's movie - the first in a trilogy - has commercialized the story and betrayed Tolkien's spirit. "I believe Tolkien's text is as good a story as has ever been told,'' said Watson. "I agree that it's necessary to remove sections from it, but I don't think it's necessary to change some of the underlying themes.'' Tolkien devotees - even those like Watson who haven't seen the movie - can reel off a list of differences between the books and the film, from changes in the story's structure to the elimination of scenes and characters. Purists are most vocal about changes to the character Arwen, who in the first book does little more than sit at her father's side during a banquet. She is absent in the second book, returning only in the third book and appendices.
In the movie, Arwen helps protect protagonist Frodo Baggins from spirit-warriors who are searching for him and the magical ring he carries. That's too much for Watson, who accuses Jackson of creating a "warrior princess" to appeal to female moviegoers at the expense of the story. "I'm very uncomfortable with the idea that she should be rescuing Frodo at the ford,'' Watson said. "It removes Frodo's heroic stature in the film where he's essentially facing down the Black Riders single-handed. It distracts from Frodo's evolution as a character";
XXVII. Quoth the Burger King announcer: "Fro-do, the hobbit!"
XXVIII. It sounds like a certain 50 year-old librarian and fantasy novel enthusiast is a little sensitive on the topic of warrior princesses;
XXIX. Quoth the Burger King announcer: "Gor-don Wat-son, the librarian!"
XXX. Comic book fans will want to check out the recent entry in Neil Gaiman's journal, wherein the normally polite and reserved genius lets loose and takes Todd McFarlane's punk ass to the house;
XXXI. Pandas are generally given good names, such as Ling-Ling, which compares favorably to Al Bean and Buzz Aldrin, I think;
XXXII. J.G. Ballard once wrote that it is entirely possible the only man from the twentieth century who will still be remembered 1000 years from now is Neil Armstrong;
XXXIII. Well, why not a panda;
XXXIV. The Chinese need something to keep them occupied and not making more babies. They'd be the first ones to tell you that;
XXXV. We were standing around in the lobby of a Hawaiian bar, critiquing the internal design of pandas (seriously flawed), but the bar was very crowded, so we left;
XXXVI. Bears 27, Steelers 24;
XXXVII. Space panda or astro panda? I'm not sure;
XXXVIII. Enough with these fucking communications satellites, and to hell with Anytime Minutes. The astro panda poops on communication satellites. Mischievous astro panda! Bamboo for you;
XXXIX. Quoth the Burger King announcer: "Ling-Ling, the astro panda!"

I hope that clarifies my position.

Read more: Books, Outer Space, Panda Porn, Politics, Sports | Permalink

I wanted a cookie, and there were only five minutes left until the store with no minimum charge closed, so I left my apartment and I ran, free, unbound, perfect in form and effortless in speed, alive in the cold air and the moonlight. Golden boy! Everyone I passed looked at me as though I wasn't wearing any pants.

From the outer space editorial desk: will China - which recently sent a monkey, dog, rabbit and snail into space - be sending up a panda any time soon? I think I am speaking for more than myself when I say that I'd like to see a panda sent into outer space.

Here are some more stories about homeless guys:

1. I am leaving the Rock 'n Roll McDonalds in downtown Chicago. I bought some sunflower seeds across the street for lunch, and I needed somewhere to sit and read while them. For some reason, I never work in buildings that have cafeterias. As I leave, trying to figure out where my office is from there, a homeless man asks me if I am an honest man. In all honesty, I am not an honest man. I tell nothing but lies, but they are sweet lies. Still, I think that he is looking for a specific answer here, so I shrug and say that I am. He bets me a dollar that by looking at my coat and my shoes, he can tell me how many children my father had. I have never met my father, so I am curious, but I have no way of confirming whether he's right, and the homeless guy isn't about to start giving it up for free. Anyway, I don't have a dollar.

2. I am one block away from work. A homeless man offers to shine my shoes. He explains that he doesn't have his shoe-shine kit with him right now, but he's pretty sure he could do a good job anyway. I am wearing my basketball shoes, which I bought because they were cheap, have no visible logo and were the only ones available in size 14, so they aren't really the type of shoes that you shine. I tell the homeless guy that. He assures me that he can do wonders, and he makes me guess how old his shoes are. When they turn out to be much older than my guess, they are held up as evidence of his shoe-shining prowess. I try to express my sincere belief in his abilities, but, as usual, I don't have a dollar. The homeless man says that it's okay and maybe we'll have dinner some time. I say, sure, why not.

3. I am approaching the turnstile at the train station, ready to pay my fare with a fully-charged transit card. A homeless man asks if I will give him three dollars. He is more ambitious than other homeless people, and for that I respect him. Still, I do not have three dollars. He offers me a mixtape in exchange, and assures me that it's really good. I shrug. He offers to give what he refers to as his favorite quarter if I will pay his fare to board the train. I am willing. I have not yet spent the quarter.

Read more: Food, Outer Space, Panda Porn | Permalink

Some people have been wondering why I haven't written about China's recently announced plans to land a man, presumably a China man, on the moon in 2005. To these people, I say: I don't know. I must have been doing something else.

(news) BEIJING - China is forging ahead with a mission to send a man to the moon as it prepares for manned space flights by 2005, state media reported on Friday. The moon mission is part of Beijing's ambitious plans build a space industry, the China Daily quoted Sun Laiyan, vice director of the China National Space Administration, as saying. A leading Chinese scientist said Beijing, which sent a monkey, a dog, a rabbit and snails into orbit in January aboard its second unmanned "Shenzhou" spacecraft, needed further unmanned flights before it could send an astronaut into space.

God damn, that is the craftiest shit I have heard in a long time. A monkey, dog, rabbit and snails all in the same spaceship? Just imagine the questions that will be answered when the results of that mission become public. Did the monkey pet the dog? Did the rabbit and the snails band together against the monkey? What the fuck happened up there, Sun Laiyan? Why won't you talk about Shenzhou II? Holy shit. As an expert on monkeys, outer space and wily schemes - the world's foremost authority on that particular cross-indexing, some say - if I had to hazard a guess, I would guess that the snails were implanted with miniaturized brains from the Khans, Genghis and Kublai and some of the other Khans that real fans are into, and it was the monkey's job to stow the snails away on the moon, where they will lie in wait for people to arrive. (They can hide from radiation in their shells until they become accustomed to it.) Before they left, the barbarian snails probably beat the crap out of the rabbit and took it with them to the moon, where they impaled it on the American flag at Tranquility Base with a poorly-translated message about the fighter plane collision from earlier this year as an ominous gesture. Meanwhile, the dog chased its own tail. Everyone sends dogs into space. The Chinese didn't want to be rude.

That's just a guess, of course. But, let's be honest, I'm right.

"For mankind in the 21st century, space applications will become as essential as electricity and oil in the 19th century," scientist Liang told the China Daily. "We are just in the first year of the new century and my prophecy will come true," he said.

Scientist Liang does not lack for confidence. And that's good. You need confidence in the 21st century. I can only assume that the Chinese character for "tearing open (scientist Liang's) shirt and beating (scientist Liang's) chest" proved too difficult to translate, so they left it out, idiomatic meanings being what they are.

I have many friends who are scientists, and I heartily recommend that they refer to their work as prophecies. I have to imagine it's a morale booster. Try it. I'm warning you, though, my prophecy will come true.

Here is something useful: Jenny, a correspondent in Westmont, sent a link to an MP3 of David Sedaris reading his essay "You Can't Kill The Rooster", which is definitely the essay I would most like to hear him read. Nice. How useful is the world wide web? Fucking useful, I'd say.

Also, if anyone needs an MP3 of the Super Bowl Shuffle, let me know. I will take care of that.

(news) This touring show, which is headed to Radio City Music Hall after its Toronto date this week, is the work of two pop culture mavens dedicated to the "pure" Scooby. Which means no Vincent Price, no Monkees-esque love songs, no post-modern sneering about Shaggy being on drugs, and no -- shudder! -- Scrappy Doo (the wisecracking other dog of the cartoon's later years). What you're getting is pure vintage Saturday morning stage cartoon -- Fred, Daphne, Velma, Shaggy and Scooby chasing ghosts with their van The Mystery Machine. "The producers knew me through Mark (McKinney) and the Kids when I worked on that show (Kids In The Hall)," says Millan. "They wanted someone to translate an extraordinarily famous cartoon into theatre. "Then it was, 'Who'd you like to work with on the script?' I said Mark, who's got a few comedy ideas of his own. They're old and hackneyed but they're useful."

Adds McKinney, blithely: "It's good for the children to be reminded what the basic building blocks of French farce are."

It certainly is.

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