Assorted Nonsense

Yes, we turned our lights out.

Did you?

And we all went out and walked around the block. Maybe a third of the houses we passed had their lights out.

Maybe it was my imagination, but the stars seemed to shine a little brighter. The girls loved it… said it was like a campout.

We might do it next week too, just for fun.

 By Joe Mahoney

The technician listened uncomfortably as the Executive Producer talked about Rolf taking early retirement.  Lots of people were doing it these days.  Cutbacks.  Golden handshakes.  But Rolf… the department would go down the tubes without him.  Rolf would go down the tubes without the department.  Something about needing the package.  Debts to pay off.  Forced into it, really.  Sad case.  Wouldn’t get his full pension now.  The man had lived for his work.

The Department Head came in with the coffee.  The technician took his black.  The Department Head tried to give him his change, a whole nickel.  The technician waved her off.

“So what happened the other day?” the Executive Producer asked. 

The technician considered playing dumb but he hated people who did that.  What day?  Punish the Executive Producer for not being specific.  Yes, the technician knew damn well what day.  Something else the technician hated was making excuses, even if they were true.  A point of pride.  They hadn’t been able to talk about it that day, but he had known it was coming. 

He sighed.  “Equipment.”

“Equipment?”  The Executive Producer knew that much already.

“Yeah.  Bloody console.”

Uncomfortable situation this, really.  Fact was, as the sound technician it was his responsibility.  He’d selected the equipment, tested it, set it up, tested it again, then tested it yet again.  It wasn’t his fault the audio console had decided to crap out just then.  It was the console’s fault.  Blame the console.  Except that it wasn’t the console’s fault.  It was his fault, ultimately, because he was the technician, and it was his job to make sure things worked. 

The Executive Producer was waiting to hear some more. 

The technician stared back at him.  Sure, he felt responsible.  Wished he could have done more.  Wished he’d chosen another console.  Wished he’d been somewhere else that day.  But he had been around long enough to know that these things happened, it was just plain bad luck, you got past it, moved on, forgot about it.  The Executive Producer knew that.

“Did you test it?”

Holy cow, there was a question.  Had he tested it?  Of course he had tested it!  Two, three times.  The technician frowned.  How to respond to this remarkably stupid question?  This insulting question. 

He said, “Yes.”  No need to add, “Of course”.

“And it worked.”

The technician wanted to say, “Well, no, it hadn’t.  But I used it anyway.”  But he was on shaky ground to begin with and sarcasm wouldn’t help, even if deserved. 

So he said, “Yes, it worked.  Every time.  All three times I tested it, yes.”  That ought to drive the point home.  The Executive Producer laughed.  Because he wasn’t exactly sure why the Executive Producer was laughing, the technician just sat there.

“Wow,” the Executive Producer said.  He shook his head.  “What a screw-up, eh?”

The technician shrugged.  “Well.”

“They had to fill back at the station.  Had to play fill music for the whole show.”  The Executive Producer laughed again.  “Cause we sure as hell weren’t there.”

The technician refused to laugh.  It wasn’t all that funny, not to him, not yet.  It was embarrassing, as embarrassing as hell.  The whole live audience had been waiting, waiting for the show to begin.  All the lines back to the station had been tested.  He had done hundreds of these remotes before, they had become routine, but still there was always that moment of tension just before you went live.  Would it work?  Everything you had set up, would it get the signal back to the station and then out onto the air and make everybody happy?  The producer?  The host?  Especially the host?

Then the moment was past and the host was talking, the theme was playing and you were live, you were on, the producer was smiling, the host was smiling, the audience was smiling, you were smiling, everybody was as happy as pigs in poo.    

Not this time.  The moment was upon them and nothing worked.  Nothing.  Everything was dead.  The host’s mouth was moving and nothing was coming out.  The Executive Producer was shouting, the host was freaking out.  The audience was murmuring, wondering.  In that instant, the technician checked a thousand things.  The CD player didn’t work, neither did the tape machine, the microphones, the wireless, nothing.  It all pointed to the damned console.  

“What is it?  What’s wrong?” the producer shouted.     

“It’s the console,” the technician told him.   

“What can we do?”

“Nothing.  I didn’t bring another one.”  And the station was too far away to go and get one.  The technician never liked to beat around the bush, and he didn’t see the point in doing so now.  He hadn’t brought a spare, and there was nothing they could do about it.  All they could do was tell everyone involved that the show was over before it even began.  Tear down and go home.

 A bad day.

Now they were in the Executive Producer’s office, going over it all again.  The Executive Producer had stopped laughing.  The Department Head was still there, and had yet to say anything.  Nice of her to have brought the coffee, though.  The technician began to get annoyed.  Where was this leading?  It was time to stop beating around the bush. 

He said, “Well, it was my fault, I apologized to everyone already.  I should have brought a spare console.  I don’t know why I didn’t.”

So, were they going to fire him?  Or just make him feel bad?  He waited.  He’d said his piece, laid his head on the chopping block.  The ball was in their court.    

Then it struck him.  Rolf.  Early retirement.  That’s why the Executive Producer had started this meeting by mentioning Rolf!  They weren’t going to fire him, they were going to make him accept some stupid package!  Get rid of him that way.  It all made sense.  He wanted to lean across the desk and choke the Executive Producer, choke the life right out of him.  It wasn’t his fault, it could have happened to anyone!

The Executive Producer was being cruel.  He had a goofy grin on his face.  The Department Head was smiling too.  How could they be so heartless?  “Yes sir, quite a screw up.  Biggest one this corporation has seen in a while.”

“So you’re going to force me out.”    

The Executive Producer looked puzzled.  “What?”      

“You’re getting rid of me, right?  No more embarrassing mistakes,” the technician said bitterly.  “You’re going to force me to accept a package.”

“Hell no.”    

“What then?”  What else was there?     

 The Executive Producer leaned forward.  “You have a gift for screwing things up.  That means you have a bright future ahead of you in public broadcasting.”   

The Department Head extended her hand.  “Congratulations,” she said.  “We’re making you a manager.”

The End

Originally published in Our Times: Canada’s Independent Labour Magazine

The Easter Rabbit is happy enough to bring our girls treats, it seems, but he makes them work hard for those treats.  This morning the girls got up at five o’clock and discovered the following notes outside their door (the first one to K is partially a response to a note K wrote the Easter Rabbit):

Dearest K,

You asked me if your bunny

was my very own cute honey

I do hope you are not frustrated,

but we’re not at all related

You’ll probably notice that I took

your gift, it’s such a nice phone book

To business now: if for a treat

you’d like to eat something that’s sweet

You should hop on your hind feet

to a place that sees the street

***  

K’s Clue Number Two:

Did you think to find treats here?

Then you’ll be disappointed dear

I’m sorry to be teasy

but finding treats is not that easy!

Careful: don’t become a grouch

Instead, go down and look beneath a couch!

*** 

K’s Clue Number Three:

Of course the treats won’t fit down here

There’s far too much of it I fear

Now to read the next sweet clue

You have but to find a shoe

*** 

K’s Clue Number Four:

Are you getting tired now?

Perhaps you’d like to ride a cow

But I don’t have a cow to ride

Instead I have a place to hide

Yet another Easter Clue

Inside the sometimes stinky loo

Where you go to have a poo!

*** 

K’s Clue Number Five:

This is the last clue my friend

after this will be the end

But if I may just kindly posit:

tooth decay: chocolate can cause it

when you eat your treats don’t rush

Afterwards be sure to brush

Now to find some real sweet deals

Go to where you cook your meals!

*** 

Dearest E:

Such a pretty, friendly girl

Like your sister, quite a pearl

Because you’re both so nice and sweet

I have brought for you a treat

But first a clue you understand

Underneath a great big can

*** 

E’s Clue Number Two:

With the treats a furry friend

If you make it to the end

To find the next clue go downstairs

And look beneath a great big bear

*** 

E’s Clue Number Three:

Congratulations!  You are now

One step closer to a cow

I beg your pardon! That’s not true

I meant to say that if you moo…

Wait a sec!  That’s not it either

Just find a cow and look beside ‘er

*** 

E’s Clue Number Four:

Now you’re getting really near

And if you listen you might hear

Something chocolate calling dear

Don’t go shedding any tears,

One more clue awaits, I fear

If you want your special stash

Go and look beside the trash!

*** 

E’s Clue Number Five:

Because you’re like a shining star,

and you’ve found your way this far,

I shall make you wait no more

Look behind a closet door!

Thank you both for playing this game

Next year we shall do the same!

*** 

You’ve got to like a rabbit not afraid of including the odd scatalogical clue.  It took the girls all of fifteen minutes to find every clue and baskets full of chocolate and fuzzy animals at the end of the trail.  Did they go back to bed after that?  Of course not.  Am I ready to go back to bed?  You bet.  And I’ll get to go back to bed, too… in another fourteen hours.

Ah, to have the energy of an eight year old again…

Happy Easter Everyone!

 

Just when I was nearing completion, I’m forced to stop…!

Here’s another casualty of the untimely and senseless destruction of Assorted Nonsense Version 1 that I think is worth reposting.  It’s a brief conversation with science fiction author Larry Niven that I had at Torcon 3 in 2003:

Here’s a rather shifty-eyed Joe the Story Editor talking about the writing process on Canadia.  Why I can’t look in one place is beyond me.  My wife said I look nervous.  I don’t recall being nervous, but I was rather taken by surprise by the whole thing.  I hadn’t been told they were interviewing that day and I just happened to drop by the studio.  Matt said, hey, why don’t you give an interview about story editing?  So I did.  I’ll know better next time.

 There are a lot of infinitely more interesting interviews with infinitely better-spoken people on the subject of Canadia here.

Someday I’ll do a longer post about my experiences working on Canadia.

 Someday.

Courtesy of XKCD…

Gary Gygax, creater of Dungeons and Dragons, and named by Sync magazine as the single biggest nerd of all time, has passed away at the age of sixty-nine.

“I would like the world to remember me as the guy who really enjoyed playing games and sharing his knowledge and his fun pastimes with everybody else.”

That’s how I’ll remember you, Gary.

On my birthday my wife teased me about getting old. I said I didn’t mind… lots of people don’t get the chance to turn forty-three. Little did I know that on that very day Canadian Blues Great Jeff Healey would be one of them, passing away at the all-too-tender age of forty.

I was fortunate enough to meet the man twice, once way back in the spring of ninety-two, when I’d been working as a CBC Radio technician for all of four years. Here’s a piece I wrote in my journal at the time about meeting him:

Spring Nineteen ninety-two.

I was asked to work overtime and it turned out to be a two-hour booking packaging My Kinda Jazz, hosted by Jeff Healey.

Myself I’m not really into the kind of music he plays, although I do like the kind of music he apparently prefers, which is the sort he featured on his show. Antiquated jazz, dating back well into the Forties and beyond. Anyway, when he got to the studio booth he greeted me over the talkback, having been informed of my presence in the control room by the producer. I thought this was a friendly thing for him to do, as it’s not of unheard of for people to completely ignore us technical types until they just about trip over us.

I said hi back, and he commented that he couldn’t hear me very well over the talkback. This was unimportant, really, as in all likelihood I wouldn’t be talking to him during the show, but I decided to look into it anyway. I went to the booth and pointed out a certain knob that I suspected might have control over the volume of the talkback. He had his hand partially over the knob in question so I couldn’t turn it up myself, and as he is blind, I was pretty sure he didn’t know which knob I was talking about.

I did sort of a stupid thing, I said, “It’s the one just to the right of your hand”, and then reached out and touched the knob, also brushing his hand slightly. It let him know the position of the control I was talking about, but I think it annoyed him greatly. I guess I was acknowledging his handicap and underestimating him.

He said huffily, “No, that doesn’t have anything to do with it, that’s the monitor control.”

I suppose I had a thing or two to learn about dealing with blind people, not to mention studio booth controls. Finally I just adjusted Healey’s mic and with my tail between my legs returned to the control room. (Found out later you can’t adjust the level of the talkback, it’s pre-set.)

If Healey really was annoyed with me it didn’t last long; there was a bit of friendly banter before we started the show. The packaging went well, it was a straightforward sort of affair, chatter, song, chatter, song, with all the songs prerecorded by Healey one right after the other on a DAT. I guess he has a DAT machine home. Made my job easy.

Just so happened it was March 25th, 1992, his twenty-sixth birthday, I think, the producer (David, I don’t know his last name) told me.

Healey was quite knowledgeable about his subject matter. I couldn’t tell how much he was reeling off the top of his head or how much he derived from his notes (all in braille). All the tunes were from old 78’s, his own; apparently he has a collection of about 6000 or so (note: as of 2008 it numbered 30,000 plus).

We played a song from Duke Ellington and his Orchestra, one of four versions the Duke recorded of this particular song, called the Mooch. There was a muted trumpet solo in the song, and Jeff remarked in the intro that what the trumpet player used for a mute was a plunger. I asked David if Healey was joking and he assured me he wasn’t. Maybe they were having me on, I don’t know, but during the song David asked Jeff over the talkback if the plunger the guy used was a used plunger. Jeff laughed and remarked that if it was, it was probably a “shitty plunger”.

He sat with his eyes closed the entire booking, rocking a bit to the music, and when he left he didn’t say goodbye.