Magnecow

I know the feeling. (Source)

MAGNECOW

I learned once that cows can accidentally ingest a lot of metal while grazing out in the fields. 

Screws, nails, tractor equipment, barbed wire.

Go on, think of other metal objects a cow might encounter. I don't have to list them all here. 

The resulting ailment plaguing these cows is colloquially referred to as "Hardware Disease."

Occasionally, farmers feed their cattle something called a "cow magnet". 

They (the cow) eat the magnet; it passes through their system, collecting as many bolts and washers and nuts as it can along the way; and exits out the rear of the cow.

Presumably, perhaps, to be eaten by accident by the next cow, I imagine.

Imagine finding a nice big consolidated nugget of shrapnel out in the field after a long day of eating and regurgitating cud.

"You know what? Yeah, actually, I could go for a little iron right now."

Except it comes out as:

"Moo moo moo? Moo, moo, Moo moo moo moo moo moo moo moo moo."

So the cow eats the whole amalgam, magnet and all. And this lays our premise:

I always thought there was a superhero concept somewhere in that idea...

You have a character like "Magneto" already built-in to the superhero genre.

And what is one thing that would guarantee to make "Magneto" better?

If he was a cow.

A mutant cow who ate a radioactive magnet, transforming him into: 

Magnecow. A cow with the power to manipulate metal through "moo"gnatism.

I'm really excited about this one; I honestly think there's a lot of potential.

Now I just have to chisel out the tragic backstory that made him Magnecow. 

Maybe he's a Holocaust survivor.

FIRST BORN

Sometimes I think about who that first person born off of Earth will be and try to imagine what some of the challenges or inconveniences might be, growing up off-world. 

Like, will it be hard for them to pay their taxes?

SHOULD HAVE GNOME BETTER

I made a short film in school inspired by an anecdote I had heard from an ex-girlfriend.

A friend of hers had allegedly [gone backpacking and camping across Europe, imbibing "magic mushrooms" at various campouts along the way. 

One particular "trip," however, brought about a little visitor from the woods. The man was shocked to discover an enchanted little gnome who danced around the campsite in mystical whimsy, while peering at the man curiously with big round eyes.

Wishing to commune with the mysterious gnome, he tried feeding it some of his sandwich scraps, discovering that the little gnome was absolutely famished, eating everything that was given.

The evening carried on, in the ring of light around the fire, feeding the funny little man speaking the strange language bits of sandwich meat and bread. The man wondered what good it might do to try and capture the little gnome. He lured it out of the woods toward the fire with another sandwich before throwing a bag over it. 

Eventually, morning came. 

The "trip's" strength now fading, the man felt the sack. It wasn't entirely hallucinatory, since he felt something moving inside. Could it be that he had actually captured a magical gnome from the forest? He opened the sack, unsure of what he might find.

To his shock, he looked down into the sack to see a little boy, covered in sandwich crumbs!]

The two couldn't understand each other, as the boy spoke no English, but the man was now immediately alarmed. He had unintentionally kidnapped a child in a drug-induced stupor. He thought for sure it would cause a scandal and he was worried that he would face prison time in a foreign country if he couldn't explain what happened.

However, his conscience demanded that there was only one thing to do. To bring the boy to civilization and turn him in to authorities and hope they would understand that nothing nefarious occurred. 

Turned out the boy had been missing for some days and the family was jubilant upon his return. The boy spoke the man's praises—saying that he fed him many, many sandwiches, and was very nice and excitable. The man was thanked and he continued along his backpacking journey across Europe.

My short film was very limited in scope, starting and ending where indicated by brackets.

HISTORY AND SOCIAL INFLUENCE OF THE POTATO

Remarking on the breadth of his career, Redcliffe Salaman, author of the History and Social Influence of the Potato, said that he had "embarked on an enterprise which, after forty years, leaves more questions unsolved than were thought at the time to exist."

"Whether it was mere luck, or whether the potato and I were destined for life partnership, I do not know," he said. "But from that moment my course was set, and I became ever more involved in problems associated directly or indirectly with a plant with which I had no particular affinity, gustatory or romantic." 

This is what I mean when I tell people that I don't care about having things in common with other people. I much prefer talking to someone with a niche passion or obsession that would never have occurred to me in a thousand years. 

Who needs common ground when you discover someone who has dedicated their lives to understanding the history and social influence of the potato?

Salaman sounds like a great hang and I should pick up this book.

JOHN JOHNSON (OR) HOW I LEARNED TO MESS WITH SCAM CALLERS AND LOVE THE BOMB

Taking obvious scam calls is among my bad habits.

But if possible, I can hardly resist the temptation to answer the phone and annoy the scam caller on the other end of the line.

"Hello my name is John and the reason for this very short call today..."

I love wasting their time and seeing how often I can get them to repeat themselves. I let them say everything they're going to say, once, and then I apologize profusely and ask them to repeat it again, please, without giving a reason. 

"I'm so sorry. Please. Can you please say again the reason why you're calling?"

A slight pause. Maybe, sometimes, a little sigh (if I'm lucky), and then they repeat the entire phrase again—verbatim. Why not? They've been saying it hundreds upon hundreds of times already today. Why not just say it one more time? 

One time I astoundingly had someone repeat themselves continuously, as many times as I asked, long after I had started laughing. I think he was going through something—emotionally—and maybe he realized it didn't matter if he just said it over and over to me, or once to new cold-called strangers. 

Eventually he did hang up, but only after a long pause where I could almost sense him asking himself if he should bother saying it a fourteenth time.

But that's a rare case. Usually, they only repeat the entire introductory script three times at max. Most often, by the second time you ask them to repeat themselves, they'll hang up. 

And that's no good. The point is to keep them on the line so you can waste as much of their precious, fleeting time toiling away on the phone as possible.

So after they repeat themselves twice, I then purposefully get significant details about the reason for their call wrong, including their name.

What I discovered is that if you call them a woman's name, they will become unreasonably angry.

"Sorry, Maryanne," I say. "I'm so sorry. You said you're calling because my car's warranty has expired?"

They bark back, defensively, their tone furious:

"Who's Maryanne?"

Almost every single time. I always think it's so funny that this is what they get bent out of shape about.

"Sorry, Maryanne? Could you repeat that?"

Ask them to repeat themselves again, now that they're off-script.

"Who's Maryanne, motherfucker?" (Sometimes they do go straight to cursing. This is when I know I have them). 

"Sorry. I'm so sorry. Didn't you say your name was Maryanne?" I ask, sounding earnestly apologetic. Their tone softens a bit, but they are still clearly bristled.

"My name is John,"

"Oh, okay," I say, really getting it now. "Okay, okay, I'm sorry, I must've misheard. So tell me again why you're calling?"

They'll start again from the top. Same scripted intro as before, including their own name, again.

"Hello my name is John and the reason for this very short call today..." 

I wait, patiently, for them to finish.

"So may I ask whether you have Medicare part A or B?"

"Hi Joselyn," I say again. "Sorry, you're asking about my property taxes?"

"Who is Joselyn, motherfucker?" Again. So irate, instantly. But their masculinity is wounded; they have to avenge their honor, so they can't just hang up.

I'll keep this going as long as possible; always getting their name wrong, always mistaking them for a woman, and always asking them to repeat why it is they're calling—getting more and more wrong about what they're trying to get me to do.

In most cases, only after a few minutes of this, they'll call me a motherfucker one last time and hang up on me. But what really makes me laugh is when they accuse me of wasting their time. 

I consider them happy customers when they tell me to go fuck myself. But sometimes their vitriol becomes really elaborate. 

One guy, realizing that I was messing with him, began asking me elaborate questions about my surroundings. 

"Sir, sir, sir... look around you right now."

"Okay," I said, intrigued, with a smile on my face, wondering where this was going.

"Look around. Do you see a window?"

"Yes," I said, looking at my window. 

"Sir, walk over to your window please," he said.

This was great. Sure. I walked over to my window. "Okay," I said. 

"You are at your window now, sir?"

"Yes," I answered.

"Jump out of it, please, sir."

I laughed, and he hung up.

Another guy, however, became morbid.

"Sir, I know where you live," he said.

"Oh?" I asked, smiling.

"Yes, I know where you live. I can see you right now."

I laughed.

"I am sending a bomb to your house right now, motherfucker," he said. 

This is true. This really happened to me.

"Oh, okay," I said, sarcastic.

"I am sending you a bomb. Open it, please," and then he hung up.

Funny, yes. Entertaining, yes. But that one did give me pause. Not because I actually believed he knew where I was or that he had the means to send me a bomb from his country into mine (yes, they were all foreigners, and yes, you can probably guess from what country they seemed to originate from). 

But I also realized that I didn't know who any of these anonymous telephone scamming callers were, or what resources they did have at their disposal. 

Maybe nil, but maybe not. Anyway, it does make you stop and think when you become the target of that level of rage. 

Whether or not there's any legitimacy to it, I take bomb threats against my life seriously. It's just a policy I have.

So, I cooled it for a while after that. 

But then, weeks later, there I was. My phone rang for the hundredth time that day with the familiar looking string of random numbers from nowhere. 

I thought about John, and the reason for his short call, and how mad he gets when I call him Maryanne, and to repeat himself over and over, and I wonder if he could use a little laugh himself. 

He works too hard. He takes his job too seriously. He really should lighten up.

"Hello, this is Z."

"Hello, my name is John and the reason for my very short call today..."

"Kristen? Hello? Sorry, could you repeat that?"

RE-ENTERING REALITY

In the future, someone will 'suit up' to just go back into reality. 

They'll get all prepped, say goodbye to their loved ones, and risk hazard pay just to emerge out of their virtual stupor into regular old reality so they can check the dials, flip the switches and tap the bulbs to make sure that all the hardware keeping everyone plugged in is still working properly.

They might even need to unplug and re-plug in the modem for a full restart while everyone else is queuing in virtual reality.

"Playing offline."  

Then, once he's confident that the virtual world isn't at risk, he'll eagerly return back to where things make sense—putting his goggles on, lying back in his immersive recliner, connecting all the sensory nodes over his body, sinking back into the Matrix to rejoin his friends and family, to pick up his life of simulated bliss where he left off. 

Hopefully he wasn't sniped while AFK.

CODE & LAW

A scout is trustworthy loyal helpful friendly courteous kind obedient cheerful thrifty brave clean and reverent.

On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country to obey the scout law help other people at all times and to keep myself physically fit mentally awake and morally straight. 

That's right. I was a boy scout. I did it for years. Camping, hiking, all the badges and conservation projects. Everything. 

I had done almost everything there was to do, rising through the ranks:

Tenderfoot, Second Class, First Class, Star, Life...

But stopped just short of Eagle Scout.

I could've done it. 

I was so close. 

All the work was behind me. 

It would've been so easy. 

But I quit. Right before Eagle. 

Why?

No real reason.

I could have, but I also decided I didn't have to.

I've always been like this.

AM I AI?

Story idea: 

A man works a remote customer help service job from his home. Isolated and alone, he has no personal human interactions. 

All his work takes place digitally, over the phone, through email, chat window, etc. 

His behavior, his responses, his manner are so curated by the company's customer service protocol that he doesn't even seem human. 

Emotionless, detached and efficient.

More and more, he overhears people on the other end of the phone, or responding to his email responses, with annoyed or apathetic voices of real human people saying:

Caller: "Agent."

Caller: "Speak to an agent."

Caller: "Speak to a real human."

Taken aback, the man is thrown off from his script, momentarily. 

They think I'm automated? he asks himself, almost amused with the idea. 

Help Associate: "Sir, I am a real human," 

Caller: (Talking slowly, but more irritated) "Speak to a real operator," 

He transfers them to another operator, laughing at first, but over time—the exchange rattles him.

Especially when it begins happening more and more.

Caller: "Wow, these AI automated systems are sounding better and better these days..." they say. 

In response to emails they write: "PLEASE TELL ME HOW I CAN TALK WITH A REAL PERSON!" 

He begins listening to himself in his work, hearing his own voice—recognizing how inauthentic and impersonal he has really become.

He tries to raise the concern with his supervisor, who he only interacts with remotely—only to have the vague, unnerving feeling that whether he's communicating with him via email, chat, or phone, something about his supervisor doesn't seem quite "real". 

"Are you... AI?" he asks.

I'M SORRY

I'm sorry.

EASE & OPULENCE

In my life, my thoughts always return to how easy and opulent the times are. 

Experiencing luxury can be novel, at times. Like a posh hotel room, or a gourmet meal. Or a sleek new suit. Visiting a truly beautiful home or resort getaway vacation. Luxury rental "smart" cars. 

But the more opulent the experience, like an uncanny valley effect, after a while I find myself emotionally and psychologically disengaging from it. 

Like an organ transplant being rejected by the host—I just could never see myself living this way.

I'm not a mountain-man, log-cabin in the woods type, but I'm closer to that than I am the chic metropolitan man of affluence.

I can't help but think about the long lineage of ancestors who predate me who lived and bred through times when things were not so easy.

When things were not so opulent.

I think of the struggles and hardships they must've endured just to culminate in my existence. 

Only for me to come face to face with a refrigerator that can read my retinas and deduce my dehydration levels and prepare a beverage suited precisely to my taste because it picked up my phone's search history through Bluetooth.

(That's right, my phone's search history only contains beverages.)

I can't help but wonder what instincts have been muted, or outright dulled, due to the ease and opulence in which I live.

And while I do alright, I'm not living in the lap of luxury every day of my life. 

But even just to the degree in which my life is detached from basic rudimentary survivalist know-how, a nagging part of my consciousness is aware that if things suddenly became less easy... 

Became less opulent... 

Then I'd have to rely on some ancient part of my DNA activating and taking over.

I have to trust that, if called upon to do so, an innate and primordial part of my soul would take over and operate in a manner that would be suited for a more rural and quintessential form of life.

And then I think about genetic manipulation and "designer humans." 

Biotechnicians who go into the human DNA and take out things that don't make sense, anymore. And maybe add in things that would be more helpful.

"Helpful" in our modern day lives of ease and opulence.

Secure in their belief that they are culling undesirable genes from the collective human pool—

—Yet, at the same time, unknowingly removing something ancient, and critical, for survival. Something that has remained dormant, under the surface of Man, for generations.

Something essential to our survival when things are not so easy.

For when things are not so opulent.

You only know what you know. You don't know what you don't know. 

And I don't care what you think you know, the amount you don't know will always be greater.

Reaching a genetic dead end isn't likely to be remedied by simply taking a big step backward and choosing a different turn further up the bend.

You need to evolve out of survivability problems.

Long. Slow. Natural.

Be patient. The genetic manipulation you're looking to achieve will be made possible if natural conditions suit it.

NOTHING

Sometimes there's just nothing you can do.

Other than to just accept exactly that:

That there's nothing you can do.

DAILY OPTIMISM/PESSIMISM LITMUS TEST

A radiation-eating fungus has been discovered thriving inside one of Chernobyl’s most dangerous buildings.

https://www.sciencealert.com/chernobyl-fungus-appears-to-have-evolved-an-incredible-ability

Optimistic take: Nature keeps finding astonishing ways to adapt and rebound from even our worst disasters.

Pessimistic take: A hyper-resilient, radiation-fed organism is evolving in the middle of an active conflict zone.

PRIVATE EYE

A woman hires a private investigator because she believes her husband is having an affair. 

The gumshoe takes the case and tails the husband.

What the investigator ends up discovering isn't that the husband is spending time with another woman.

The investigator tails the man through open roads.

To remote, isolated areas of town.

In parking lots. Building rooftops. Wilderness. 

Park benches. Creek beds. Sidewalks.

Hikes. Fields. Night skies.

When the private investigator reports this behavior back to the wife, it does little to abate her lingering concerns. 

THE UNUSUAL PUNISHER

As long as we're on the subject of superheroes, I have another one as well.

He's a Batman, or Punisher-style superhero.

No real "powers," per se. Just a cold, calculating determination to administer justice, no matter the cost.

The idea came to me back in middle school, when we learned about the U.S. government, including the eighth amendment to the Constitution:

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

No "cruel and unusual punishments."

That got me thinking. Sure, it's good that we have a system that doesn't administer cruel punishments upon our criminals and accused.

But why not unusual?

In fact, I could see how some unusual punishments might be quite effective!

And as long as they aren't "cruel," and still gets results, what's the harm?

Well that's where The Unusual Punisher comes in.

This hero is an ardent supporter that there should not be any cruel punishment levied against the villains plaguing the good people of his sovereign city.

But that doesn't stop him from inflicting unusual punishment upon the worst criminals the underworld has to offer. 

The Unusual Punisher hunts the city's darkened shadows, capturing his nemesis' and subjecting them to bizarre and beguiling consequences that will make them think twice about committing another crime under his watch.

Once the Unusual Punisher is certain that his victim is in a well-ventilated cell, with plenty of food and water available, his vision of justice can be served.

Nothing cruel.

But... definitely unusual.

Like—

Filling the containment cell waist-deep with sardines (remember: there is proper ventilation!)

Or playing Captain Beefheart's Trout Mask Replica on repeat for 24 hours (with periodic 10-minute breaks!) 

Or being handcuffed to the wall and forced to listen to the city's comptroller give an annual report of the city's budget and financial status, complete with PowerPoint visuals (a snack tray will be available!)

The Unusual Punisher will stop at nothing to end the tyranny of criminals in his city. 

As long as it doesn't transgress a certain ethical boundary that he will never cross...

"HUCK"

I can't wait for people to begin uploading their pet's consciousnesses into humanoid bodies. 

Think of how thrilled Tabitha will be when she discovers a service that will allow her to upload her cocker spaniel's consciousness into a humanoid shell.

All Tabitha has to do is download the app! 

Then upload her cocker spaniel's mind and essence into the cloud.

Then transfer its folder into the empty vessel of the human surrogate. 

The surrogate will surely be just some volunteer, allowing his body to be used by an animal for the previously purchased time allotment. Like Uber, they earn a fee for their services.

Nevermind that he may also get some unspeakable kinky thrill by allowing his consciousness to be taken over by a cocker spaniel.

His name will probably be something like "Todd".

"Todd's" consciousness will be temporarily stored in the cloud while Tabitha's cocker spaniel, probably named "Huck", experiences an hour or two inside the shell of a human body.

What will "Huck" think when this happens to it for the first time? What could "Huck" possibly think is happening?

It will fucking blow "Huck's" cocker spaniel mind.

How will "Huck" cope with the inexplicable appendages it now controls; leg's upright, forearms dangling awkwardly down at its sides?  

How will "Huck" behave, inside the body of an adult man probably named "Todd"? 

Will "Huck" have greater mental capacities? Will "Huck" suddenly be able to analyze, plan and rationalize in ways it never thought possible before?

Will "Huck" adhere to the familiar, walking on all fours, "Todd's" hands and feet flat on the floor? Or will "Huck's" surrogate body's natural evolutionary aligned bipedalism force it to walk haltingly on two legs toward Tabitha, calling "Huck" toward her to give it a vaguely cheese-flavored treat, holding back tears as she repeats his name over and over? 

Will "Huck" hear her, but less acutely than before? Will "Huck" be able to smell her, but less comprehensively than before?

What would the look in "Huck's" humanoid eyes be like, guided by the intelligence of an aging cocker spaniel? What would "Huck" make of the psychedelic kaleidoscope of new colors it perceives in this new body? 

What would "Huck" look like to a casual observer? Would "Huck's" eyes still appear human—or would there be a vaguely eerie and unmistakable vacant animalistic stare peering out at the world behind a human mask?

Why stop at "Huck"? Give other animals their shot at being human, too!

Upload the consciousness of a deer into "Todd". 

Upload the consciousness of a sparrow into "Todd". 

Upload the consciousness of a walrus into "Todd". 

Upload the consciousness of a cow into "Todd". 

Upload the consciousness of a boa constrictor into "Todd".

Upload the consciousness of a mantis into "Todd".

Upload the consciousness of a hyena into "Todd". 

Get a whole bunch together and let them loose. See what they do. See if other people can tell. Film it. Put it on YouTube. Sell merchandise. Sell app subscriptions. 

See how long they can go before they get a job.