If you are a regular reader here, you know I am married to one of the smarter homo sapien sapien’s on the planet Earth. Of that there is little dispute. One need only check out the win/loss column of our daily Jeopardy game to know that. Course that requires that you assume that I’m pretty darn nifty in the noggin department myself, and this blog is no doubt pretty good proof right? Whatever, moving on.
Anyway, we were watching a thing on black holes on the science channel a few nights ago, when as usual, I was assaulted with more “brain” storms from my beloved.
I say this kindly of course, but with a certain exasperation, since our evenings before the TV are peppered with “finger up!” Now if you don’t immediately get the significance of that phrase, let me explain. It’s the polite way of saying, “I have something important to say, don’t let me forget, and I’ll tell you at the next commercial.” This happens 3-5 times a night, and really hampers my ability to do all those things that commercials are made for such as getting snacks, going to the potty, and otherwise setting things in order.
Anyway, (did I say that already?) we were watching about black holes. This was dangerous, I recognize, because the Contrarian has some “problems” with certain aspects of both Einstein’s theory of general relativity, to say nothing of quantum mechanics. He is pretty much unable to handle time issues. Got that? Good.
In case you don’t well, time can slow down as you approach the event horizon, just as it does as you get closer to the speed of light. The Contrarian sees this as purely nonsense of course. Well, it seems that once you enter the event horizon and actually are in the black hole, all hell breaks loose so to speak. Physics actually breaks down, and every mathematical equation resolves itself into infinity–which pretty much ends any further discussion.
Science can’t handle infinity any better than it can handle a singularity. Meaningless concepts by and large.
So, you see, the Contrarian is getting a bit hot under the collar by now, and I figure I’m in for some utterly boobied question that I can’t possible answer (which begs why he bothers me with them in the first place, but oh well). I am now in possession of fully 1/5 th of a brain mass devoted to nothing but trivial junk he has loaded into it by forcing me to listen, so I’m doomed anyway. I figure any day now, my brain will signal “full” and well, I’ll be fit for nothing better than Dick and Jane and Spot books.
Anyway, (I did say that, I’m sure of that!), he fingers up, and the commercial comes, and I sigh, and wait.
Now, here it comes:
“I just realized what I should have done for a living!”
Hmmm, well, now I gotta question that! I mean at 60 freakin’ years of age, I don’t think that figuring it out AFTER retirement is worthy of a man with more smarts than the average bear as Yogi used to say.
I roll my eyes–I am exceptional at this action in case you were wondering. Being married to the Great One (NO not Jackie Gleason!) and being forced to listen to one inane question after another, for eleven years will give eyeball rolling a lot of workout. “Babe, when they sell a Buick to somebody in France do they use a French Buick word?”
Sometimes, rolling of eyes is not sufficient. I’ve been known to scream, and occasionally threaten him with a head bashing with any near object. But, I digress once again. Or twice.
I can barely contain my excitement at his announcement, and so yawn, and mumble, “what is that dear?” By the way, “dear” is the word I use when I find him utterly frustrating my desire for peace and freakin’ quiet, but so far, he has yet to get the drift of that.
“The perfect lazy man’s occupation is undoubtedly being a theoretical physicist!”
Ever seen a grown man look like he just succeeded with his first correct tying of his shoes, even though he got his shirt on backwards? Well you got the face of the Contrarian well in hand! (By the way, he has been known to this day to put his shorts on backwards, which is not too much of an issue when he waltzes around in them all day, but really a pain when he has bibbed up. He hates (you may recall) the concept of “redressing.”
Anyway, (dang I like that segue!). I look at him like he’s perfectly crazy, which he is, and with suitable puzzlement, ask, “Why?”
“Did you see that last scientist. He actually was laying on a couch! Just like me! That’s what they do! They sit, and lay and THINK. Perfect, I’d say.”
This is pretty heady stuff, given that the Contrarian is the only man I know who offered to have people pay him to conduct a “thinkathon” to raise money for any charity of their liking. He thinks all that walkathon and runathon is purely wasteful of energy and all.
“Don’t you kinda have to know an extraordinary amount of mathematics for that, DEAR?”
“Oh, no sweat. That stuff on those chalk boards just look hard to understand. It’s just a lot of squiggles. I bet they don’t know what half of them mean. They get paid, and are enjoying the heck out of life, and everybody thinks they are thinking of big stuff. Boy I missed my chance!”
Yes, and I undoubtedly missed the early warning signs eleven years ago didn’t I?
Welcome to my world.
